Global Sports Data and Technology Group Ltd v IPS Law LLP

Hearing dates: 18–20, 25–26 November 2024, 22 January 2025

Approved Judgment

This judgment was handed down remotely at 10.30am on 24 July 2025 by circulation to the parties or their representatives by e-mail and by release to the National Archives.

SENIOR COSTS JUDGE Rowley

Introduction

This is my reserved judgment in respect of preliminary points of dispute 1 to 4 ordered to be heard by the then Senior Costs Judge Gordon-Saker on the first open date after 26 July 2024. Witnesses for both parties were cross-examined over five days in November 2024 and a day of submissions by Andrew Hogan of counsel for the claimant and Robin Dunne of counsel for the defendant took place in January 2025.

Both parties' counsel formulated the questions for the court to decide in their closing submissions since, as is sometimes the case, there is some difficulty in distilling the points of dispute in this fashion. Moreover, in this case, it became clear that the need to address Point 1 of the points of dispute (concerning the formatting of the bill) depended upon the court's decision in respect of points 2 and 3 (regarding the existence of a retainer).

There was also some dispute about the relevance of point 4 to the fundamental issues that I have to decide. I limited the evidence sought to be introduced by the claimant regarding point 4 in an application at the beginning of the hearing. The gap between the evidence being given and closing submissions was not ideal and, as I indicated to the parties at the end of the evidential hearing, I made a start on drafting this judgment whilst the evidence was fresh in my mind. I then produced the great majority of this judgment in March but unfortunately was unable to complete it until now.

The Central Issue

Mr Hogan described the key issue as being:

“Is there an express or implied obligation on the part of the claimant to pay the defendant the fees and disbursements sought in Invoice Number IPS 17759 and Invoice Number IPS 17762?”

Mr Dunne described it as a two part question in this way:

“(1) Did the claimant engage the defendant's solicitors? If so, then (2) as there is a presumption the claimant is liable to pay reasonable fees, can the claimant rebut that presumption by showing clear evidence of a binding agreement that the claimant was never liable to pay the defendants fees under any circumstances?”

Although Mr Dunne described the second part of his test as being the central issue between the parties, that was not my impression based on either the written closing submissions from the parties or the advocates' oral submissions. There is no evidence of the sort described in the second part of Mr Dunne's formulation. Therefore, if the defendant was instructed by the claimant to act as its solicitors, there is an obligation to pay reasonable fees in the manner set out in Mr Dunne's question. As this is so plain, I have not felt it necessary to set out the Adams v London Improved Motor Coach Builders [1921] KB 495 line of authority cited by counsel.

In my view, Mr Hogan's formulation encompasses the dispute between the parties. The claimant says that it has no obligation, whether express or implied, to pay any fees to the defendant because it did not instruct it to act as its solicitor. The claimant says that, instead, it joined with the defendant, amongst others, in a commercial venture to pursue claims on behalf of sportsmen in respect of alleged data breaches.

It is a striking feature of this case that, although everyone says the nature of the relationship was made clear at the outset, no one committed anything to writing at that time. Consequently, both parties have had to produce witness statements and give oral evidence as well as provide such documents as were created and then seek to show that they support their version of events.

The evidence

The evidence on behalf of the claimant was given by its two founders, Jason Dunlop and Russell Slade. The evidence on behalf of the defendant was primarily given by Christopher Farnell, the senior partner of the defendant, along with brief evidence from Elaine Lawler and Fred Rose, who were employed by the defendant at the relevant time, together with Ronald Higgins, a potential investor in “Project Red Card”, which was the venture at the centre of the relationship between the claimant and the defendant.

Given that the best part of five days of court time was spent in the witnesses giving evidence, it might be thought that a lengthy recitation of the evidence they provided would be necessary. However, that is not my view, having heard the witnesses giving evidence. Mr Dunlop, Mr Farnell and, to some extent, Mr Slade were the key witnesses. Although their evidence was diametrically opposed on the nature of their relationship, I formed the view that all of the witnesses were seeking to assist the court in the evidence that they gave and that they firmly believed what they said to be true. It would be fair to say that their evidence was unshakeable on the central issue that I have to decide. It would also be fair to say that there was not a lot of evidence in respect of that central issue and most of the cross examination related to other matters which were, at the highest, seeking to question the credibility of the evidence given by those witnesses.

The Practice Direction to Part 67, which governs proceedings brought under the Solicitors Act 1974 seeks to avoid parties providing witness evidence before the initial directions hearing. But Part 67, and its Practice Direction is not particularly well known, and this evidential variation on the usual requirement to file and serve evidence in Part 8 claims is regularly overlooked. In this case, Mr Farnell provided a witness statement prior to the directions hearing setting out his position in detail. Consequently, when the Senior Costs Judge came to give directions regarding the preliminary issues hearing, he took Mr Farnell's first witness statement into account. The parties were to file and serve witness statements from anybody other than Mr Farnell who the parties wish to give evidence by 28 June 2024 and then the parties were entitled to serve witness statements in reply by Mr Dunlop and Mr Farnell by 26 July.

The witness statement provided by Mr Slade in accordance with these directions simply adopted the evidence of Mr Dunlop. However, following receipt of Mr Farnell's second witness statement, the claimant sought to rely upon a second witness statement of Mr Slade which was a substantial document. I allowed it to be used at the hearing despite the defendant's objections.

It transpired during the cross-examination of Mr Slade on his witness statement, that Mr Slade was probably not the best person to give at least a proportion of the evidence included in that statement. There were also a number of occasions during which Mr Slade gave evidence at which he reiterated the point that his strength in the company was his relationship with footballers and other sports people so that he could drum up business from potential clients. The business of running the company, including relationships with the other entities, was Mr Dunlop's domain. Consequently, it seems to me that Mr Slade's evidence added little to that given by Mr Dunlop and the initial approach taken by the claimant of Mr Slade simply adopting Mr Dunlop's evidence, without taking matters further, very largely reflected the evidential position.

The evidence of Jason Anthony Dunlop in his witness statements

In his first witness statement, Mr Dunlop set out his evidence in respect of “the basis of the parties' relationship” at paragraph 4 onwards in the following terms:

“4. Global is a data rights company. Amongst other interests, we have an ongoing large-scale project, known as Project Red Card. Project Red Card, which I shall refer to as PRC, was a commercial joint venture between the Defendant and Global. I will summarise the history and basis of that commercial joint venture as follows.

5. PRC concerns potential large scale, group litigation, concerning breaches of data protection laws and GDPR, regarding the personal data of professional athletes. The breaches, I believe, the purpose of PRC, have been committed and are ongoing, by various gaming or betting entities.

6. Russell Slade and I were introduced to Chris Farnell, the Principal Sole Practitioner of the Defendant, through one of our business consultants. That consultant had worked with Mr Farnell on a previous matter. We had an initial Zoom call with Mr Farnell on 19 March 2021 at 11:30am. We had a further Zoom call with Mister Farnell on 24 March 2021, at 10am. Accompanying us were Richard Dutton and Dean Armstrong KC, who were part of Global's advisory team.

7. As a result of discussions and Mr Farnell, it was agreed that he would find litigation funding with the aim of raising £20 million. The agreement between Global and Mr Farnell was based on the premise that Russell had extensive contacts in sport and professional football, I have expertise in sports data governance; and Mr Farnell held out to us that he had contacts in sport finance. In return for his role in PRC, it was agreed that Mr Farnell and his firm would enter into either conditional fee agreements (CFA) or damage[s] based agreements (DBA) with the individual athletes or players, who would bring individual claims against entities who had breached and misused their personal...