R Srinivasans v Croydon County Court
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Lord Justice Rix |
| Judgment Date | 20 July 2012 |
| Neutral Citation | [2012] EWCA Civ 1302 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Civil Division) |
| Docket Number | Case No : C1/2011/2717 (A) |
| Date | 20 July 2012 |
[2012] EWCA Civ 1302
IN THE COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION
ADMINISTRATIVE COURT
(MR JUSTICE BLAKE)
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
Lord Justice Rix
Case No : C1/2011/2717 (A)
Mr Lewis (solicitor) (instructed by Srinivasans Solicitors) appeared on behalf of the Applicant.
The Respondent did not appear and was not represented.
This is the renewed application of a firm of solicitors known as Srinivasans for permission to appeal from the judgment of Blake J given on 11 October 2011, which was the last judgment given in a cascade of litigation which lies essentially between the solicitors and a former client of theirs, a Mr Sayathakumar, who is an interested party in these proceedings.
These proceedings are judicial review proceedings in which the solicitors are claimants, complaining about a jurisdictional error of the Croydon County Court, which is the defendant in these proceedings and respondent to this application, and in which the client whom I have identified is an interested party.
The judicial review proceedings arose because the solicitors complained that the interested party was wrong to commence his proceedings in the Croydon County Court some years ago in pursuit of a costs dispute which he had with the solicitors. The point in the judicial review proceedings which succeeded before Blake J was that the Croydon County Court lacked jurisdiction in such a matter by reason of provisions of the Solicitors Act 1974 and in particular section 61. That argument, as I say, succeeded before the learned judge although other arguments failed.
Back in the county court, without taking the jurisdictional point on which the solicitors ultimately succeeded in these judicial review proceedings, the solicitors had sought to strike out the interested party's claim (the interested party in those proceedings was the claimant) but failed in doing so. Ultimately, after making a decision on some of the matters before her by way of declaration, the learned deputy District Judge, District Judge Sadd, transferred the matter. It was her judgment which gave rise to litigation which unfortunately grew out of all proportion to the issues originally at stake.
At the end of his judgment Blake J turned to the question of costs. The solicitors had many complaints about Blake J's judgment which they sought to take to appeal to this court, but they have all been ruled as being totally without merit on paper by Hughes LJ. The one matter which Hughes LJ did not prevent the solicitors renewing as they have done this morning was what the learned judge described as their ground 5, the question of costs which I am considering, so that is the one matter which has come before me this morning.
As I said, at the end of his judgment the learned judge considered the questions of costs. He indicated in the course of argument at paragraphs 57 and 69 of the transcript that he was sceptical of the solicitors' claim for costs. They were seeking summary assessment in the sum of some £43,000. He referred to :
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