Fixed recoverable costs in clinical negligence claims. A new regime that may act to the detriment of Claimants? Part 2

Changes in the way clinical negligence cases are run which come into force in April 24 mean that many cases will be forced to consider settlement at an early stage. The fixed costs regime means the amount of work that can be done to ensure a fair settlement is reached will be limited because the costs a solicitor can recover will be fixed by reference to the amount recovered and not the amount of work required to properly investigate the case.

This is likely to result in claims being settled on far earlier because the new system doesn’t allow for any flexibility in cases where the full extent of injury might not be known from the outset.

In D’s case, his claim may have been settled quickly under the new regime, before the dementia was diagnosed. In that case he would have received a significant lower award of damages than he eventually did.

Liddys fully support the efforts being made by APIL and other bodies that speak on behalf of Claimant’s to ask the government to look at the new rules and ensure that victims of negligence are not disadvantaged by the race to implement a fixed costs scheme for lower value clinical negligence actions.