Civil Courts: The Civil Procedure Rules 1998

Simplification of procedures:

	Small Claims	Fast Track	Multi Track
Value	Up to £10,000	Up to £25,000	Over £25,000
Personal Injury Claims	Up to £1,000	£1,000 - £15,000	Over £15,000
Court	District Judge - County Court	Circuit Judge - County Court	County Court or High Court
Legal Representation	Not Recommended	Optional	Recommended

The simplification of procedures includes:

• Simplification of language - for example plaintiff became claimant, writ became claim form and a minor became a child. This is because claimants are encouraged to bring their case without legal representation
• Simpler forms - the N1 claim form is now the standard form used for all claims and is easily accessible online. It also passed the Plain English Campaign for simplicity and accessibility for claimants not familiar with legal jargon

Judicial Case Management:

• Active Case Management
• Judges are now known as "case managers", which means they adopts a much more "hands on" approach to the case and are responsible for much more than just deciding the outcome of the case, for example:
• Encouraging the parties to cooperate with each other
• Identifying issues at an early stage
• Encouraging the parties to use methods of alternative dispute resolution
• Helping the parties to settle
• Fixing timetables and controlling the progress of the case
• Making use of technology
• This encourages a much more inquisitorial system and should make the system a lot less daunting and intimidating for claimants as well as reducing the need for legal representation
• Limitations on Evidence

Expert evidence is being reduced significantly because it is expensive and it often contributes to delay. In most cases, the court will encourage a single joint expert to act for both sides. This is set out in Part 35 CPR

Encouragement to settle:

• Where possible, the courts will encourage people to settle at any time before the case gets to court, because often the costs will outweigh the compensation. 
• Part 36 CPR offers are designed to settle disputes without going to court. Both sides can make a Part 36 offer and if accepted by the other side, the claimant is entitled to their costs up to that date. If the offer is refused and the refusing party is subsequently awarded less by the court, sanctions (penalties) can be made by the court against them. This means that any Part 36 offer must be considered carefully

Pre Action Protocols:

• Protocol - guidelines that are not compulsory, but you are expected to follow by the court
• Pre Action protocols aim to get parties to settle outside of court, thus reducing costs and delay
• Each category of case has its own set of Pre Action Protocols. Each category of case has its own protocol that has to be followed; for example, personal injury, clinical negligence, defamation etc. Both clinical disputes and personal injury pre-action protocols recommend:
• Detailed letters of claim
• That the reply should be issued within 21 days of the date of posting (sometimes 7)
• Within three months, both sides should organise full disclosure of key documents
• An agreement on the number of expert witnesses (Part 35 CPR)
• Use of alternative dispute resolution
• Agree single joint expert
• These are the documents that have to be disclosed in a Personal Injury Claim (Annexe C)
• The point of protocol
• Preparation for the trial
• Attempts to settle
• Keep costs down

Encouragement of ADR:

• One of the ways that judges can actively manage cases fulfil their obligation under the Part 1 overriding objective is by encouraging parties to use ADR when this is appropriate
• Parties can postpone proceedings for one month to attempt to settle the case using ADR. Courts should also actively promote its use. However, in Halsey v Milton Keynes General NHS Trust (2004), the Court of Appeal said the courts cannot force parties to ADR as it might be against Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights - the right to a fair trial
• However, in the previous case of Dunnett v Railtrack (2002), the judge had ruled that an adverse costs order could be made against a successful party if that party refused to mediate
• The benefits of this are that there is a likelihood that the parties will maintain a working relationship and save themselves the expense of court costs, which can often outweigh the compensation. Forms of alternative dispute resolution include:
• Negotiation
• Mediation
• Arbitration
• Conciliation
• Tribunals

Key Terminology:

• Overriding Objective - the overriding objective of the Civil Procedure Rules is to enable the court to deal with cases 'justly' - Courts must seek to further this objective by managing cases 'actively'
• Alternative Dispute Resolution - alternative methods to court (negotiation, mediation, arbitration, conciliation, tribunals)
• Judicial case management - 
• 3 track system
• Single Joint Expert
• Simplification of Procedures
• N1 claim form
• Pre-action Protocols
• Aims of Woolf Reforms
• Litigation
• Allocation Questionnaires
• Adversarial
• Part 36 Offer to Settle
• LEARN THESE TERMS AND WRITE THE DEFINITIONS ABOVE

Analysis of Reforms

There are two key reports which have provided an analysis of the Woolf Reforms:

'Zander on Woolf' by Michael Zander , New Law Journal 13th March 2009

'A Few Home Truths' by Tony Allen, New Law Journal 3rd April 2009