{"id":1343,"date":"2017-06-26T11:12:51","date_gmt":"2017-06-26T11:12:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/?p=1343"},"modified":"2017-09-29T08:58:52","modified_gmt":"2017-09-29T08:58:52","slug":"the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/","title":{"rendered":"The Court of Appeal speaks again: Gore v Naheed"},"content":{"rendered":"

By David Watkinson<\/a>, Garden Court Mediation<\/strong><\/p>\n

In May this year I blogged about the case of Thakkar v Patel <\/em> [2017] EWCA Civ 117 as an example of a case in which the Court of Appeal was encouraging parties to mediate their dispute or face serious cost consequences [Mediation? \u201cGet on with it\u201d says the Court of Appeal<\/a>]. In that case the Court found that mediation was \u201cobviously appropriate\u201d and did not occur because of lack of co-operation by the defendant. I commented then that \u201cno two cases are the same\u201d. Now along comes the case of Gore v Naheed<\/em> <\/strong><\/a>[2017] EWCA Civ 369. <\/p>\n

In this case the Court of Appeal (differently constituted) held, on the defendant\u2019s appeal, that the trial judge had not erred in principle when, awarding the costs of the claim to the successful party,\u00a0he\u00a0made no\u00a0allowance for the claimant\u2019s refusal or failure to engage with \u201c[the defendant\u2019s] proposal that the dispute should be referred to mediation\u201d [para 48].<\/p>\n

Patten LJ, giving the judgement of the court, said of the trial judge that he had taken the failure to engage into account but \u201cconcluded that it was not unreasonable for [the claimant] to have declined to mediate.\u00a0His\u00a0solicitor considered that mediation had no realistic prospect of succeeding and would only add to the costs. The judge said that he considered that\u00a0the case raised quite complex questions of law which made it unsuitable for mediation\u201d [para 50]. And so he did not err.<\/p>\n

The area of law involved was relating to easements and no-one would deny its complexity.<\/p>\n

However, Patten LJ also referred [para 49] to PGF II SA v OMFS Co 1 Ltd <\/em><\/a>[2013] EWCA Civ 12 \u00a0<\/em>(upon which the defendant had relied) as\u00a0 a case in which;-<\/p>\n

\u201cBriggs LJ, emphasised the need, as he saw it, for the courts to encourage parties to embark on ADR in appropriate cases and said that silence in the face of an invitation\u00a0 to participate in ADR should, as a general rule, be treated as unreasonable regardless of whether a refusal to mediate might, in the circumstances, have been justified. Speaking for myself I have some difficulties in accepting that the desire of a party to have his rights determined by a court of law in preference to mediation can be said to be unreasonable conduct particularly when, as here, those rights are ultimately\u00a0vindicated. But, as Briggs LJ made clear\u2026a failure to engage even if unreasonable, does not automatically result in a costs penalty. It is simply a factor to be taken into account by the judge when exercising his costs\u00a0discretion\u201d.<\/p>\n

Comment<\/strong><\/p>\n

Note the rather dismissive treatment in my view, given to Briggs LJ\u2019s judgement in PGF<\/em>. It was not just \u201cas he saw it\u201d. It was the judgment of a fully constituted Court of Appeal in which the only issues raised concerned mediation and which were fully considered, in contrast to the brief treatment to the issue given in Gore<\/em> as one of three issues in that appeal. Reading PGF<\/em> [especially paras 34-40 and 56] one would be left, as I see it, with the general understanding that failure to mediate was more than \u201csimply a factor\u201d in the sense of a one of a number of evenly matched factors but rather a factor of prime importance such that failure to properly deal with a mediation request would ordinarily be likely to lead to costs consequences.<\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n

Perhaps these cases can be reconciled by focusing on the result in Gore<\/em> and concluding that a case in which complex questions of law are raised can <\/em>constitute one of the circumstances in which a party can be justified in refusing an offer to mediate. Of course such a factor can also make the outcome at court\u00a0less predictable and so encourage settlement. The exercise of judgement when such an offer is made, and how it is responded to, remains as tricky as ever.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By David Watkinson, Garden Court Mediation. In May this year I blogged about the case of Thakkar v Patel [2017] EWCA Civ 117 as an example of a case in which the Court of Appeal was encouraging parties to mediate their dispute or face serious cost consequences [Mediation? \u201cGet on with it\u201d says the Court of Appeal].<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[91,92,29,89,90,26],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe Court of Appeal speaks again: Gore v Naheed - Garden Court Mediation, David Watkinson<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Court of Appeal speaks again: Gore v Naheed - Garden Court Mediation, David Watkinson\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By David Watkinson, Garden Court Mediation. In May this year I blogged about the case of Thakkar v Patel [2017] EWCA Civ 117 as an example of a case in which the Court of Appeal was encouraging parties to mediate their dispute or face serious cost consequences [Mediation? \u201cGet on with it\u201d says the Court of Appeal].\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Garden Court Mediation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-06-26T11:12:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-09-29T08:58:52+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/logo.gccmed.social.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"315\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Helen Curtis\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@GardenCourtLaw\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@GardenCourtLaw\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Helen Curtis\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Helen Curtis\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/#\/schema\/person\/0891f5b6c2e903725452365c542e2c2f\"},\"headline\":\"The Court of Appeal speaks again: Gore v Naheed\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-06-26T11:12:51+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-09-29T08:58:52+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/\"},\"wordCount\":661,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/#organization\"},\"keywords\":[\"Briggs LJ\",\"costs consequences\",\"failure to mediate\",\"Gore v Nasheed\",\"PGF II SA v OMFS Co 1 Ltd\",\"unreasonable refusal to mediate\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Blog\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/gardencourtmediation.co.uk\/the-court-of-appeal-speaks-again-gore-v-naheed\/\",\"name\":\"The Court of Appeal speaks again: Gore v Naheed - 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