The Supreme Court Costs Office

No.33 of 2004

Ross v Stonewood Securities Ltd
7 October 2004
Mr Justice Lewison (Sitting with Assessors)

The claimant, having failed in the courts below, ultimately succeeded in the Court of Appeal in having a bankruptcy order against him set aside, and the costs were awarded to him. His solicitor's bill came to £155,000 odd, and the initial objection for the Costs Judge was these costs were disproportionate. He accordingly carried out a 'Lownds pre assessment' and held that, on the face of it, the costs were disproportionate, and then proceeded to assess the bill applying the necessity as well as the reasonableness test to the various decisions he had to take. The result was a substantial reduction in the bills.

The receiving party appealed, firstly on the grounds that the costs were not disproportionate, and secondly against various substantial reductions to counsel's fees.

The Judge upheld the decision of the Costs Judge, holding that it did not fall outside the generous ambit within which a reasonable disagreement was possible. So far as the preliminary ruling was concerned, the Judge made the point that although permission to appeal on preliminary issues such as this should be strongly discouraged, if and when such permission was granted, it was the duty of the Judge hearing the appeal to deal with it on the merits, and he could not go behind the question of whether or not a Costs Judges' preliminary ruling was right.

Another issue raised on the appeal was whether there was such a thing as the 'principle' in Armitage v Nurse [2000] 1 Costs LR 231. The Judge held that there was no such principle; what that case decided was to point out the obvious risk to counsel that if his apparently high fees are unexplained, they may not be allowed on a detailed assessment.