The court considered an assertion that a contract for fee sharing with a solicitors firm was unenforceable being in breach of the Solicitors Practice Rules.
Held: The court refused to follow Thai Trading. There should no longer be any common law developments in this field. Now that Parliament had modified the law which had prohibited all arrangements for receiving a contingency fee in relation to litigation services, there was no room for the court to go beyond that which Parliament had now permitted.
Judges:
Schiemann LJ, May LJ, LCJ
Citations:
[1999] EWCA Civ 3002, [1999] EWCA Civ 3036, [2001] QB 570, [2000] 3 WLR 1041, [2000] 1 All ER 608, [2000] 1 Costs LR 105
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Not followed – Thai Trading (a Firm) v Taylor and Taylor (of Taylors Solicitors, Caversham) CA 27-Feb-1998
A solicitor had agreed with his wife to act for her in litigation on the understanding that he would only recover his profit costs if she succeeded.
Held: This agreement did not offend public policy. This type of agreement was distinguished . .
See Also – Awwad v Geraghty and Company CA 8-Sep-1997
The court considered an application for leave to appeal as to whether a litigation agreement was champertous and void. . .
Cited by:
Cited – Sibthorpe and Morris v London Borough of Southwark CA 25-Jan-2011
The court was asked as to the extent to which the ancient rule against champerty prevents a solicitor agreeing to indemnify his claimant client against any liability for costs which she may incur against the defendant in the litigation in which the . .
Cited – Kenneth L Kellar Carib West Limited v Stanley A Williams PC 24-Jun-2004
(Turks and Caicos Islands) The appellant had failed in his action but argued that he should not be called upon to pay the costs of the respondent because there had been an unlawful conditional fee agreement. The bill had referred to one factor as . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Legal Professions, Costs
Updated: 01 December 2022; Ref: scu.235833