The Plaintiffs had filed evidence of the contents of without prejudice negotiations in order to resist an application by the Defendants to strike out the action for want of prosecution. The question was whether they were entitled to rely on such evidence or whether they were precluded from doing by reason of the fact that the negotiations were without prejudice.
Held: The court considered that reliance upon such without prejudice communications did not infringe, in those particular circumstances, the public policy in favour of exclusion.
Hirst LJ described these circumstances as a ‘narrow context’. To admit it would not infringe the public policy in favour of exclusion, concluding: ‘Consequently I am unable to see how exposure to the course of negotiations in this narrow context is in any way harmful to either side. If the application succeeds, the action will be at an end. If it fails, and the case proceeds to trial, the material will not be available to the trial judge and he will not be in any way embarrassed.
For the above reasons I accept Mr. Bloom’s submissions, which seem to me to have particular force in relation to reliance upon an alleged estoppel . . It seems to me to be manifest that a plaintiff must be entitled to rely for this purpose on any relevant statements in the without prejudice correspondence to demonstrate either conduct or an implied intimation by the defendant that he is willing for the case to proceed.’
Judges:
Hirst, Mann and Balcombe LJJ
Citations:
[1993] 1 WLR 354, [1993] 2 All ER 567, [1993] 2 EGLR 239
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Ravenscroft v Canal and River Trust ChD 14-Sep-2016
Special Circumstances to appoint McKenzie Friend
An application was made to have a nominated person appointed as McKenzie friend and as advocate for the claimant. The claimant’s narrow boat had been seized by the defendant for non payment of licence fees and for not having a Pleasure Boat . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Litigation Practice
Updated: 12 April 2022; Ref: scu.569655
