The government is seeking to reduce the costs that successful
litigants can recover from defendants in personal injury (PI)
claims. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice has
issued a call for evidence which outlines a number of proposals to
achieve this aim. The deadline to respond to this request is 25 May
2012. The government's intention is to:
- reduce the current road traffic accident (RTA) portal fees
because of efficiency savings and the ban on referral fees
- increase the limit on the value of claims that can be pursued
through the RTA Portal from 10,000 to 25,000
- introduce an electronic portal process with fixed costs for
public and employer liability claims with a value up to
25,000
- review the existing predictable costs regimes for cases that
fall outside any portal scheme
- review the guideline hourly rates
We need your evidence
The Law Society needs to collect evidence on the financial costs
of running a typical personal injury practice or department. This
will help us make the best case possible on behalf of personal
injury solicitors on all of these fronts.
We have engaged Otterburn Legal Consulting to undertake a survey
of PI firms on our behalf.
We urge senior members of PI firms to complete this firm-level
survey:
Download
the survey and guidance notes (Excel)
APIL survey
In addition, and in parallel, with the Law Society's work, the
Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) is collecting data in
order to respond to the government's call for evidence. The APIL
survey is asking individual PI practitioners to look at their last
two closed and settled RTA cases between 10,000 and
25,000 and provide some basic information. This will
highlight the costs and complexities involved in high-value RTA
work. There are also questions about why cases drop out of the
portal. We would urge all members who undertake PI claimant work to
contribute to this important evidence collecting exercise.
Complete
the APIL survey
Contact
If you have any queries or problems with the survey then please
contact us.
Keith Blakemore
Senior Economist
Research Unit
Email: keith.blakemore@lawsociety.org.uk
Telephone: +44 (0)20 7320 5694 (direct line)