The latest on PI damages & the interview of a lifetime
IN GENERAL
More answers to questions (or the penny but not the bun)
Well, you can’t accuse the Association of British Insurers of lacking guts. Through Derek Castle (who is in danger of becoming a cult figure) in Simmons v Castle [2012] EWCA Civ 1288 it went before the Lord Chief Justice, Master of the Rolls and Vice-President of the Court of Appeal (Civil) and most respectfully asked them to reconsider what they decreed a few weeks earlier in Simmons v Castle [2012] EWCA Civ 1288 (see NLJ, 14 September 2012, p1154). Those claimants whose conditional fee agreements were made before 1 April 2013 and so would be able to recover their success fees from the defendant, asserted the Association, should not also qualify for the 10% increase in personal injury generals: double jeopardy for the insurers. And the powerfully constituted Court of Appeal agreed. So it is that claimants will now be unable to score an extra 10% when the award is made on or after 1 April 2013
