Part seven: Mark Solon on the dilemma of choosing a new single joint expert
Sometimes one or both parties may have needed, or have chosen, to obtain advice from an expert, particularly on liability, before proceedings are issued. If the court decides expert evidence is required, but that evidence from two experts would be disproportionate, the case management judge has a dilemma—whether to impose a new single joint expert on the parties, or to allow them to continue to retain their own experts, with the court seeking to narrow the issues in dispute on both parties’ expert opinion evidence, by requiring service of written questions on the experts, and/or by ordering an experts’ discussion.
Frequently, the relative cost, or whether involving a new expert will cause delay, will be the deciding factor.
Separate instructions
Both parties can give separate instructions to a single joint expert (CPR 35.8). In Yorke v Katra [2003] WL 21491870, the Court of Appeal held that a district judge was wrong to strike out the defence in a small claim because the defendant, a litigant in person, had unilaterally amended the
