![]() On appeal it became clear that the defendant had little input into the drafting of her statement and that, in fact, she had difficulties with basic literacy. The trial judge concluded that a witness with such a detailed knowledge of the case law must have understood the position and gave judgment to the claimant. Her affidavit went into great detail in relation to the case law involved and explained how these cases applied to her. The defendant was disputing a claim by the claimant on the grounds that when she signed a document she did not understand its full effect and should have received independent advice. Look at the way that the plaintiff nearly came to grief and lost her house because her solicitors used an affidavit by her to put forward legal arguments in Alex Lawrie Factors Ltd -v- Morgan The Times 18 August. Look at the previous post The Dangers of Allowing Witnesses to give their Opinions (it hinders rather than helps your case).ĥ. ![]() Look at Jackson L.J’s guidance in Nicholls -v- Ladbrokes Betting & Gambling Ltd EWCA Civ 1963 where the (successful) defendant had costs reduced by 20% partially because of opinionated witness evidence as opposed to facts.Ĥ. The way to highlight relevant passages in authorities is by sidelining, not by quoting long passages in the skeleton arguments. (If this applies to skeleton arguments then how much more true must this be in relation to witness statements?).ģ. They must not include extensive quotations from documents or authorities. The skeleton arguments must be concise and, in any event, not exceed 25 pages. Look at Jackson L.J’s guidance in Secretary of State for Local Government -v- Hopkins Development Ltd EWCA Civ 470 where he disallowed the costs of skeleton arguments on the basis that they contained long citations from judgments. Any unnecessary elaboration may be the subject of a special order as toĢ. Witness statements to be unnecessarily increased by over-elaboration of the It is incumbent on solicitors and counsel not to allow the costs of preparation of Look at Appendix 9 of the Chancery Guide which includes: You cannot give evidence of what the law is (except an expert in the case of foreign law). “ (1) A witness statement is a written statement signed by a person which contains the evidence which that person would be allowed to give orally.” What tends to happen is that the advocate, rather than preparing legal argument, has to base submissions by extricating the basic facts from the voluminous (and largely useless) witness statements.
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