Citation: [2015] EWHC 481 (TCC)
This case arose from allegations of defective construction in the development of a former children’s hospital in Birmingham, made against the contractors, Galliford Try, who issued third party proceedings against architects and sub-contractors. The first hearing resulted from the Case Management Conference (CMC) reported at [2014] EWHC 3546 (TCC). The claimants as assignees to the action had sought to oppose a window for ADR and had also unsuccessfully resisted the requirement that they produce a costs budget. The latter point developed into the area of dispute dealt with in the second hearing, namely the costs budget which the claimants had been obliged to submit, and its contents. In what Coulson J described as a “standard TCC defects claim” worth £18 million on the claimant’s case, they had submitted a costs budget in excess of £9 million. He criticised a number of specific features of the budget, notably the high number of assumptions and alleged contingencies, pre-action costs, rates, costs of experts, trial preparation and attendance and disclosure and CMC costs. The judge chose not to order the claimants to produce a new costs budget, but preferred a model which would involve a phase-by-phase budget with overall totals for incurred and forecast figures, but giving effect to his overall conclusion which was that the Claimant had already expended the amount (at pleading stage) which ought reasonably be permitted as proportionate for the whole litigation.
Counsel: Adam Constable QC and Richard Coplin appeared for Galliford Try Infrastructure Ltd.
