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England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions
You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions >> Pearson & Ors v Ahmed (Male) [2001] EWCA Civ 1626 (30 October 2001)
URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2001/1626.html
Cite as: [2001] EWCA Civ 1626
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COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM THE BIRMINGHAM COUNTY COURT
(His Honour Judge Playford QC)
Strand London WC2 Tuesday, 30th October 2001 |
||
B e f o r e :
____________________
| VINTON PEARSON | First Claimant/Applicant | |
| EUNICE PEARSON | Second Claimant | |
| IVY LYNCH | Third Claimant | |
| -v- | ||
| I AHMED (Male) | Defendant/Respondent |
____________________
Smith Bernal Reporting Limited
190 Fleet Street London EC4A 2AG
Tel: 020 7421 4040 Fax: 020 7831 8838
(Official Shorthand Writers to the Court)
The Respondent Defendant did not appear and was not represented.
____________________
Crown Copyright ©
- LORD JUSTICE BROOKE: This is an application by Vinton Pearson for an order that certain documents be disclosed to him for the purposes of his appeal. He seeks permission to appeal from a judgment of Judge Playford QC in the Birmingham County Court on 15th February 2001.
- Mr Pearson had an accident in Digbeth High Street, Birmingham, on 20th September 1997. He was the driver of his car, which was stationary, and a car driven by Mr Ahmed, the defendant, ran into it from behind. His passengers settled their claims satisfactorily. There has never been any dispute that Mr Ahmed was liable.
- Mr Pearson is now 35. At the time of the accident he was a car assembly production worker employed by the Rover Group. He was absent from work because of his injuries until 5th October 1997 (a period which included a short holiday). He was then back at work until 24th November 1997, and he has been off work ever since. He claimed damages originally for £40,000 and claimed that his loss was continuing. The doctors say that he suffered a soft tissue injury to his lower back, that being an injury from which one would not expect any lasting disability.
- It appears that Mr Pearson was approached by a company called Hamco UK after he had made his claim. Hamco said that his insurance company had asked them to handle his case for him. The Highway Motor Insurance Group had issued his insurance certificate. He was then approached by a solicitor who said that Hamco had asked him to handle his case. It appears that he was having the benefit of "before the event" insurance of a type described in the recent judgment of Lord Phillips in Sarwar v Alam (19th September 2001). That company continued to finance the support of his case until September 2000, shortly before the trial.
- The cause of Mr Pearson's continuing pain has been a mystery to the doctors who have been asked to advise him. The first doctor was Mr Roger Davies, who produced a report in December 1997. He said that Mr Pearson appeared to have suffered a generalised muscular strain injury and there may have been a degree of nerve root irritation. He was optimistic that the pain in his lower back would gradually subside with the passage of time. He said that Mr Pearson was suffering a degree of psychological symptoms and that his work prospects gave understandable cause for anxiety, given his physical occupation. He said that it might be 18 to 24 months before the psychological symptoms settled.
- Mr Pearson's solicitor then instructed Mr Carter, who is a consultant orthopaedic surgeon. He produced four reports on Mr Pearson's condition, ending in February 2000. The defendant instructed Mr Holl-Allen, another consultant orthopaedic surgeon. He produced four reports over the same period. Eventually the two doctors met and they produced a joint report in accordance with the principles of Lord Woolf's reforms. In the joint report they concluded that they were both of the opinion that he had sustained a soft tissue injury to his lower back. His continuing symptoms were in excess of the physical signs and investigations performed. Both they and various other specialists had been unable to offer an explanation for an organic cause of his continuing symptoms and they were of the opinion that the continuing symptoms in his back after the first two or three months were a consequence of pre-existing degenerate constitutional disease. They were both of the opinion that, on the balance of probabilities, they would have expected Mr Pearson to return to work three months after the accident.
- It appears that shortly before the case was first due to be tried Mr Pearson's solicitors withdrew, no doubt because they advised that a satisfactory offer of settlement had been made. Mr Pearson appeared in person before Judge MacDuff in November 2000, who vacated the trial of the action listed for that day and made certain directions for the trial. That took place before Judge Playford on 15th February 2001. The judge was understandably unable to award Mr Pearson any compensation except on the basis of the agreed report. He therefore awarded £500 for loss of earnings and £2,000 for general damages, which included an award for the psychological effect of the accident.
- Mr Pearson is aggrieved because he does not think that his case has been properly handled. He was concerned when he discovered that the Highway Motor Insurance Group were also Mr Ahmed's insurers, a matter that came to light when he saw a surveillance report addressed to that Group. He is also concerned that the orthopaedic surgeon, Mr Carter, who was instructed ultimately by the Highway Insurance Group through Hamco, did not do full justice to his complaints. He has shown me a letter from Mr Sturman, a consultant in neurology and rehabilitation medicine. He has highlighted the passages in Mr Sturman's report which were summarised by Mr Carter without including other features of the report. He is worried that the fact that the same insurance company was insuring both himself and the defendant has led to his case not being properly presented to the court. This feature of "before the event" insurance was a matter with which the court was concerned in Sarwar's case, where there was evidence before the court that insurance companies had effective systems in place to ensure that the case for a claimant was looked after totally independently and that there was no risk of a conflict of interest.
- Mr Pearson now faces the difficulty that the City Hospital and his GP are making it difficult for him to obtain copies of his own records, except at a high cost. He also believes that, if somehow or other an order could be made for the disclosure of the file of his insurance brokers, this might lead to a useful line of enquiry. He tells me that he has consulted a number of different lawyers, who have been unable or unwilling to help him. One of the difficulties is that legal aid is no longer available for this class of case.
- I do not want to make any judgment today on the extent, if any, to which this Court can help him. These cases where people suffer pain but where there is apparently no organic physical cause of their continuing suffering are always difficult to analyse. But it seems to me that it would be a good thing if Mr Pearson were to seek advice from the Citizens Advice Bureau at the Royal Courts of Justice. They are able to arrange for lawyers to help litigants like Mr Pearson free of charge in appropriate cases, so that they can discuss his problem with him and advise him of the most appropriate steps he might be able to take in order at any rate to get hold of his own medical records.
- I have set out the history in a little detail in this case so that in due course, when my judgment has been transcribed, Mr Pearson and the Citizens Advice Bureau advisers will be able to see a description of the position in which he finds himself. He must understand that it may very well be that an appeal to this Court is not the appropriate course for him to take, on the basis that the judge was bound to act on the agreed medical evidence which was before him. But this is very much a matter on which Mr Pearson should now take advice from a body which has experience in advising litigants seeking to bring appeals to this Court.
- I will therefore adjourn this application so that Mr Pearson can take appropriate advice and, if he is advised to continue with this application, it may well be that the problems he faces may then be clearer to this Court than they are today because letters will have been written on his behalf.
- The application is therefore adjourned in order that Mr Pearson can take appropriate advice.