England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE
COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM SHORDITCH COUNTY COURT
(MR RECORDER HAMLIN)

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand London WC2 Monday, 29th October 2001

Monday, 29th October 2001

1. LORD JUSTICE RIX: This is an application for permission to appeal by Mr Smolen in respect of the judgment of Mr Recorder Hamlin given on 2nd April 2001. It arises as another excursion in some long-running dispute bridging more than just these proceedings themselves between Mr Smolen and Solon Community Housing Society Ltd.
2. These proceedings, however, have come to a close without trial, and all that is left of them is some interlocutory costs orders which were made against Mr Smolen. These orders have led to the necessity for two costs assessment hearings: one, to assess the legal aid costs of Mr Smolen himself, the other to assess Solon's costs under the costs orders made against Mr Smolen. That second assessment is an inter partes matter; the first assessment concerns only Mr Smolen and not Solon.
3. The existence of these two separate assessments may have led to a certain amount of confusion as to which particular appointed hearing applies to which of the two assessments. In the end, both assessments were dealt with on the same day, 19th April 2001, and that is all water under the bridge.
4. For a time, however, in the autumn of 2000, Mr Smolen was concerned that Solon's solicitors, Devonshires, had applied on 16th November 2000 to adjourn and re-list for a date convenient for them an assessment of costs hearing which he had obtained unilaterally for 21st November and which was inconvenient for Solon and their solicitors. They therefore wished to adjourn the matter to a date in January 2001, applied to do so, and were granted that relief at an ex parte hearing on 17th November by District Judge Wright.
5. On 20th November Mr Smolen therefore applied to bring forward his legal aid assessment prior to a date in the new year on the basis that Devonshires had no locus standi to adjourn a hearing in which they were not concerned and in which only he, Mr Smolen, was concerned. District Judge Ryan dismissed his application on 15th January 2001 on the ground that Devonshires' application was concerned with the assessment of the inter partes costs and not with Mr Smolen's legal aid costs. It was quite clear from the letter which they wrote to the court enclosing their notice of application of 16th November that they thought that they were dealing with an assessment of inter partes costs. That was the view of District Judge Ryan, and it was again the view when Mr Smolen appealed before Mr Recorder Hamlin on 2nd April. Therefore the district judge, and again on 2nd April the recorder, dismissed Mr Smolen's applications and allowed the hearing of the inter partes assessment to follow the course which had been laid down for it.
6. District Judge Ryan made an order of £100 costs against Mr Smolen. On the appeal to Recorder Hamlin the respondents, Solon, did not appear, and therefore there was no further order for costs. It is really this order for costs of £100 that this application is all about.
7. This is a second-tier application for permission to appeal and I am therefore not permitted to give permission unless there is some important point of principle or practice or some other compelling reason why permission should be granted. I have asked Mr Smolen in the course of his submissions to identify the important point of principle or practice. He has, it seems to me, been unable to do so. His submission is, in effect, that in the course of these complex proceedings Solon's solicitors, Devonshires, had on this occasion (as on others) deliberately sought to interfere in his own legal aid position in an attempt to wear down his resources to do battle with their clients, Solon. It seems to me that that is all part of an argument that was addressed to the district judge and to the recorder. It was an argument which failed.
8. The terms of the letter which initiated Devonshires' application of 16th November is clear. They were plainly purporting to deal not with any legal aid assessment, but with the inter partes assessment. Therefore it does not surprise me at all that Mr Solon's application was rejected both by the district judge and by the recorder. It seems to me there is no important point of principle, no compelling reason for a further appeal, and for those reasons this application is refused.
9. I say in passing that Mr Smolen in any event needed a two-day extension of time for his application, seeing that there was that short delay. I would not on that ground have refused him permission to appeal if his application had had any merits, but since on the merits of his application there is no possible reason for granting him permission, I decline to extend time in any event.
(Application refused; no order for costs).