England and Wales Court of Appeal (Civil Division) Decisions

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE
COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM THE CARDIFF COUNTY COURT
(His Honour Judge Graham Jones)

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand London WC2 Tuesday, 19th March 2002

1. LORD JUSTICE BUXTON: This is an application for permission to appeal to this court from a judgment given as long ago as 9th June 2000 by His Honour Judge Graham Jones in a dispute between a firm of solicitors, Edward Harris & Son -- Mr. Harris is the relevant partner -- and Mrs Ashworth, the applicant today. The solicitors seek to recover costs and expenses incurred on her behalf. The application for permission to come to this court is out of time, but I am not going to pay any regard to that in view of the fact that Mrs Ashworth is representing herself.
2. The hearing before His Honour Judge Graham Jones in June 2000 was in itself an appeal to him from a decision of District Judge John that was made as long ago as 21st January 1999. The matter was rendered the more difficult by the fact that the events of which complaint is made largely took place in 1996 and 1997. The claim against Mrs Ashworth was for solicitors' costs. She complained that the solicitors should not be entitled to recover the costs of the work that they had done on a number of grounds, of which the most prominent, as far as I understand it, is that at her initial meeting with Mr. Harris, which took place in May 1996 according to documents, Mr. Harris either misunderstood or, as Mrs Ashworth has suggested to me today, deliberately failed to take into account Mrs Ashworth's financial position, so that he advised her that she was not eligible for legal aid. Therefore, he pursued the matter with her as a privately paying client, he having explained to her what the costs would be.
3. Subsequent to that, in circumstances to which I shall come in a minute, Mrs Ashworth appears to have drawn Mr. Harris's attention to the fact that her financial position was significantly different from that which he had originally understood or which, as Mrs Ashworth now says, had claimed wrongly to understand; that she was in fact eligible for legal aid; and that no such application was made by Mr. Harris. In the interim, she tells me, she had consulted another firm of solicitors, who had advised her not only that she was eligible for legal aid, but also that she was able to take the matter forward.
4. This is an application from an appeal before His Honour Judge Graham Jones, and therefore will not be entertained by this court unless there is a significant point of principle involved in the appeal. Similarly, the role of His Honour Judge Graham Jones on appeal from the District Judge was to review what happened before the District Judge, and he was only able to interfere if there had been a significant error made by the District Judge.
5. What went wrong at the hearing before the District Judge? What Mrs Ashworth tells me, and told the judge, is that she did not have access to the court bundle that was put before the District Judge by the solicitor, Mr. Harris, who was the opposite party. Therefore she says that she was unable to understand the proceedings or adequately to present her case. It is fair to say that the solicitors have filed evidence in which they say that, from their observations of Mrs Ashworth at that hearing, she was well able to conduct the matters referred to in correspondence. I am not going to try to adjudicate on that dispute because Mrs Ashworth is adamant that she did not receive the bundle until the day after the hearing before District Judge John, and as a result she was unable to deal with the matter properly; but, although Mrs Ashworth had some difficulty in explaining the matter fully to me, it seems to me quite clear that His Honour Judge Graham Jones was aware of this complaint, and that Mrs Ashworth, by the time she appeared before His Honour Judge Graham Jones, had received the court bundle and knew the case being put by the solicitors.
6. There is in her bundle before the Court of Appeal a document headed "Mrs Ashworth's comments on the state of the plaintiff's case". Commenting on the case as deployed before District Judge John (and she accepted after discussion that this document would have been before His Honour Judge Graham Jones, and indeed, although I do not have a copy of the full judgment before District Judge John, it is clear from the transcript I have that he was well aware of the way in which the matter developed), the complaint she makes about the conduct of the case before His Honour Judge Graham Jones, as I understand it, is that when the solicitor was addressing him, he wrongly stressed as Mrs Ashworth puts it, part of the documents; that is to say, page 3 of the bundle, which is a note of the original attendance on Mrs Ashworth in May 1996, where it is recorded that Mrs Ashworth said that she had capital savings of over £7,000. That seems an unusual thing for the solicitor to have written down by way of invention. The judge accepted that that had been said or at least had been understood by the solicitor to have been said, and on the basis of that Mr. Harris advised Mrs Ashworth that she did not qualify for legal aid. Following that meeting a very detailed client care letter was written on 20th June 1996 to Mrs Ashworth. Page 4 of that set out Mr Harris's view that she was not eligible at that point for legal aid.
7. As I have said, Mrs Ashworth complains that Mr. Harris unfairly emphasised the point on page 3 and did not go over the attendance note at page 15 of the bundle, where it is recorded there that Mrs Ashworth informed Mr. Harris at a meeting on 27th June 1996 that she had now lost the £7,000. The note says this of 27th June 1996:

"Discussed legal aid position. Mrs Ashworth mentioned applying for legal aid on another matter. Consideration could now apply. AS mentioned the fact that Mrs Ashworth said they had capital savings of over £7,000.00. Mrs Ashworth said no longer have this money as they have paid people various monies. Income is pension."

8. Mr. Harris explained that he doubted whether she was eligible for legal aid on the basis of the merits. He having looked into the dispute, which I have to say was of a somewhat complex and controversial nature. There is no reason to think that the judge was not aware of that development. Whatever Mrs Ashworth may say about the way in which the matter was put before him by Mr. Harris, the judge was quite clear, and it is clear from what he says in the extract of the observations that I have, that he knew and was aware of the matters set out on page 15 and pointed out that Mr. Harris had charged, and the judge was awarding, costs only up to the point at which in June Mrs Ashworth informed Mr. Harris of the changed financial position. Therefore, I cannot accept that Judge Jones was misled by the way in which the case was presented to him by Mr. Harris. Further, the judge had Mrs Ashworth's account in writing, which is detailed, complaining about the hearing before District Judge John.
9. In all those circumstances, therefore, I am afraid that it is impossible to say that the judge was wrong to the extent that this court will interfere with the view that he took. Looking at the case as a whole, there was nothing in it to justify his reversing the decision of District Judge John. The matter was before His Honour Judge Graham Jones anew. The question of the presence or absence of the court bundle before District Judge John is difficult to come to a conclusion on. However, even assuming that Mrs Ashworth did not have the bundle, then I have no doubt that she was well able to put the matters she complains of in this case before His Honour Judge Graham Jones. It was for him to decide the right and wrongs of the matter. He made no error of law. There is no point of general principle involved in this case. For the reasons I have indicated at some length in deference to Mrs Ashworth, I do not give permission for this appeal to go forward. The application is dismissed.
Order: Application refused.