Jersey Unreported Judgments

Costs judgment

[2017]JRC030

Royal Court

(Samedi)

22 February 2017

Mrs Broadway appeared on her own behalf.

Advocate J. P. Speck for the Defendants.

COSTS judgment

the deputy bailiff:

1.        This is my judgment on the question of costs.  Submissions were made in writing without oral argument. 

2.        On 25^TH April, 2016, I refused the Plaintiff's application for leave to appeal out of time against a number of orders, namely:-

(i)        The decision of the Deputy Judicial Greffier of 17^TH March, 2014, striking out the Plaintiff's amended Order of Justice dated 10^TH September, 2013;

(ii)       The decision of the Assistant Judicial Greffier dated 21^ST October, 2014, taxing the Defendants' costs in relation to the strike-out application;

(iii)      The decision of the Deputy Judicial Greffier dated 30^TH April, 2015, whereby he ordered amongst other things that unless the defendants received from the plaintiff a certain sum of money the plaintiff's Order of Justice would be struck out;

(iv)      The Act of Court dated 25^th June, 2015, striking out the remainder of the plaintiff's amended Order of Justice then dated 17^th March, 2014. 

3.        I do not need in this judgment to go into the details of my reasons for refusing the application as these are apparent from a review of my written judgment (Broadway-v-Salamanca [2016] JRC 089A).  For the plaintiff to succeed in her application she needed to persuade me that she should be able to appeal against the first of the decisions set out above which had stood for some 18 months. 

4.        Whilst the discretion of the Court in dealing with questions of costs is unfettered, the usual principle is, of course, that costs follow the event.  Are there, then, reasons that would justify my departure from that usual position?

5.        It is clear that the value of the trust fund had reduced substantially over the years and that the plaintiff blames the defendants for that diminution.  It is possible that a case pleaded differently might have survived a strike out application.  Further, it appeared that the plaintiff struggled to deal with matters procedurally and did not have the benefit of legal advice and I do not under-estimate the difficulties that faces a litigant in person, particularly in bringing potentially complex litigation against trustees. 

6.        It does not seem to me, however, that the factors should cause me to make other than the usual order.  There is no reason why the defendants should be out of pocket as a result of the plaintiff's action where that action was unsuccessful in these circumstances. 

7.        As I have mentioned, the plaintiff's claim was dependent upon the Court acceding to a request for an extension of time to appeal against an order which had been outstanding, at that time, for some 18 months.  This was inevitably a high hurdle for a plaintiff to overcome. 

8.        Accordingly, in my judgment, the correct order to make is that the plaintiff shall pay the defendants' costs of and incidental to her application for extension of time for leave to appeal on the standard basis to be taxed if not agreed. 

Authorities

Broadway-v-Salamanca [2016] JRC 089A.