Printfriendly

Friday 20 January 2017

Gladstones claim struck out - utterly hopeless particulars

Parking & Property Management Limited v C Limited C6GF02Z5 19/1/2017 Birmingham. DJ Musgrave 

PPML imagined some parking slight or other had occurred. C Limited did not agree. PPML therefore instructed Gladstones Solicitors to file a claim.

As with all these Gladstones claims, the particulars were a nonsense. Gladstones do not believe they need to obey practice directions. As their solicitor Helen Cook explained a while back:

We issue on a vast majority of claims, majority of which are not defended and therefore it is time consuming and not financially viable to send further particulars of claim

C Limited were not in the habit of wasting time with bogus claims and so filed for a strike out. They submitted that the claim should be struck out pursuant to CPR 3.4(2)(b) insofar as the statement of case is an abuse of the court’s process or is
otherwise likely to obstruct the just disposal of the proceedings.

They also pointed out that there was a clear conflict of interest as the IAS and Gladstones were run by the same body. A potential conflict of interest therefore exists between the Claimant’s Solicitors and their client. In effect the Claimant’s solicitors have the potential, to exert influence via their formulation of the appeals process and appointment of adjudicators (whose identities are deliberately withheld), over the extent to which appeals are allowed. This in turn is likely to have the consequence of generating more litigation for them to undertake on the IPC’s members behalves.

There is also the potential for the Claimant’s solicitors to compromise the supposed independence of the IAS to suit the broader interests of parking management companies who are both its clients and the members of the trade association it operates

C Limited sent an employee to the strike out hearing. PPML sent a man called Mr Blake, who introduced himself as a director even though he does not appear to be according to Companies House.

The hearing was short-lived.

The claim was struck out and variously described by District Judge Musgrave as 'poor', 'utterly hopeless and inadequate' and 'an abuse of process'. He did not require submissions in respect of the matters raised in C Limited's statement and the matters raised therein did not form the basis of his judgement.

PPML were ordered to pay £341 in costs.

Prankster Note

Hiring cheap shoddy solicitors does not always save money. If your solicitors believe that it is not financially viable to obey practice directions then you probably either need to change solicitors or not file the claim.

Parking & Property Management Limited - you've been Gladstoned!

Happy Parking

The Parking Prankster

4 comments:

  1. Our favourite litigation expert

    http://oi63.tinypic.com/33kfztl.jpg

    ReplyDelete
  2. Has anyone spoken to the SRA about Gladstones?

    ReplyDelete
  3. I got a letter from court today that Gladstones did not pay Trail hearing fees and therefore the case was automatically struck out. I also received a witness statement subsequently from Gladstones client Pace Recovery who wanted to enforce the claim. The ticket was issued to me on own parking bay. Can anyone guide what happens next. should i bother with the witness statement they sent if the court confirmed that the case was struck off?
    TIA

    ReplyDelete
  4. I must begin with a big THANKS to all of you in this forum. The content here is immensely helpful. Cutting the long story short - PCN was issued by Pace Recovery /Ace on the parking bay that I have a right-to-use granted on. I pay service charges to the Management company for priviledge to use the parking bay.

    After a lot of altercation with the claimant and a strong defence statement (big credits to the forum here) the hearing was scheduled for early next month.
    However the Claimaints have failed to pay the Hearing fee and I have a letter from court confirming that the case was automatically struck out.
    But Today I also received a witness statement from the claimaints solicitors which is trying to enforce the claim.

    Do I have to be bothered with the claim/Claimants Witness statemet anymore given that it has been

    struck out? At what stage can I make a claim for costs?

    Any guidance will be greatly appreciated.

    TIA

    ReplyDelete