Evidence, practice and procedure: Without notice applications and wasted costs

In B v A [2012] EWHC 3127 Charles J sets out his position uncompromisingly on without notice applications (at para [3]). The case was a successful claim for wasted costs against a father's solicitors who had 'negligently' (as defined in Ridehalgh v Horsefield (Wasted Costs Order) [1994] 2 FLR 194 CA) maintained a child abduction location order abetted by a series of unnamed High Court judges.

The judgment suggests a turf war between Family Division judges: those who grant such applications on relatively flimsy evidence; and those like Charles J who recognise their duties and grant orders only where entirely justified and on a principled basis. The latter include Mostyn J who early in his puisne judicial career expressed himself ‘shocked at the volume of spurious [urgent] ex parte applications that are made' (FZ v SZ (ancillary relief: conduct: valuations) [2011] 1 FLR 64; and Theis J (a member of the...

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