High Court judge hits out at 'systematic unfairness' of court costs for litigants
Gordon Deegan
A High Court judge has hit out at what he calls the “systematic unfairness” for court litigants after a woman who took a failed personal injury claim for an estimated €16,500 now faces an estimated legal bill of €50,000.
In the case, Mr Justice Michael Twomey said that Regina Putniene “suffered an injustice when she lost her personal injuries claim in the Circuit Court, and on appeal in the High Court”.
He said that “the reason she suffered an injustice is not because she lost her claim for damages and had costs awarded against her – the objective evidence in the case favoured the defendant.
“Instead, the reason Ms Putniene suffered an injustice is because it is likely to cost her €50,000 or more in legal costs to resolve a claim which was estimated at only €16,500.
“It simply defies all logic for a plaintiff, like Ms Putniene, to have to pay, say €50,000, to resolve a claim for €16,500.
“This is as illogical as a person paying €50,000 to repair a car worth €16,500, or a person paying €50,000 to buy a property worth €16,500. It is hard to think of any other walk of life where this type of irrationality occurs. Yet it is a daily occurrence in our courts.”
Ms Putniene’s claim was for soft tissue injuries arising from a car accident and the medical reports stated that she missed one day of work.
Mr Justice Twomey said: “In this Court’s view, it cannot amount to true justice, for the resolution of a claim to cost multiples of its value. Instead of justice being administered to Ms Putniene, in this Court’s view, she has had an injustice inflicted on her.
“This is because resolving her bona fide claim over a minor car accident, which could happen to anyone in this country, is likely to cost her several times the value of her claim. It is not the fact that costs were awarded against her, which is the issue, but the amount of those costs - all because this minor claim was heard in the High Court."
He said that “this absence of any proportionality between the costs of resolving claims and the value of those claims, runs contrary to the central importance which the Supreme Court attaches to ‘proportionality’ in ensuring that the court decisions are ‘fair’ to plaintiffs and to defendants”.
Mr Justice Twomey said that the injustice inflicted on Ms Putniene arises for two reasons.
He said that firstly, it is because of laws passed by the Oireachtas, which mean that cases of minor importance, whether on appeal or at first instance, are not heard in the affordable courts.
He said: “Instead, under these laws, minor cases are heard in the most expensive trial court, the High Court, and, to a lesser degree, in the moderately expensive Circuit Court.”
He said that the second reason is because of laws passed by the Oireachtas which have led to a dramatic reduction in the proportion of affordable courts to hear minor claims.
He said that in recent decades, there has been a 359 per cent reduction in the number of the more affordable District Courts relative to the number of (prohibitively expensive) High Courts. In addition, there has been a 54 per cent reduction in the number of (moderately expensive) Circuit Courts relative to the number of High Courts.
He said that thus, the combination of low monetary thresholds for cases to be heard in the High Court - and the Circuit Court - and the dramatic reduction in the proportion of District/Circuit Courts to High Courts, has resulted in minor claims not being heard in the more affordable District Court.
He said that as a result, litigants like Ms Putniene end up having to pay legal costs which are likely to be multiples of the value of the claim.
Mr Justice Twomey said that “it seems clear that the primary winners from this concentration of litigation in the High Court are lawyers who are paid costs which are out of all proportion to the value of claims”.
“Similarly, it seems clear that the primary losers are consumers of legal services, who have to pay those legal costs.
"The difference for consumers, in their dispute being resolved in the District Court (or the Circuit Court) rather than the High Court, is in the tens of thousands of euros.
"In very general terms, a hearing might cost hundreds of euros in the District Court, thousands of euros in the Circuit Court, but tens of thousands of euro in the High Court”.
Mr Justice Twomey said that a reduction in legal costs in the High Court “is very unlikely”.
He said that this is simply because judges have for 60 years been calling, without success, for a reduction in legal costs in the High Court.
In the case of Ms Putniene against Brendan McDonald, Munster Derivatives Ireland Ltd and Motor Insurers Bureau of Ireland, Mr Justice Twomey said that his €16,500 estimate is the midpoint between Ms Putniene’s counsel’s estimate of €30,000 and the defendant’s counsel’s estimate of between €500 and €3,000.
Mr Justice Twomey said that in the absence of any change to the foregoing laws, injustice will continue to be inflicted on litigants by a system which is supposed to administer justice.
Ms Putniene’s action arose from a traffic accident which took place on the morning of July 19th 2021 on a road between Tipperary town and Bansha. There was a collision between Ms Putiene’s car and the defendant’s truck.
Ms Putniene lost her case in the circuit court and appealed the case to the High Court.
Dismissing Ms Putniene’s action, Mr Justice Twomey stated that the accident would not have occurred if Ms Putniene had not attempted to overtake a tractor on a road with a continuous white line, as she approached the corner, which was not a safe manoeuvre.
Mr Justice Twomey has ordered Ms Putniene to pay the defendant’s legal costs.
He said that this Court must apply those laws, even though an injustice results to Ms Putniene.
He said: “All this Court can do is highlight how these laws, unless they are reformed, will continue to inflict injustice, even though the system is supposed to administer justice.”
