Cases - Yorke v Katra
Record details
- Name
- Yorke v Katra
- Date
- [2003]
- Citation
- EWCA Civ 867
- Legislation
- Keywords
- Expert witness - Civil Procedure Rules
- Summary
-
The defendant appealed against a striking out of his defence by a district judge in an action brought by the claimant contractor for payment. The defendant accepted the appointment of an SJE to provide evidence on the quality of the work, but he objected to the joint instruction required by the judge. He asked why he could not provide a letter 'inviting the expert's report in this myself?'.
The defence was struck out, but the Court of Appeal accepted the argument of the defendant's counsel based on CPR 35.7 and 35.8. CPR 35.8(1) provides that
'where the court gives a direction under rule 35.7 for a single joint expert to be used, each instructing party may give instructions to the expert'.
The court also noted that, in the notes to CPR 35.8 in the White book (a practitioner's guide to civil court procedure),
'it is clearly envisaged that both parties may give instructions to an expert even though he is a joint expert'.
Allowing the appeal, the Court of Appeal rejected the district judge's approach:
'One can perhaps understand why the judge wanted there to be a single letter of instruction, but for my part it would not appear that she had jurisdiction to insist on that, as in fact she did, in view of the ability of each party to give separate instructions: and that manifestly is what Mr Katra wanted to do. He wanted the expert to have instructions from one side and from the other, and had produced instructions of his own, which was in fact in accordance with what was envisaged by the rules.'