Manchester Civil Justice Centre has issued guidelines for hearing urgent personal injury and clinical negligence matters. This is set out in detail below.
THE GUIDANCE
“The following arrangements will be effective from Monday 4 May 2020, to assist the efficient running of matters being dealt with under the Clinical Negligence and Serious Personal Injury (“CNSPI”) Protocol whilst the restrictions imposed by the Government arising out of the Covid 19 Pandemic are in force.
On each working day, one of our CNSPI District Judges will be available to deal with urgent matters by email and to consider listing urgent matters remotely.
Without being prescriptive concerning the types of matters which might be referred to the CNSPI District Judges under this arrangement, it is envisaged that they may include: –
– Consent Orders bringing claims to a conclusion where a hearing has been listed;
– Consent Orders extending Court timetables or the time for compliance with directions
where a hearing has been listed;
– Consent Orders inviting the Court to vacate hearings and, in particular, CCMCs;
– Ex parte applications where the Order sought is urgent;
– Requests for short, urgent applications to be listed as a matter of urgency.
This arrangement is being introduced with a view to avoiding unnecessary delays in urgent matters and optimising the Court’s listing capacity.
In particular, a considerable amount of Court hearing time in CNSPI matters is devoted to CCMCs. It may be that parties are aware well before the hearing that a CCMC will not be effective or that (in light of agreements reached on directions and costs) the matter could properly be dealt with on paper by the judge or, alternatively, would only require a very short hearing. In those circumstances, parties’ representatives are encouraged to use this arrangement.
All applications/ requests / Consent Orders should be marked “URGENT – CNSPI” and sent to CNSPIMcr@ejudiciary.net and should be accompanied by any required permission for the Court staff to take the applicable Court fee, along with all information and evidence which the judge will require to deal with the matter.”
