Arguments against suspending Claim

As some of you have cases coming up over the next couple of months and are likely to be met with requests from the banks for the cases to be suspended I thought I would make a suggestion as to an approach to take if the bank does ask for a suspension of the claim until after the Test Case.


I would suggest telling the judge something like the following


The decision whether to suspend is one within your discretion in coming to your decision there are four points which you should bear in mind in determining whether this application is a genuine attenpt to come to a fair resolution of matters and should be allowed or a delaying tactic and dismissed.


Firstly, if you look at the conduct of the defendant in previous claims of this nature after putting in a defence they have waited until the day of the hearing and then settled matters. They have never defended a claim. They seem to use the court process to delay matters until the hearing when they suddenly settle so it is not clear that this matter will actually come to trial if it is not suspended.

Secondly, while they argue that this claim should be stayed pending the resolution of the test case they are not suspending the charges which are at the root of both the test case and this claim. If it is appropiate to suspend this claim pending the outcome of the test case then it must equally be appropriate to suspend the imposition of the charges.

Thirdly, applying the overridding objective and looking at the relative resources of the parties who would suffer the greater relative loss and accordingly suffer the greater detriment if this matter is suspended.

Fourthly, the purpose of the request for the stay is to allow a test case which has only just started to go through. The same result can be achieved by setting this matter down for trial on the first open date after 28 days with the defendant ot produce a statement supported by a statement of truth detailing exactly what work is involved in returning a payment and why the charge remains the same when more than one payment is returned the same time.

On this argument the judge can do one of three things grant the stay, refuse the stay, grant the stay but order that the charges be suspended until the outcome of the test case. If anyone uses this argument let me know what happens.


Michael