Euro Parking COURT DATE despite following advice. HELP!!

Coupon-mad

surreyman_2 said:

Just seen this thread (link below). This could be useful to you. Check whether the individual person who signed the witness statement is authorised to conduct litigation… https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6629609/unqualified-staff-at-a-law-firm-are-not-allowed-to-conduct-litigation#latest

It's relevant to most cases but not to this one. The WS was signed by an employee of the Claimant company, so it is clearly OK. However, he/she won't attend court and so the Mazur case may well apply to disallow the legal rep who rocks up.

That is fully discussed in the linked thread, so we don't need to go over it again for the OP.

There are pictures of the driver walking towards the boundary and coming from the boundary but not over the boundary and off the premises.

Good.

As you'll see in the witness statement from Gladstones above there is reference to the fact that the initial defence was formed using advice from this site and that the defendant "wouldn't understand the complexities of all the references to the Civil Procedure Rules".
I'm hoping people on here could kindly direct as what the best way to defend this would now be?

The first thing I'd have done, before posting that here on your thread would be to search the forum for those words and really open up the pages of the forum as a resource, using other cases to help you. We expect you already did, to find all the other cases with that wording where this has already been tackled? Copy from them.

jd576

Could you post a photo of the N1SDT Claim Form?

Reading their witness statement, it seems to me that they're essentially admitting that their particulars of claim are deficient and then stating that since you produced a substantive defence, you have not suffered any prejudice, which is nonsense. They're also using the argument that there's not much space to put in proper particulars in MCOL.

The particulars of claim must state the exact term of the contract that you breached, otherwise it is in violation of Practice Direction 16.7.5 (a generic "unauthorised parking" doesn't cut it) and their claim is likely to be struck out. The authorities here are Civil Enforcement Limited v Chan [2023] E7GM9W44 and of Car Park Management Service Ltd v Akande [2024] K0DP5J30. 

I just had a claim struck out for exactly this reason, and the firm pursuing me used the same arguments as I see in the witness statement you posted, which the judge dismissed out of hand. So in light of this apparent admission from them that their POC is defective, it would be helpful to see the suitably redacted claim form they sent so we can see for ourselves.

For what it's worth, they also attacked me in a similar manner and I hit back in my WS, not that this even got to the point of being reviewed by the judge, since their claim was struck out. They're rank hypocrites, the lot of them

E. UNPROFESSIONAL CONDUCT FROM CLAIMANT’S SOLICITORS

33. In paragraph 18 of the Claimant's Witness Statement, Claimant's solicitor’s paralegal makes an unprofessional and unsubstantiated ad-hominem attack regarding my ability to understand the proceedings in this case.

34. Claimant's solicitor’s paralegal's assertion that most of the information is "beyond the knowledge of the Defendant and therefore nonsensical and/or irrelevant" is itself irrelevant speculation, since Claimant’s solicitor knows nothing about me, my profession or my education.

35. Claimant's solicitor’s paralegal furthermore accuses me of being "unreasonable from a resourcing point of view" because "Claimant's solicitors have had to review and respond to a large volume of information", but then submits a Skeleton Argument longer and with substantially more citations than my own Defence. It seems that Claimant’s solicitor feels entitled to use the legal system to bludgeon and terrorise consumers into paying inflated and unfair parking charges levied by their clients, but cries foul when met with a robust defence.

36. I am a litigant in person and I have every right to research legal matters and use any available resources to present my defence, just as Claimant’s solicitors have evidently relied on templates for both their Particulars of Claim and Witness Statement. Contrary to the assertion in paragraph 31 of Claimant’s Skeleton Argument, my defence has consumed dozens of hours of my time and contains relevant case law and legal arguments, regardless of the method by which I prepared it.

37. That a regulated firm of solicitors would resort to ad-hominem attacks in a witness statement amounts to unreasonable conduct, reflecting rather poorly on their professional standards.

James_Poisson

Interestingly as part of their claim I have been sent an aerial view of the garage with a bright red line on it to show where the boundary is.

That's quite ridiculous to include that after the (alleged) event, in fact I think it makes their claim more difficult.

In effect they are admitting they have a plan of the site, which they could have displayed on the signage if leaving it is so detrimental to their client's business.

I wouldn't get to worked up over this (I'm sure you aren't) we don't think on here that any leaving site case has ever made court since the laughable VCS "toothbrush case" where an operator's solicitor was threatened with a few nights at Her Majesty's Pleasure.

beaniemans

Hi could anybody here guide me to the VCS toothbrush case as discussed in this thread please?

I am hoping to make reference to it in my witness statement.

Thanks 

beaniemans

P.S I have searched for the case but can't find the details. Thanks 

Gr1pr

beaniemans said:

P.S I have searched for the case but can't find the details. Thanks 

VCS v Ibbotson from around 11 years ago 

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5840501/vcs-letter-before-claim/p5

https://www.ftla.uk/private-parking-tickets/driver-or-passenger-observed-leaving-site/

Coupon-mad

Please please DO NOT USE an 11 year old county court case. Read it if you want - entertainment value only - but don't expect to use it.

TBH, I wish posters would stop mentioning it. This is as bad as mentioning Hetherington-Jakeman!

Waaaaay out of date and not binding.