Failure to mediate

Royal Bank of Canada Trust Corporation Ltd v Secretary of State for Defence QBD LSG 26 June

In a lease dispute the Ministry of Defence refused to mediate because the dispute turned on a point of law, was between commercial parties and (unlike previous ADR cases involving costs penalties) the matter was not one where emotions played a significant part in the case. The MoD won but was deprived of its costs because it had ignored the Government’s ADR pledge (given by the Lord Chancellor’s Department in March 2001) that ADR would be considered and used in all suitable cases wherever the other party accepts it. The judge said that the MoD’s reasons did not make the matter unsuitable for mediation.