Costs of investment advice

Paige v Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust [2004] EWHC 1154 (QB); NU 4 June

A successful claimant in a personal injury action is precluded from recovering as damages the costs of investment advice and fund management charges incurred in the management of the prospective award. These costs were taken into account by the Lord Chancellor when he fixed the discount rate at 2.5% in order to achieve certainty and consistency. The discount rate was prescribed by reference to the index-linked gilt-edged stock and not a mixed portfolio. The application in the present case represented an indirect attack on the Lord Chancellor’s order prescribing the rate, from which the Court could not depart.