Crystallisation of disputes

In MW High Tech Projects UK Ltd v Balfour Beatty Kilpatrick Ltd [2020] EWHC 1413 (TCC) O’Farrell J held that the claimant was not entitled to a declaration that an adjudicator lacked jurisdiction to decide the dispute which had been referred to him on the ground that no dispute had crystallised between the parties. The claimant’s challenge was based on a report which it claimed introduced new issues and to which it had not had the time to respond. O’Farrell J held that the issues raised in the report were not materially different to the claim which had already been made by the defendant and in relation to which a dispute had already crystallised by virtue of the claimant’s failure to respond to the claims made by the defendant.