[speaker001:] The component parts of the multiplier have been agreed as four years for the period up to the age of nineteen when he leaves school and thirteen years thereafter... Mrs doctor and Mr Paul's headmaster agree that Paul needs an enabler at school during... school hours, that is classroom hours, an enabler is in effect a classroom assistant who works with him on a one to one basis to ensure that he can participate in lessons.... It is right to say that I have heard from Mrs Paul's classroom assistant during the last academic year, she appears virtually to have acted as an enabler, but she was by no means dedicated to Paul as a one to one enabler and of course the extent of the attention of which she had to give to Paul detracted from her ability to give attention to other pupils. Mr the headmaster has recently applied to Paul's present local authority London Borough of Merton for a classroom assistant for Paul for thirty hours per week... he does not know whether he will get that or a lesser number of hours or none at all, he was repeatedly, in my view quite rightly, extremely reluctant to express any view about what the outcome of his application maybe, but, rather force time is to which we have to guess, his guess was that ten hours might be afforded but he was at pains to emphasize that that was pure guess work. He was however er reasonably clear as to the speed at which local authorities tend to deal with these matters, he said that it always takes a long time and getting any answer out of the local authority might well take somewhere between six months and up to two years, he thought that perhaps eighteen months was a reasonable guess before he would actually manage to get somebody... if Paul were to move as er, it maybe well occur to here or a different local authority then of course the application would just go back to square one and that would lead to more delay. Mrs proposes that there should be such a classroom assistant or an enabler for twenty hours per week... that would almost cover the full classroom week of twenty five hours. Mr for the defendant effectively accepts that, but says that having regard to Mr er undoubted success in regard to provision of one to one assistance in relation to other children, some of whom are less disabled than Paul, that I should try and look to local authority will provide thirty hours assistance or thereabouts after say eighteen months and that therefore in this regard the defendant should pay for only one and a half years of er enabler's time. I think that that is over optimistic, I cannot be confident that there will be any local authority provision at all, it seems to me that this particular provision is really vital to Paul's education and I think it right to ensure that it is available. In addition to classroom support Mrs says that Paul needs general support for three hours per evening in relation to his er social well being in his leisure activities... three hours per evening for the four evenings a week which he spends at school, in relation to this I think it right to bear in mind Mr evidence about the school, being a special school of course has generous staffing levels, staffing levels which would make the mouth of any head teacher of any other school water I suspect.... There are ninety nine pupils, the total staff is one hundred, of course that does not for a moment mean that er, there is one member of staff attendant on each pupil at all times, and I don't for a moment suggest that. Of the ninety nine pupils, seventy five are boarders, the suffer varying degrees, degrees of disability, something like nine or ten of them are roughly in Paul's category of disablement, although he is the most severely disabled. There are nineteen full-time care staff of whom eleven are on duty in the evenings and Mr has asked for a further eleven full-time care staff, he hopes in due course to be able to have seventeen such staff on duty at any one time. In these circumstances in my judgment there is entirely adequate support for Paul of the sort that Mrs envisaged and indeed I am inclined to the view that one to one dedicated support for him out of classroom hours may not be desirable and might well tend at least to come between him and his fellow pupils... so if one turns to Mrs schedule one on page forty seven, papers before me, I think that the appropriate arithmetic is to provide for twenty hours per week at seven pounds per hour for thirty seven school weeks, that is an enabler for the school period, I confess that I find it much easier to deal with Mrs [clears throat] schedules on page forty seven by treating schedule one as having to do with the, the... school period, schedule two having to deal with the home periods and schedule three with parental care, as it is actually set out on page forty seven, and I confess that during the case I kept confusing [LAUGHTER] myself [] about this point, schedule one deals not only with school but also, rather confusingly, with an enabler at home and I think it easier to confine that schedule to er school time. The result of the calculation that er I think appropriate is that one finds... [clears throat] twenty hours a week, seven pounds an hour, thirty seven weeks a year comes out I hope at five thousand, one hundred and eighty pounds, to that should be added four hundred and forty five pounds national insurance contributions and I have left the advertising fees at the same amount two hundred pounds. That means five thousand eight hundred and twenty five pounds which one multiplies by four, giving a total under that schedule of twenty three thousand, three hundred pounds, I regret to say that it is of course inherent in the judgment that I have to deliver that there is a good deal of what [cough]
[speaker002:] I might call rather boring arithmetic, I'm sorry about that, but it is unavoidable. Going on to er schedule two, and first of all the weekends, it is not common ground that care of twenty four, four, twenty four hours should be provided, that gives a weekly figure, a yearly figure for er [clears throat] of seven thousand, one hundred and four pounds, multiplying that by four one gets twenty eight thousand, four hundred and sixteen pounds. In the same schedule I accept Mrs suggestions for the school holidays and the rates that she gives so that one has seven thousand, eight hundred and fifty two pounds fifty times four which equals thirty one thousand, four hundred and ten pounds. I do not however accept that in addition to the hours of care which she provides at home during the school holidays that there should also be an enabler for twenty hours per week as... she suggests... that would mean that the number of hours of care, and I appreciate of course, that there is some artificiality in dealing with this in pure terms of numbers of hours of care, but nevertheless it provides a sort of common denominator, which can give some indication, that would mean no less than ninety hours of boarding and care per week... fifty during the week erm [clears throat] and twenty during the weekend and a further twenty for the enabler, I think that that er is [clears throat] too great and I make no allowance for an enabler at home. Next in schedule three there is provision to compensate Mr and Mrs for the extra work involved in caring for Paul, it is agreed that er since they are in the special position of course of being Paul's carers they are, not er, I mean no disrespect to nursing but they're not erm [clears throat] it is agreed that there should a deduction of twenty five percent, that would give an annual figure of two thousand, six hundred and thirty one times four will amount to ten thousand five hundred and twenty four pounds, adding these figures together, future care during schooling comes if my addition has been accurate to ninety three thousand, six hundred and fifty pounds in total. Turning to care for Paul after the age of nineteen... the approach of Mrs is very much at variance with the approach of Mrs, both agree that Paul will require a resident carer present, twenty four hours a day. Mrs thinks that that is best provided by two carers living in the house, each on duty for half the week, such carers being directly employed by the, by contrast Mrs says that an agency should provide a carer all the time from its available pool, she envisages that in practice three or four carers would share the work, they differ over the full number of hours care to be provided by hired carers, Mrs envisages seventeen hours a day in total, Mrs ten hours, again I emphasize that the artificiality of the working in precise number of hours, where you have somebody actually living in the house all the time and available to er carry out active care at any time, but of course carers... are not always having to do things which might be described as active care. The advantages and disadvantages of each proposal have been canvassed helpfully by Counsel, I have to say that I prefer the approach of Mrs, she had in my view more experience and more relevant experience than Mrs was able to bring to bear. Her scheme of things in my judgment is likely to offer better continuity of care and thus more rapport between Paul and his carers and a better opportunity for one carer to hand on the necessary skills with Paul's equipment to any successor. These advantages appear to me to outweigh the disadvantages identified by Mr of there being more outsiders in the family household, possibly homesick and unhappy carers who are not living in their own homes, but at the establishment and the trouble and worry to the of what would be not infrequent, recruitment of new carers for Mrs, I hope perhaps a trifle pessimistically thought that on average carers would not spend more than about a year of course, some longer, some shorter, because such carers necessarily had to be fairly young, fit, strong people and the stresses and strains of the er the whole business she thought would lead to reasonably rapid turnover, not the emergence of long-term carers who might stay for a number of years, er, as I say I'd rather hoped that she may be unduly pessimistic about that, but, that, I accept what she says about it. I think that agency care by its nature is likely to be more impersonal, is likely to involve a greater turnover of staff and would be considerably less satisfactory for Paul. I also think that Mrs somewhat underestimated the formal hours required, I have noted from the er, the B M A documents setting out the charges to be expected to be levied by agencies in relation to nurses that extra hours will be charged per hour and I can foresee that if an agency contracts to provide ten hours... formal care that er, it might be that with a number of carers they would find themselves very, very frequently putting in for extra hours of care. For those reasons as I, have I, hoped made plain, it seems to me that the general scheme provided by Mrs is the one that ought to be adopted, however in my view when Mrs also makes provision for a second carer for some three hours a day that is well over egging the pudding, if I may adopt a phrase used by Mr at one stage during the case [clears throat], I feel sure that in practice the two resident carers would not simply say well I'm on duty from eight am on Monday till twelve midday on Thursday and I shall do nothing during the rest of the week, I think that living in the household for, at
[speaker001:] [cough]
[speaker002:] least periods of months and hopefully, well rather more than that, they would work things out in a way in which they in fact helped each other very considerably. In addition Mrs scheme at page forty three provides for a further twenty eight hours a week to be provided in some other way, that it is suggested is parental care, but it seems to me that it would either be parental care or hired care. That I think recognizes a possibility, by no means a probability, but a possibility that Paul might move away from home and the more real possibility that in due course that Mr and Mrs might be unable to bear their part further as carers. To allow for those contingencies I think it right to allow the commercial rate for the twenty eight hours per week... in inverted commas, parental care, rather than a discounted rate. Accordingly this is schedules on page forty three, they overlap in numbers for their schedules three and four, erm [clears throat] come out... at er the first of schedule three, thirty five thousand, six hundred and eighty six pounds seventeen per annum times thirteen and seven thousand, two hundred and eighty pounds per annum times thirteen... as I er [clears throat] hope is correct arithmetically, but I invite correction in due course, adding all the figures for future care together, one gets to a figure of six hundred and fifty two thousand pounds, two, sorry, sixty hundred and fifty two, two, one zero, from that an agreed sum of thirty nine thousand, six hundred and ninety one pounds for disability living allowance, Paul's to be deducted leaving six hundred and twelve thousand, five hundred and nineteen pounds. That finding effectively determines the agreed figures on which damages relating to the provision of suitable accommodation in turn, it is agreed that if two carers are to live in the household, that suitable new accommodation for the plaintiff can be acquired for two hundred and seventeen thousand, five hundred pounds, the house in which he at present lives will fe fetch eighty two thousand, five hundred pounds, a difference of a hundred and thirty five thousand pounds. It is further agreed that the approach adopted by the court of appeal in the case of and incorporate of nineteen eighty nine, one queens bench page eight hundred and seventy eight, is that which I should adopt, er the person which seeks to persuade me that the percentage which I should apply should be four point five percent rather than the two percent used in that case by the court of appeal, he argues... partly on the basis of er, evidence by Mr an architect who er, with the greatest respect to him, whilst I feel quite sure his architectural abilities are of the highest quality, I feel that as an economist he is perhaps er not more reliable than any other economist, er [clears throat] but er, Mr argues that er, recent falls in house prices show that houses are not the risk free inflation proof investments which the court of appeal assumed when and was decided.... It seems to me when deciding that case, the court of appeal were as Mr suggests taking a long-term view, I of course bear in mind the well known aphorism of Lord about er what happens in the long term, but er, [clears throat]... my own view is, that in fact, a house should not actually be built as an investment at all it is something to live in, to make a home in, it is not something to make money out of, I very much regret the fact that er over recent years that view seems to have become somewhat old fashioned. In so far as the house does represent a large capital asset, and it undoubtedly does, I am quite clear that in the long term, house prices are likely, generally to rise with inflation, indeed I would think must do so or perhaps to rise rather more quickly than inflation if there is a rising population and as there has been for very, very ma many years have passed, [clears throat] that, in the passed a decreasing occupancy rate. I suspect that the proposition that broadly the price of housing will rise at least as fast as inflation could only be falsified if some pestilence almost on the scale of the black death were to occur so that... supply vastly exceeded demand or significantly exceeded demand. I think that whether as er Mr submits and is a guideline case and to be adapted to changing conditions or whether it is a case which lays down a bounding rate, that it is a case which I should follow and that the reasoning leading to the adoption of two percent as the appropriate percentage to be applied still applies today, thus the calculation is one hundred and thirty five thousand pounds times two percent, is two thousand, seven hundred pounds times seventeen, is forty five thousand, nine hundred pounds, to this there is to be added a cost of conversion, thirty two thousand, four hundred and seventy two pounds less the enhancement in value thereby created of twelve thousand, five hundred pounds that is a figure of nineteen thousand, nine hundred and seventy two. Further figures have been agreed, three thousand pounds, eight hundred and fifty po fifty five pounds and fourteen hundred and twenty five pounds for additional costs of moving, maintenance and insurance respectively.
[speaker001:] [cough]
[speaker002:] I am not persuaded that any further calculation relating to enhancement of value such as that adopted by Mr in case is required. The figures which I have given, I hope, add up to a total for new accommodation of seventy one thousand, one hundred and fifty two pounds. There remain three further issues, one relates to the cost of conversion of future transport. It is agreed that an appropriate vehicle for the transport of the plaintiff in the future is a vehicle called a Nissan Serena, the plaintiff... claims for a cost of conversion of such a vehicle at six thousand, two hundred pounds, it would need to be renewed of course from time to time and allowances made for that, the defendant says that a firm called can convert the same vehicle for less than the tenth of the price, six hundred pounds, Mr says that such advantages, if any, of the conversion for which the plaintiff claims are so minimal that it cannot possibly be right to spend ten times the money on achieving them. That argument would I think be very persuasive if I were able to be confident that the levels of conversion is one which would be... an adequate and proper one, it is relatively new, there is nothing wrong with that, it is not apparently been a conversion which has been put into practice, except in the last year because have only started conversion when the Nissan Serena was brought out. Not very many sub-conversions have yet been done as I understand it and my source of information about the levels of conversion is solely from Mrs, called on behalf of the defendants and her real source of information is simply one family whom she has... talked to on the telephone about it, who find the levels conversion of their Nissan Serena perfectly satisfactory for their twenty year old daughter. I do not think that that evidence second and third hand as it is, is really enough for me to be confident that the conversion will answer. I think it right to bear in mind the evidence of Mr a solicitor now specializing in re-habilitation work who is himself alas wheelchair bound, erm, he has directly relevant experience and he expressed the view that er two ramps leading up to the vehicle from the rear could be unsafe and were in his view generally less satisfactory than the platform with which the conversion equips the Nissan Serena, in those circumstances it seems to me I really have no choice but to er adopt the alternative of the conversion and er there is an agreed figure of thirty nine thousand, eight hundred and sixty six pounds in relation to that. The next matter is this, that it is known that unfortunately the plaintiff will require an operation in due course to correct a... I'm not sure whether deformity is quite the right word, mm, mm but it is close enough of the foot. That operation as I understand it is certainly either available on the National Health or er likely to be available on the national health... I have not understood that it is the sort of operation which will for any reason suddenly need to be done and I bear in mind that the plaintiff has had already an operation on his hip done on the National Health, it seems to me on the probabilities that there is a very strong probability that that operation will be done on the National Health and not done privately and for that reason it does not seem to me right to include any sum in relation to that in the damages. There are of course the court of protection costs which are to be calculated and are not a source of disagreement. The last matter relates to some possible supposed uncertainty about the plaintiff's further education at school, as I have already noted it is expected that the plaintiff will remain at school until he is nineteen, he has been there now for three years. It is clear to me from Mr evidence that er he regards school as entirely appropriate for the plaintiff. Mr and Mrs are as I understand it entirely satisfied with that school. The only fear is that the local authority who would retain responsibility for Paul's schooling, after normal school leaving age, if he remains a child with a statement of special educational needs, might possibly say that they would no longer pay for him being at school. I think it is absolutely plain that there is no possibility, that any local authority wherever Paul were living would find it possible to... that he should cease to be a statement in child, it is quite clear, I think, that he is bound to remain a child with a statement of special educational needs, in those circumstances any local authority would have the statutory duty to provide for his education, either at or somewhere else and in practice it seems to me there is no reasonable possibility of his being moved from after he has spent, will it be probably more than four years there perhaps five years there, that I think is not a possibility which has to be catered for. In those circumstances it does not seem to me right to leave open, whether the court has power to do so I'm doubtful, but in any event it does not seem to me right to leave open a question of whether there should be some damages... to provide for the possibility that er... Paul may have to leave school, nor do I think that it is a situation in which any contingency award should be made in respect of that. To summarize the total award is thus made up in this way... there are agreed items as shown on the er schedule of the plaintiff's submissions which come to three hundred and fifty two thousand, five hundred and ninety six pounds,
[speaker001:] [cough]
[speaker002:] I hope that figure is right... er, I have to confess that I have not added it up and er the copy that I have, the five and the nine could be mistaken for other figures, but I hope that [LAUGHTER] there the right figures []... to that must be added first the general damages... a calculation which like all by other calculations need to be carefully checked, I would... er calculate the interest on general damages to date would be five thousand, two hundred and seven pounds... future care totals six hundred and twelve thousand, five hundred and seventeen pounds... suitable accommodation, seventy one thousand, one hundred and fifty two pounds, transport costs thirty nine thousand, eight hundred and sixty six pounds, that makes a total of one million, two hundred and six thousand, three hundred and thirty eight pounds... that is the amount which I would be minding to award, I understand that the parties in the light of that would wish to have further discussions about the matter...
[speaker003:] For the total I counted two pounds different from his Lordship, I
[speaker002:] [LAUGHTER]
[speaker003:] erm
[speaker002:] I came to two pounds difference about something
[speaker003:] yes, the future care
[speaker002:] erm, I think it's in the future care, I rather think that perhaps the future care ought to have been five hundred and nineteen, not five hundred and seventeen
[speaker003:] that's why I come to two pounds separate er
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] er six thousand one, one, nine
[speaker002:] you're, you're absolutely right, I'm afraid in, in erm... I, I,re remember seeing that discrepancy and I'm not quite sure why it didn't get into my notes
[speaker003:] your Lordship's findings were to the age of nineteen a total of nine, three, six, five, O. From the age of nineteen, six, five, two, two, one, O and from the sum of those two figures
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] you deducted three, nine, six, nine, one, and so whatever it is should end in nine at least
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] because it's one taken away from
[speaker002:] yes yes I think it should be six, twelve, five, one, nine
[speaker003:] yes, so we altered it?
[speaker002:] yeah, you're absolutely right, obviously so sorry
[speaker003:] so one, two O
[speaker002:] although that is the only error I've made in these figures I, not [LAUGHTER] myself []
[speaker003:] I haven't done precise cal computation of interest, but, erm the rough one indicate that it is something in the region of five thousand, two hundred... but I quite agree with his Lordship's figure of five, two, O, seven, total one is one, two, one, six, three, four, O
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] my lord various er matters arise under that, we would ask er at this stage erm [cough] not for a judgement, two reasons, but for an adjournment, the first reason is the court of protection costs will have to be calculated
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] and the second reason is that we wish, we wish to take professional advice from experienced accountants on the merits or demerits of the structured settlement
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] to which one might add this additional gloss, erm recently there have been under a statutory instrument which regulates er, the ca computation of court of protection costs in the event of the structure in a way differently from the traditional one and the defendants would wish to argue
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] er that if the structure is to be offered, accepted and approved then court of protection costs should be lower than it would be, if the lump sum order was eventually made
[speaker002:] I see
[speaker003:] and one, my, letting myself
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] to say that in fairness to them, so what we would respectfully submit is that your Lordship [cough] having assessed the damages and erm, together with interest other than court of protection costs that the figure which we had mentioned and, and adjourn the matter for consideration of a structured settlement erm and that's the first figure erm, that, the, the second thing, is that there is money in court er we would ask for a direction of the balance of the money, the balance over and above the money in court which is an extra three hundred and six thousand, three hundred and forty pounds at the present stage be brought into court within a reasonable time which we would note is fourteen days, maybe the defendant would ask longer, we haven't discussed it.... It's, it's four fourteen days
[speaker002:] yes certainly
[speaker003:] the first thing that we, we, we would respect is and suggest and this is a course which has been offered erm, erm, in order of other cases, er, we... should ask that the er [clears throat] because of the adjournment necessary for investigation, the, the money will attract interest and we would ask for an order that the erm, the plaintiff is entitled to interest at the special account rate on any lump sum hereafter ordered to be paid, now what that means is that if at the end of the day the instruction say goes off and the conventional lump sum order is made, we are entitled to interest on the whole of that lump sum, if on the other hand a structured settlement is put into position and er part is either applied to the purchase of the annuities, in the commercial way to try and settle it or taken it back by the health authority, in consideration for self funding structured settlement, then we would only get the interest on the actual cash we have been kept
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] a simple example if the contingency sum was to be six hundred thousand pounds, the balance were go to the structure, er we would have the er interest on the six hundred thousand pounds contingency sum only er
[speaker002:] yeah
[speaker003:] the purpose of this double arrangement is to try and arrange something of advantage to both parties erm
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] and we, we would ask of that, but the next point and erm, is this my Lord erm... at the moment erm the negotiations are erm proceeding in relation to the house, about which we have heard evidence, er, we could not properly buy it until it had been investigated by the court of protection and there was approval of that, and er it will be necessary for er consideration to be given as to how it should be purchased, in practical terms, firstly your Lordship has erm [clears throat] awarded a figure of seventy one thousand pounds, then there is the eighty thousand pounds on the existing house which takes one up to a hundred and fifty or thereabouts, and one sees that the special damages and interest thereon comes to something over fifty two thousand pounds to which these er parents will be entitled in the normal way, and if they were to apply, they might do and apply, that would go a long way to purchasing it and the court of protection, if it approved that might take the view that it would be fair to take something out of the notional aspect of damages for loss of earnings, because after all the plaintiff would have spent his earnings for housing and so on in the future, that, that is the sort of problems that now have to be tackled er what, what we would respect and suggest is er simply that there is liberty to apply erm. The sort of applications which we... might wish to make in the future would... be for an example that an interim payment be made out of the money in court or that the money be transferred to the public trust office, we don't know how we should proceed yet, but if we are at liberty to apply generally
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] simply to put the matter into effect, and cover it, that apply to erm [clears throat]
[speaker002:] er, er how would... one would at liberty to apply in relation to monies required for purchase of new accommodation
[speaker003:] my Lord is, I would respect that they are at liberty to apply generally
[speaker002:] generally oh well
[speaker003:] well cos what
[speaker002:] yeah
[speaker003:] we, we can then come back to the court, erm as, as other orders which we would seek and we would seek an order for costs, erm clearly
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] after today
[speaker002:] [clears throat]
[speaker003:] and erm er, we, and that there are various other erm we ways in which the parties should be protected, erm, which I haven't had a chance to look at today... clearly the costs of investigating, the proper costs of investigating any structured settlement would have to be dealt with on a later occasion, that it is somehow awarded, instead of protected that the plaintiff gives the defendant notice, seven day's notice before instructing any account on to advise on the structured settlement, so if the defendant thinks the plaintiff is being wholly unreasonable they can come back to court, quite at liberty to apply and get, make his point of the directions on the therefore within these context these are the sort of orders which, on the behalf of the plaintiff I can see and I would respectively suggest that we go away, draw them up and hand them in toy our Lordship and come back later in the day if we have difficult
[speaker002:] [cough]
[speaker003:] er difficulty in agreeing how so
[speaker002:] well no, erm, Mr [cough]
[speaker004:] Your learned friend very fairly set the sort of orders one would expect in the case of this sort, erm, can I only add one thing which erm there is still a, failing erm his right there should have been an adjournment this morning that the question of a structured settlement could be investigated, all these people who have indeed, it must be from the plaintiff's point of view as well, desirable that those investigations be erm carried out, with the greatest, greatest speed possible, obviously it takes time to er instruct the and so on and erm, it seemed er to me that it would be appropriate to include some of the I happen to discuss with my friend, erm providing for the matter to be brought back not later than a certain time
[speaker002:] well if, [clears throat] if both parties have liberty to apply... that would really cover that wouldn't it?, I mean if, if... you felt that... if there were any, it's unlikely I think but you felt that there were any dragging of the feet in relation to the structured settlement you could come back and ask the court to make orders limiting time for further discussions or... whatever you thought appropriate
[speaker004:] well certainly one could do that, but it, it, it would preferably if my suspicions if er imposing perhaps not the right word, er define er at the outset we erm the time limits that er are envisaged for the obtaining of magistrate licence or than that I'm
[speaker002:] I'm rather reluctant to do that because I have absolutely no basis for knowing how long negotiations of this sort are likely to take, erm [clears throat] and if I say well... er that such negotiations must be completed by
[speaker004:] oh no
[speaker002:] an arbitrary date I mean
[speaker004:] I'm not saying that negotiations should be completed by a certain date, but that the matter should come back to court by a certain date so that there is therefore er er is a time, an incentive for the
[speaker002:] well what sort of time are you suggesting?
[speaker004:] well I haven't discussed this with my learned friend, but it seems to me a date sometime next term would be appropriate, er which would give another term, or so for the plaintiff side to investigate these matters
[speaker003:] oh the timetable which I as well will, will erm, would be about two months, the first [clears throat] step has to be taken by the defendant because we don't know yet whether they are prepared to oppose the structure, and if so, what sort of structure they would be prepared to oppose, erm, if and when, er a formal offer of structure came through, I would have little doubt that we could instruct accountants and get a response within a matter of weeks, sometimes one has to if they're doing an commercial structure within a week or so because the offer is only open for ten days
[speaker002:] yeah [clears throat]
[speaker004:] erm the the order which one, one I concern, maybe we can discuss if to, if, if the defendants were prepared to undertake to erm provide any as to instruct within twenty eight days from today, the matter should be list on and this convention on a Friday, Friday in about two or two and a half month's time from now, which will take us in the next term, I, I beg a suggestion
[speaker002:] I, er are you both in effect asking me to adjourn to a date which in a moment will agree on
[speaker004:] yes
[speaker002:] but that be the way
[speaker003:] my Lord I think so yes, erm if I can just say this I understand on the structures that a letter has been, er, an offer has been made by a letter erm of the structure and obviously there would be and that, that was done I think some time ago, erm and it might be my Lord how to what sort of structure is, but, but, erm I think from our side, erm we, we've taken the first step and we're going to
[speaker002:] yeah
[speaker003:] and, and therefore all potentially I think we'll be very much in the plaintiff's court, although
[speaker002:] should we, should we look at say the first Friday after the middle of January, something of that sort, I, I haven't got a calendar on my desk at the moment I'm afraid, but erm
[speaker003:] my Lord if we draft an order for your approval we can do the dates
[speaker002:] yes alright
[speaker003:] the only thing I will say
[speaker002:] certainly we let erm
[speaker003:] is that we can't move until we know what sort of structure is being offered, the general offer of structure is to take advice because we, we could then but unless we know what is forthcoming we don't
[speaker002:] yes well it would be very helpful if you'd like to draft an order, erm as I understand it Mr there's nothing which Mrs has asked for which you er contend I should er
[speaker003:] no my Lord
[speaker002:] er I, I should refuse him
[speaker003:] no, certainly not and er I await for liberty to apply for further to to fall out over anything
[speaker002:] yes
[speaker003:] then, then er, then, then, then we can come back
[speaker002:] yes, very well, thank you very much, well... I better advised that all these take with me, thank you both very much for the...