1 May 2012
298.Certain bodies, such as trade unions and other membership organisations, often provide legal services to their members as a benefit of membership. Section 30 of the Access to Justice Act 1999 allows bodies that are approved by the Lord Chancellor to recover from a losing party the cost of insuring themselves against the risk of paying costs to another party in the event of losing a claim. The effect of section 46 is to prevent the recovery of these insurance premiums from a losing party.
299.Subsection (1) repeals section 30 of the Access to Justice Act 1999. Although similar in effect to section 48, section 49 does not provide for any exceptions to non-recoverability, since the circumstances which require specific provisions relating to expert reports in clinical negligence cases do not arise.
300.Subsection (2) contains a saving. It provides that a costs order made in favour of a member of a body in proceedings about a matter may provide for the recovery of a body’s costs where the body gave a specific undertaking to the member to meet the costs of other parties to proceedings about that matter before the day on which section 47 comes into force.