Court of Appeal: getting what you want doesn’t make you successful

13 June 2018

A claimant who made a judicial review claim in order to secure housing for her family under section 17 of the Children Act did not "succeed" in her claim when the authority then provided the housing.

The High Court found that the authority reached the decision that they had a duty under section 17 independently of the arguments put forward in the claim. The claimant was not therefore entitled to any costs.

The Court of Appeal agreed. It rejected the claimant's argument that an authority which gave a claimant the remedy that it was seeking in a judicial review will always have to pay the claimant's costs. The question was why the remedy had been provided, If it was not as result of the claim, then the claimant could not claim costs on the basis that they were the successful party.

Mark Tempest of Field Court appeared for the successful local authority in : RL and Others v London Borough of Croydon [2018] EWCA Civ 726, [2018] WLR(D) 212., as reported in The Times, 4th June 2018 (Paywall).