When asked if I would do a blog on Personal Injury law in 2004, my hand went up tentatively, one because it meant that I was old enough to have been practising in PI at the time and two because my memory, like most of me, is fast fading.

To assist in my plight, I referred to the Legal Gazette for the year 2004 and found an interesting article titled, “2004: The Year of the Shake-up.” This highlighted 2004 as the year of Clementi.

Aptly named after Sir David Clementi who had published the ‘Review of the Regulatory Framework for Legal Services in England and Wales’ in December 2004. This had followed an initial Government Report written in 2001 and Clementi concluded that “the current framework is outdated, inflexible, over-complex and insufficiently accountable or transparent”.  In essence, Sir David wanted solicitors-advocates to be regulated by his body and law firm barristers to be overseen by the Law Society.

The Legal Gazette article also gives reference to an issue I remember well, (and which thankfully jogged my memory.) In 2004, the Law Society approved the lifting of its ban on referral fees.  I recall this was a joy to many a claimant personal injury practitioner at the time. 

Thinking back, I was working in a medium-sized personal injury department for a high street firm of solicitors. We acted for claimants, and each handled a caseload of approximately 200 cases - the majority being RTA.  Even though we would sometimes get work from passing clients, most cases came via referrers.

This meant as a firm we could secure work and would be free to do so.  RTA was our focus and there was constant stream of this work available.   I remember thinking how problematic it could be without the ability to purchase cases. In fact, many an injury department would collapse.  At the end of a case, the file would simply be sent to a cost draftsman to prepare a bill and they would then send it to the paying party. Negotiations would follow, and an offer on costs would be accepted. Happy client, happy cost target, happy partners….

Of course, in the ever-changing legal landscape, most practitioners will be aware that all ‘good things’ must come to an end. The payment of referral fees was subsequently banned by Lord Jackson in September 2011. He believed referral fees had led to high costs and encouraged a compensation culture leading to the growth of an industry which pursues claimants for profits.  I recall the words used by the MOJ were “This feeds through to higher insurance premiums, and is unnecessarily forcing up the cost of living”.

20 years on – I’ll leave those words with you.