Solicitors' charges vary enormously. The main factors are (1) geographical - where the lawyer is based - much higher in the City of London than more rural areas; (2) his or her experience - years in practice and speciality; and (3) the type of work.
The courts and Lord Chancellor's Department have developed a tariff of hourly rates which are used to assess what parties should pay when they lose a case. These are only a guide, and we expect to be able to recover at rather higher levels to reflect our experience and speciality. The courts have expressly endorsed this in one of our cases - for more information, see the discussion at the end of the judgment of the High Court in Plymouth City Airport. The Court of Appeal upheld that approach.
Understandably, clients therefore wonder if they win a case, and have costs ordered in their favour, why they should have to pay at all. The problem is that during litigation you will almost always end up doing work the costs of which for one reason or another cannot be recovered from the other side. The other side might, for example, object to the amount claimed, or extra work caused by overlap between two fee earners, or travelling to see the client where the client might have come to visit the solicitor, or what is perceived as excessive time spent on the case. Normally, doubt is resolved in favour of the paying party. This means in practice that if your bill is £x you will recover only a percentage of £x. This varies. We normally warn clients that they should expect a 70-80% recovery of the claim if successful. We hope and expect to do better than that; and, indeed, have achieved on occasion 100%. However, even with a 100% recovery of one's claim, there may be some costs which the client has to pay. For example, costs that you do not include in the claim because you know they are irrecoverable. Among these in particular (it is a real bugbear with clients!) the client's own costs of travelling, lost time etc. in pursuing the case. (These can be recovered in rare situations, such as where the client is offering expert evidence.)
The same factors of course affect exposure to the other side's costs. Usually solicitors in public bodies (including the Treasury Solicitor representing central government) charge at less than commercial rates, and their bills can appear relatively modest. Sometimes, however, they will employ outside solicitors and/or expensive barristers when the exposure can increase markedly, especially if those are London solicitors. As a litigant one's exposure is therefore uncertain. We normally suggest estimating the same costs for exposure to the other as one budget's for one's own side's case.
In judicial review work, one is often claiming against a decision-making authority, but another party (for example, a developer) who has benefited from the decision wishes to make representations in court to help the authority defend its decision. Such a party is called a "second respondent". Second respondents are often very well funded and employ expensive solicitors and barristers. Fortunately, however, they are not normally entitled to their costs from a losing party, although sometimes they will be awarded the costs of, for example, producing some evidence that has helped the court. Obviously the issue of possible exposure to a second respondent's costs in something that needs careful consideration, though normally it is not a problem. The point was clarified in one of our cases, where the Court of Appeal overturned a High Court ruling awarding a second set of costs against our client - see the Berkeley costs judgment for more details.
Current commercial rates for litigation are set out in the Terms of Business, available on request. As is normal practice, we record time on a six minute (=one tenth of an hour) basis. Our case management and accounts system enables us to provide a fully itemised breakdown of all time spent, so the level of fees charged is entirely transparent.
We are prepared to agree lower rates and/or rates on a daily basis for certain types of work, particularly appearing at or managing a public inquiry, where it does not make sense to charge on a strict time basis.
In conditional fees cases we will base our charges, and any success element, by reference to these rates.
Barristers tend to charge more on an item-by-item basis, although this will, of course, in fact tend to reflect time spent. However one can agree these fees in advance so the solicitor (and client) knows exactly where everyone stands.
Contrary to popular belief, it can be a lot more economical to have a barrister involved in the work at an early stage. Barristers' hourly rates are comparable to those of solicitors, though the structure of the bar (involving "junior" barristers divided in turn by experience between very junior, middle ranking, and senior, and "silks" - QCs) makes for some anomalies. When it comes to the hearing of a case the barrister will charge a fixed "brief" fee which reflects estimated preparation time and appearing in court for the first day. A daily "refresher" is charged thereafter.
Court fees for judicial review work in the High Court are modest and relatively insignificant in the context of costs generally. (Note - fees for other types of action, including statutory appeals and e.g. nuisance cases, are higher.) Fees increase somewhat in the Court of Appeal. In the House of Lords they become much more expensive - but then, by the time one gets there, so are the stakes generally. In our experience fees are not usually a determinative factor as to taking a case forward in any level of court.
VAT is chargeable on practically everything except court fees. A nice quirk of the VAT rules means, however, that if you lose and have to pay the costs of another party which is itself VAT registered (which most public body opponents are) you do not have to pay their VAT.
The crucial stage in a judicial review case is getting permission to proceed at all. Click on the judicial review procedure link for details of what is involved. How much time is spent and therefore how much it costs will depend on all sorts of factors - for example, complexity of the matter, the documents involved, meetings with the client, whether one makes a site visit and/or a visit to the decision maker's files, work prior to beginning the actual court proceedings, extent of counsel's involvement, level of counsel used, and so forth. Sometimes, owing usually to the need to act very quickly in this type of work, but having been approached at the 11th hour, one can physically lodge the bones of a claim in short order, so actually protecting the position is relatively cheap.
Costs therefore vary a lot but we usually advise clients to budget around £3,000-5,000 plus VAT for the permission stage. It can be lower - but seldom less than £1,500. Large, complex cases can take up more time and therefore can cost more.
These costs get you to the stage of the judge deciding on paper whether you have permission to proceed or not.
If you are refused permission but renew to an oral hearing, the costs of this will normally be in the region of £2,000 to £3,000 plus VAT including counsel's fees. Rules of court make it unlikely that you will be exposed to the other side's costs even if they turn up and successfully oppose you at the oral hearing. However you are exposed to the costs that the defending party has been put to in providing written so-called "summary grounds for contesting the claim". We have experience of a huge variability in the level of such claims and will give you more detailed advice if required, but these should be relatively small. It is sensible to budget a figure in the £1,000-2,000 bracket.
Once permission is granted, we normally estimate the costs from then on to the conclusion of a one-day hearing in the High Court at £10,000-15,000 a side. It can be more or less than this range, but this is a useful guide. The exact amount will again depend upon many factors, including what the other side says by way of evidence, what level of barristers are used and the complexity of the issues. For example, use of a QC in addition to one's junior barrister will increase costs to considerably above that bracket. The level of costs is something to keep under continual review. Our case management system enables this to be done easily.
All sorts of factors affect time spent and therefore costs of a case. These include complexity of the law, amount of documents, number of parties and advisors involved, etc. Meetings can be very time consuming. Clients can themselves help to keep costs down.
Costs in the Court of Appeal are of a similar level to the High Court, particularly if the High Court has not granted permission to appeal and one has to go through the process of seeking it from the Court of Appeal.
House of Lords costs are invariably higher, primarily owing to the procedural and documentary requirements, and, as mentioned, the level of court fees. Also, because it is a final court of appeal, one inevitably leaves no stone unturned in an effort to win the case.
Cases we have going to the ECJ are normally "referrals" from the national court - at whatever level - seeking a "preliminary ruling" i.e. clarification of a point of law. The costs are treated as costs in the national court.
If you win a case in Strasbourg, the ECHR will normally award you your costs against the UK Government. If you lose, however, you do not have to pay the government's costs. The level of costs is very much dependent on the circumstances of the individual case; initial costs are similar to an application for judicial review though normally it will have been necessary to have gone through the domestic process first.