Part 36 Offers - Life After The Court Of Appeal's Decision In C v D

Eighteen months after Rawlison Butler LLP won its application in the leading Court of Appeal case of C v D, Michael Axe from our Commercial Disputes Team looks at how the Court of Appeal's decision has been applied to other cases involving Part 36 Offers and what the future may hold.

The Court of Appeal's decision in C v D [2011] EWCA Civ 646 (27 May 2011) was arguably the most important case dealing with Part 36 Offers in recent years (see our earlier article, Part 36 offers - Rawlison Butler wins important Court of Appeal decision, for more details). Perhaps unsurprisingly therefore, in the eighteen months since the Court of Appeal delivered its judgment, its decision has been cited in a number of other cases that have considered the interpretation of the rules governing "Part 36" settlement offers.

Giving effect to the Offeror's intentions

For example, in the case of Howell & others v Lees-Millais & others, the Court of Appeal applied the principles from C v D to confirm that, wherever possible, a settlement offer which is clearly intended to be a Part 36 Offer should be interpreted in such a way as to give effect to that intention. This approach was also followed by the Court of Appeal in the later case of Epsom College v Pierce Contracting Southern Ltd.

The decision in Howell & others v Lees-Millais & others arguably went even further than the decision in C v D by suggesting that, where...