Just when one would have come in handy, there is no practice direction to tell solicitors how, and when, the judges will impose sanctions for breaches of the pre-action protocols, the Civil Procedure Rules 1998 (CPR), practice directions or court orders.

But it will not be a free-for-all.Out with the oldThe court's starting point will be the over-riding objective in part one of the CPR.

The court must deal with cases justly and that involves concepts of expedition, fairness and proportionality.Yet the CPR are also a new procedural code which means that the old authorities dealing with, for instance, the striking out of a case for non-compliance with an 'unless order' are not going to help.

Old cases under old court rules with no place in a new regime.The strike outCPR r.3.4(2) is clear.

The court may strike out a statement of case - that is, any pleading, in present-speak - if there has been breach of a rule, practice direction or court order.Note the absence of reference in that list to the pre-action protocols.

Even if the court does not strike out the entire case, it may still 'exclude an issue from consideration'.For instance, a failure to file and serve an amended schedule of special damages, may well result in the cla im for special damages being struck out and the trial going ahead just on the issue of general damages.However, striking out by the court may not always be a proportionate response and sanctions should be aimed at preventing rather than punishing non-compliance.If the parties are to be encouraged to act reasonably and proportionately, it is right that the courts should also do so when applying sanctions.But it is with a big bang that the new regime will start off on 26 April 1999.

The lead in will not be gentle.

Judges will expect the same of advocates that day as they will six months later.The approach of the courts will be to start as they mean to carry on.

The chaos with automatic striking out under CCR Order 17, r.11 happened largely because the profession took two years to realise r.11 existed.The ensuing debacle must never be allowed to happen again.

Of course, there are always differences of view and two judges might deal with the same situation in slightly different ways.

Nevertheless, solicitors should not expect any quarter or believe that just because a decision was tough it can be successfully appealed.Striking out may be the draconian response to non-compliance but 'unless orders' should often be expected first time around.

Take, for example, a failure to serve a list of documents on time.

The court is likely to make an 'unless order' with costs summarily assessed and payable two weeks later.Equally importantly, the solicitor's client against whom the costs order was made has to be told what happened in writing unless the client was present (r.44.2).Furthermore, repeated failure to comply with the CPR and practice directions could also deprive a client who is ultimately successful of some of his costs at the end of the case (r.44.3(5)(c)).The philosophy behind this approach is to encourage the solicitor to serve the list, or whatever it may be, to do what he ought to have done and to get on with resolving the particular case.Protocol defaultWhat will the court do in the event of the failure by one party to comply with a pre-action protocol? The approved protocols on personal injury claims and clinical negligence claims were published on 29 January 1999, so the courts will be applying them from 26 April 1999.

By then three months will have passed.

If it is the claimant who has failed to comply, the court will almost certainly give the defendant more time to file a defence, if that is needed.But other sanctions could include an order under r 3.1(5) to make a payment into court, deprival of pre-action costs or even a deprival of interest on any monetary award subsequently made in the client's favour.

And if a claimant in a personal injury case goes off before proceedings and obtains an expert's report without following the protocol, thus depriving the defendant of the option of agreeing on a single expert to be jointly instructed, the claimant's expert's report may well be disregarded and the cost of obtaining it disallowed.Where the defendant fails to comply with a protocol, possible sanctions will include a judgment in default but, more likely, would be an order which puts the defendant under pressure to catch up.Such an order will itself be backed with sanctions should there be additional non-compliance.

Or an expert's report may be excluded from evidence.

Or a deep-pocket defendant, such as an insurer, may be ordered to make a payment into court under r 3.1(5).PD on PAPMost of the practice directions follow the relevant part of the CPR in The Stationary Office printed version of the civil justice documents.Tucked away in volume two after the two protocols is the practice direction on the protocols themselves.

It is worthy of a read, before 26 April.Paragraph 4 says the court will expect the same pre-action behaviour from parties not covered by a protocol, as the court will expect in cases where one exists.

The spirit of the protocols will therefore always apply, whatever the case.ReliefAny sanction imposed for failure to comply with a rule, practice direction or court order has effect unless the defaulting party applies for and obtains relief from the sanction.Where a rule, practice direction or court order requires something to be done within a particular time and sanctions are specified for non-compliance then the time for doing whatever it may be cannot be extended by agreement between the parties (r.3.8(3)).The defaulting party must apply to the court for relief from the sanction.

Even if relief is granted - and that cannot be taken as read - the costs of the application for relief will almost certainly have to be borne by the defaulting party.

The checklist the court will apply when asked to grant relief from a sanction is to be found at r 3.9(1).If all parties fail to file allocation questionnaires then the court will usually make an order that those questionnaires be filed within three days, backed up with a strike out sanction.

If all parties fail to file listing questionnaires a similar order will normally be made.But one sanction, and one sanction only, is mandatory under the CPR.

If the claimant fails to pay a court fee due on the filing of an allocation or listing questionnaire despite an 'unless order' requiring him to do so, the claim will be struck out.