Solicitors have mastered the Civil Procedure Rules 1998 (CPR).

My guess is that procedural applications have reduced by 75%.

Part 36 offers to settle have substantially changed the conduct of proceedings.

Statements of case, particularly those drafted by solicitors, are much better than the old pleadings.

The shift from separate to jointly instructed expert has been quicker and more positive than I believed to be likely.

Encouragingly, there have been few procedural appeals from district judges to designated civil judges or to the Court of Appeal.

These factors have struck me forcibly.Allocation questionnaires'The court will seek whenever possible to give directions .

.

.

without the need for a hearing to take place.' That is PD 28 para 2.2 dealing with the fast track.

The multi-track PD 29 para 3 is less prescriptive.

In the majority of cases the court should be able to give comprehensive directions whether of its own initiative or as agreed by the parties and approved by the court.

It is essential that solicitors should supply enough information to ensure that the district judge can see their problems.

Empathy with the district judge should work wonders.

A letter that summarises the points in issue is always helpful, as is a proposed form of directions and an attempt at least to agree those directions with the other parties before they have been lodged.

An explanation as to why any non-standard directions are appropriate is wiseIn my court there have been few allocation hearings or case management conferences (CMCs) in fast track cases.

Where directed, the commonest reasons have been an unrepresented litigant or the existence of or quest for an apparently disproportionate number of experts.

On the multi-track, directions of the fast track kind have been given in as many claims as possible.

A CMC has been directed where the value or complexity of the claim or number of parties has made it proportionate to do so.Home ground advantageProceedings can issue out of any court unless a special rule applies (for example, PD 7B for consumer credit claims).

Unless the claimant intends to apply for summary judgment, there is no point in issuing in their home court if the parties all live in the district of another court.

In the fast track, procedural applications should be rare and so solicitor home court convenience is unlikely to be relevant.

The court, of its own initiative, ought to transfer a defended claim to the trial court that is most convenient to the witnesses.

Justice in the county court should be local (r 30.3).

If a party's solicitor fails to ask for a transfer in the allocation questionnaire and the district judge gives directions in the court of issue and a trial date is fixed, it may be too late to secure a transfer at listing questionnaire stage.

A transfer would then postpone the trial and that is an event of the last resort (PD 28 para 5.4).No score draw - automatic transfer ping pongWhere the claim is for a specified sum of money and is against an individual but was commenced in a court other than the defendant's home court, it will be automatically transferred there when a defence is filed.

If the defendant's solicitor has signed the defence, their home court will be treated as the defendant's home court.

There has to be a re-:transfer if the court of issue or another court is more convenient in view of the witnesses' addresses.

Everybody finds transfers irritating: they waste time and lead to muddle.

With some forethought, transfers can be anticipated and avoided.Case management breakdownThe court may strike out a statement of case if it appears to the court that it discloses no reasonable grounds for bringing or defending the claim (r 3.4).

Unfortunately, the court staff will rarely know sufficient about the claim or defence to refer it to the district judge to consider exercising the strike out power.

This means that if the defendant states 'I don't owe the money' at the top of the defence form, the document will probably be treated as a defence by the staff and allocation questionnaires sent out without any judicial intervention at that stage.

Worse, the automatic transfer rule may apply (see above) and cause even more delay.

In this situation, it is suggested that the claimant's solicitor ignores the allocation questionnaire and request for the allocation fee and writes to the court ask ing for the case to be referred to the district judge.

Only if the district judge refuses to strike out will consideration need to be given to an application for summary judgment under part 24 and the filing of the allocation questionnaire.New words for old - disposal hearingsPD 26 para 12 applies to an order or judgment which requires the amount of money to be paid by one party to another to be decided by the court.

In personal injury claims under the new regime, the number of admissions of negligence and consents to judgment with apportioned liability have increased substantially.

In a personal injury claim, where the defence admits negligence, the court may use its case management powers to give judgment of its own initiative.

At the disposal - the old assessment hearing - the defendant can raise any point going to quantification of damage, causation being the most common (Lunnan v Singh The Times 19 July 1999).

If the claim would have been allocated to the small claims track had it been defended, the court will normally allocate it to that track for the disposal (see [2000] Gazette, 27 January, 36).If the value of the damages only-claim takes the case outside the small claims track, PD 26 intends the quantification of damages should be made at the disposal hearing.

Most practitioners ask in their allocation questionnaires for a damages-only claim to be allocated to a track.

Disposals procedure will more often than not make allocation unnecessary.

Of course, at some point the weight of the damages may justify allocation to the multi track of a damages only claim.

Courts will vary as to where they draw the line.These are some of the advantages of the disposal hearing (without a tracking) direction:-- The fast and multi-track case management PDs will not apply and so, for example, no listing questionnaire needs to be filed and, it is suggested, no listing fee is payable.-- The court can give any appropriate other directions.

Some claims can be listed immediately for disposal: others may be listed for a CMC 12 months later by which time the claimant will have undergone and recovered from surgery.-- The fast track fixed trial costs will not apply to the disposal hearing and these costs will have to be proportionate to the issues that the court decides.-- In the Royal Courts of Justice, the masters anticipate quantifying the damages in claims that do not exceed £250,000 or take longer than two days to hear.

This practice is followed in many provincial trial centres.If judgment is entered for damages to be decided before allocation - by default, admission or consent - remember that the district judge will not know the issues to be determined or the state of the evidence.

The claimants' solicitor should supply information about the state of preparation of the case.

Suggested directions are helpful or otherwise a CMC should be requested.If liability is agreed after the claim has been allocated to a track, the court should be asked to rescind the allocation and changes to the timetable should be suggested.