Evidence

Investment banking existence of body of expertise capable of providing useful evidence court to regulate evidence by weight not admissibilityBarings Plc (in Liquidation) and...Investment banking existence of body of expertise capable of providing useful evidence court to regulate evidence by weight not admissibilityBarings Plc (in Liquidation) and Another v Coopers & Lybrand (a firm) and Others: ChD (Evans-Lombe J): 9 February 2001The claimants in two related actions brought by the liquidators of Barings Plc and various subsidiaries thereof against the auditors of Barings Bank in London and the auditors sister firm in Singapore, applied to strike out all or part of three expert reports filed by the defendants in relation to the conduct by the first claimant of a derivatives trading business through a subsidiary company (the second claimant) dealing on a futures market in Singapore known as SIMEX, on the basis that the relevant reports dealt with matters which were not properly the subject of expert evidence.Charles Aldous QC and Rhodri Davies QC (instructed by Slaughter and May) for the first claimant.

Michael Brindle QC and Craig Orr (instructed by Ashurst Morris Crisp) for the second claimant.

David Garland (instructed by Lovells) for the third party.

Mark Howard QC and John Lockey (instructed by Barlow Lyde & Gilbert) for the first defendant.

Richard Field QC and James Aldridge (instructed by Herbert Smith) for the second defendant.

Jonathan Gaisman QC, Christopher Butcher and David Bailey (instructed by Clifford Chance) for the third defendant.

Held, dismissing the application, that while the admissibility of expert evidence was now governed by section 3 of the Civil Evidence Act 1972, such a report was not automatically admissible solely by virtue of its coming within section 3 of the 1972 Act.

It must also be helpful to the court in arriving at its conclusions; that the modern view was to regulate such matters of evidence by weight, rather than admissibility, even where the evidence in question went to the ultimate issue in the case, and a trial judge could rely on such evidence provided that he did not lose sight of the fact that the final decision as to what was or was not negligence was for him alone; that if the experts description of the background facts were to be successfully challenged in cross-examination or the experts accounts were to be found to be overly tendentious or partisan, those findings would undermine the authority of the experts opinions in the eyes of the court; but that the claimants criticisms of the reports were not reasons for striking out any part of the reports at this stage.