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Here is what the House of Commons had to say on the success rate of "specialists"

House of Commons
NHS Redress Bill

13 July 2006, column 1564

John Baron: ...The objective measure of the performance of so-called specialist lawyers is worth considering. In a letter to a member of the public dated 7 November 2002, the Legal Services Commission stated that, since August 1999, only specialist lawyers had been able to start new cases on legal aid. In 2000-01, the overall success rate in clinical negligence cases was 23 per cent. for specialist lawyers, and 24 per cent. for non-specialist lawyers.
According to a written answer to me on 17 January 2006, in the last year for which figures were available, the overall success rate for legally aided clinical [1565] negligence cases had remained at 23 per cent. The figures are revealing. First, they show that about five or six years ago, when ongoing legally aided clinical negligence cases had specialist and non-specialist lawyers, the performance of both categories of lawyers was roughly comparable. Secondly, even though legal aid was made available only to specialist lawyers in 1999, the figures show that there has been no improvement since then in excluding opportunistic and unsustainable claims.



6 November 2006, column 591

John Baron: Much has been made of the contribution of so-called specialist lawyers. The Minister referred to
“a specialist quality mark in clinical negligence.”—[ Official Report, 13 July 2006; Vol. 448, c. 1563.]
Policy and decision making must be based on evidence. I am not aware of evidence of better success rates of specialist lawyers.
The evidence that I have seen tends to show that their success is comparable to non-specialists. Action against Medical Accidents—AvMA—makes the following statement in its promotional literature:
“The evidence shows that specialist solicitors are much more likely to make an accurate assessment of the chances of success in claiming compensation for clinical negligence”.
I have asked AvMA to produce the evidence, which it has been unable to do. It should make it clear in its promotional literature that there is no evidence to substantiate its claims. I believe it will eventually be required to do that.

As a PI Lawyer we regularly run and win clinical negligence cases at a rates better than those above and we do not take three to five years and settle at full value.

PI lawyers can and should run clinical negligence cases.