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I am not sure there is anything "opaque" about the current rules, which have been largely unchanged since 1843.

The problem is that a large part of the legal profession have had little involvement in "billing" real clients for the best part of two decades as the majority of PI cases have been dealt with under CFAs, and they have no real experience of it. Likewise the costs profession.

LASPO has changed that and, for the first time since 1999, PI/clin neg clients are being asked to make significant contributions towards their legal fees and both solicitors and costs people (as well as many judges for the first time) are having to get to grips with the rules. It is only really the interaction with the post LASPO regime that has caused uncertainty over many of the Solicitors Act cases that we currently deal with (though a significant number of our cases are actually on much larger privately funded matters, where the application of the rules is much clearer).

What is needed in my view -

1. Guidance on what constitutes "the bill" in these cases (Parvez only decided what could not be a bill).

2. Guidance on disclosure of documents (the Hanley / Green appeals were heard yesterday afternoon I believe, so not far off)

3. A final decision one way or another on Herbert -v- HH Law