Cooke v Parker & Anor

A court may vacate and re-list a final hearing where the issues, evidence and submissions cannot fairly be accommodated within the available fixture. The assessment must be realistic and may take account of the time required for judicial reading, evidence, submissions, judgment preparation and consequential matters. The court must also balance the needs of the case against other cases requiring judicial time. Applications affecting absent or insufficiently notified parties should be deferred where it is no longer fair or necessary to determine them at short notice.

This was a pre-trial review in financial remedy proceedings. The final hearing had been listed for seven days, but the case had expanded substantially. The parties disputed conduct, a prenuptial agreement, the value of a company, the parties’ assets, and issues involving the husband’s adult sons. The court was also asked to consider an application for information and documents from the sons, who had received short notice and were not represented.

The central issues were whether the listed final hearing could fairly and realistically proceed within seven days, and whether the application involving the sons should be determined at that hearing.

1. The final hearing was vacated and re-fixed. The court concluded that the case could not be resolved fairly within the seven-day fixture. The assessment included two days of judicial reading, the oral evidence of the husband, wife and accountant, possible evidence from the adult sons, approximately one day of final submissions for each advocate, about two days for judgment writing, and a day for delivery of judgment and consequential matters.
2. The court’s responsibility to manage its calendar required it to consider the needs of other cases, including cases involving abducted children, children denied contact with parents, and a dying child. It was not appropriate to remove those cases from the list to enlarge the fixture. The final hearing was therefore re-fixed for 15 October 2018, when two clear weeks were available.
3. The application for information and documents from the husband’s sons was not determined at the review. One son had received the application only shortly beforehand and was moving house. In the circumstances, and because it was no longer fair or necessary to decide the matter at short notice, a further pre-trial review was fixed for 18 June 2018. Directions were to be given for consideration of the application at that hearing.
4. The judgment emphasised the exceptional scale and intensity of the litigation, including linked company and insurance proceedings and very substantial costs. Those circumstances reinforced the need for a realistic hearing estimate and careful case management.