GHS Global Hospitality Limited v Edward Anthony Beale & Ors

A claimant seeking permission to amend must plead an intelligible and apparently credible claim. The pleading must identify the alleged works, confidential information or database sufficiently for the defendants and the court to understand the case, assess the legal elements, and conduct disclosure and expert evidence proportionately. Confidentiality does not justify postponing essential particulars, although suitable arrangements may protect genuinely confidential material. Serious defects in particularisation may justify refusal of amendment and striking out for obstruction of the just disposal of proceedings. They do not necessarily establish abuse of process, failure to comply with pleading rules, absence of reasonable grounds, or a basis for summary judgment.

The claimant sought permission to amend claims against three defendants arising from alleged misuse and copying of software and business data acquired from Global Hospitality Services Limited. The proposed amended particulars alleged copyright infringement, breach of confidence, infringement of sui generis database rights and unlawful conspiracy against the first defendant, and copyright infringement against the second and third defendants.

The first defendant applied to strike out the pleading and for summary judgment. The second and third defendants opposed the proposed amendment on the basis that the copyright claim was insufficiently particularised. The central issues were whether the proposed pleading was intelligible and apparently credible, whether it disclosed reasonable grounds, and what procedural consequence should follow from its deficiencies.

1. Amendment. Permission to amend was refused. The court’s discretion was governed by the overriding objective. An amendment should identify an intelligible and apparently credible claim, and should not be allowed where it is liable to be struck out or summarily dismissed.
2. Copyright. The claimant had not identified the alleged copyright works, their authorship, the elements said to embody intellectual creation, or the alleged copying with sufficient precision. The absence of images or other means of identifying the works and comparing them with the alleged infringing software prevented assessment of originality and substantial copying. Where copyright in a database was alleged, the four-stage approach in Football Dataco v Brittens Pools required particulars enabling the court to analyse the relevant selection and arrangement.
3. Confidential information. The categories in Schedule A were excessively broad and insufficiently defined. A claimant must identify the confidential information sufficiently to enable the defendant to know the case to meet and to show, where appropriate, that parts of it are public knowledge. That requirement was not confined to cases involving oppression or interim injunctive relief. Confidentiality could be protected through appropriate arrangements, but it did not excuse inadequate pleading.
4. Database right. Although the definition of the Syncomate Database was workable, the pleading did not identify the relevant investment in obtaining, verifying or presenting its contents. The alleged infringement was also a bare and confused assertion.
5. Procedural consequences. The defects meant that the defendants could not fairly respond without Part 18 requests and that disclosure and expert evidence could not be properly focused. The pleading was therefore liable to obstruct the just disposal of the proceedings under CPR 3.4(2)(b). It was not, however, an abuse of process, did not fail CPR 16.4(1)(a), and did not disclose no reasonable grounds under CPR 3.4(2)(a). Summary judgment was inappropriate because properly pleaded claims could have realistic prospects of success.
6. The claim against the first defendant was not struck out in its entirety. The claimant was directed to review and re-plead its claims. If no new amended particulars were produced, the claim against the first defendant would be struck out.