Camran Mirza v Mark Lewin & Ors

A stay of enforcement under CPR 83.7 requires special circumstances or inability to pay. Commercial disadvantage alone is insufficient unless there is a realistic prospect that the position will improve within a reasonable period, or a successful appeal creates a material risk of injustice.

Where the relevant order is not itself under appeal, a possible challenge to the order’s foundation does not ordinarily justify a stay. The court may grant a short temporary stay to permit an application for permission to appeal.

An examination order is not itself an enforcement order and may remain appropriate despite a stay, although its implementation may be stayed. Charging-order applications may be adjourned where insufficient notice and potential prejudice, including an event of default, require fuller consideration.

The judgment concerned consequential enforcement applications arising from an earlier judgment dismissing Mr Mirza’s Part 20 claim against three directors and a subsequent interim costs order of £1.3 million in their favour.

Mr Mirza sought stays of enforcement pending appeals in the related main action, a stay or variation of an examination order requiring him to answer questions about his means, and relief from charging-order applications over land and securities. He argued that the pending appeals, procedural-unfairness ground, financial consequences, existing asset-preservation undertakings and alleged failures of disclosure justified relief.

The central issues were whether the circumstances justified a stay, whether the examination order should be set aside or varied, and whether the charging-order applications should proceed.

1. Stay applications. The applications for stays until determination of the appeals in the main action were refused. The relevant costs order and Part 20 claim were not under appeal. The alleged funding relationship between Mr Morjaria and the directors did not justify a stay, particularly since the evidence showed that the interim payment would not simply return to Mr Morjaria.
2. Commercial disadvantage in realising property assets was not, by itself, a sufficient special circumstance under CPR 83.7. Such circumstances may justify a stay where there is a specific and realistic prospect that assets can be sold or refinanced at a proper value within a reasonable period, or where a successful appeal creates a material risk of injustice. The anticipated improvement in Mr Mirza’s position was too uncertain and was balanced by the possibility of further adverse liabilities.
3. Applying the balance-of-injustice approach associated with Hammond Suddard Solicitors v Agrichem International Holdings Ltd, the court accepted that a stay would have been appropriate if the Part 20 claim itself were under appeal. A possible future appeal did not have that effect. A short stay was nevertheless granted to allow Mr Mirza to seek late permission to appeal the Part 20 decision on procedural-unfairness grounds. If an application was lodged within one week, the stay would continue until the Court of Appeal determined whether permission would be granted.
4. Examination order. The application to set aside or vary the examination order was dismissed. The information already provided was incomplete and insufficient, and the asset-preservation undertakings did not remove the directors’ need to understand what assets were available for enforcement. Following Sucden Financial v Fluxo-Cane, an examination order is not itself part of the enforcement process. Its implementation was, however, stayed as part of the general temporary stay.
5. Charging orders. The court considered the case for charging orders strong, but adjourned and stayed the applications. The limited notice, lack of oral argument, possible event of default under the financing facility, and prejudice to other shareholders and creditors required fuller consideration. The applications were to be heard as soon as practicable after the temporary stay expired.
6. The parties were directed to agree an order. Costs were reserved for determination on paper.

This was a first-instance consequential judgment. It arose from the earlier substantive judgment, [2025] EWHC 1961 (Ch), and the August 2025 interim costs order. Permission to appeal aspects of the main action was granted by Newey LJ, but permission to appeal the Part 20 claim and the interim costs order had not been granted.