Edward Hicks, led by Paul Darling KC, appeared for Blue Manchester Ltd in its application to strike out and/or require the amendment of large parts of the Second Defendant’s trial witness statements for various failures to comply with Practice Direction 57AC. HHJ Stephen Davies ordered an extensive re-working of the statements on an “unless” basis.

“The case underlines the importance of compliance with PD57AC, in particular by ensuring that trial witness statements are written in the first person and in the witnesses’ own words, that the quality of the witnesses’ recollection of (objectively) important matters of fact is stated and memory refreshing documents are identified, that the source of matters of information or belief is identified. They should avoid taking the court through or deriving a narrative from documents, commenting on other evidence or advancing argument or submission, reference to documents being limited to that which is relevant and necessary

A copy of the of a judgement is available here.