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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> England and Wales High Court (King's Bench Division) Decisions >> Paisley v Linehan [2025] EWHC 624 (KB) (17 March 2025) URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/KB/2025/624.html Cite as: [2025] EWHC 624 (KB)

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IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
KING'S BENCH DIVISION
MEDIA AND COMMUNICATIONS LIST

		Royal Courts of Justice Strand, London, WC2A 2LL
		17/03/2025

This judgment was handed down remotely at 10.30am on 17 March 2025 by circulation to the parties or their representatives by e-mail and by release to the National Archives.

Aidan Eardley :

1. This is my third judgment in this claim for libel and other matters. It follows on from my First Judgment ([2024] EWHC 1976 (KB)) in which I determined certain preliminary issues in respect of most of the statements complained of, and my Second Judgment ([2025] EWHC 228 (KB)), in which I addressed some further statements complained of that I had not been in a position to address fairly on the first occasion. Interested readers can glean the background to the claim from my first two judgments and I adopt the terminology used in those judgments where appropriate.
2. This Third Judgment concerns costs. The Defendant submits that the Claimant is to blame for the fact that I was unable to decide all the issues in my First Judgment and should therefore pay the Defendant's costs of preparing for and conducting the hearing which resulted in my Second Judgment. The Claimant submits that I should order "costs in the case" as is usual following a trial of preliminary issues (TPI). My decision is based on the written submissions of the parties. It was not necessary to hold a further hearing.

Procedural history

3. I start with the Amended Particulars of Claim dated 8 February 2023 (APOC). They complain of 7 "publications" consisting of articles posted by the Defendant on the Defendant's Substack and comments posted by third parties. I am concerned here with what has been referred to as "Publication 4". At paragraphs 6-6.4 it is pleaded that the Defendant published on 24 October 2021 and continues to publish an article (referred to as "Item 4"), which has been recently changed to remove a photograph of the Claimant ("Item 4a"). For present purposes it is not necessary to distinguish between the 2 versions and I refer to them collectively as the Article. At paragraph 6.5 it is pleaded that, below the Article, the Defendant published or caused to be published a number of responses from his subscribers. In paragraphs 6.5-6.8 some 11 such comments are listed (as well as 3 responses from the Defendant himself). They are dated between 24 and 28 October 2021 (the precise times are not given) and, save for one comment, which is said to have been deleted at an unspecified time, the implication is that the Claimant is complaining of the publication of all these comments from the date of their first publication and continuing. The comments are set out in chronological order but paragraph 6.5.2 notes that readers also had the option to have the comments displayed by reference to the number of likes received ("Top First") or in reverse chronological order. It is pleaded that some of these 14 comments could only be viewed if the reader clicked a "show more" button. The 14 comments are said to have been "amongst a total of 54 comments".
4. At paragraph 6.10, the APOC state:

6.10 The statement complained of comprises:

6.10.1 the article set out at paragraphs 6-6.4, as originally published (Item 4a) and/or as currently published (Item 4), and/or

6.10.2 the comments/replies (or one or more of them) set out at paragraphs 6.5, 6.6, 6.7, and/or 6.8 above (set out, in their context, in Items 4b, 4c and/or 4d)

And/or

6.10.3 the article and comments/replies when read together.

5. Paragraph 10.4 of the APOC then pleads a meaning for this "statement", namely that the "Claimant is a paedophile…", and some alternative meanings, (e.g. that "the Claimant is an aider and abettor of paedophilia"). There is no distinction drawn between meanings that might be taken from the Article read alone and meanings that might be taken from individual comments, or combinations of different comments or combinations of the Article and one or more comments.
6. Paragraph 11 of the APOC states that "the statements [i.e. all of "publications 1-7"] and their relevant context are set out in Annex 3…No links are relied upon as context beyond what is set out in these Particulars of Claim and in Annex 3". Annex 3, so far as relevant contains "Item 4" (the Article); "Item 4a" (the Article as recently changed to remove the Claimant's photograph); "Item 4b" setting out the comments that were (ultimately) visible to a reader looking at them in chronological order but without clicking the "load more" button; "Item 4c" being the same as Item 4b but also showing the additional comments that a reader, viewing the comments in chronological order, would ultimately have seen had they clicked the "load more" button; and "Item 4d" showing the comment that was originally posted and then deleted.
7. The Defence paragraph 6 pleads some detail about how comments are displayed on the Defendant's Substack, including that a reader who "clicks through" to read the comments has a choice about the order in which they will be displayed. Paragraph 38 essentially admits APOC para 6.5.2 but adds that, as well as options to display comments in chronological, reverse chronological and "top first" order, a user of the Defendant's Substack would have other options by which to order the comments as well. At 38.6, the Defence notes that, "Sub-paragraph 6.10 pleads a series of different statements complained of but paragraph 10.4 fails to identify any difference(s) in the meaning complained of depending upon which of those statements is being relied upon". Then, at 38.7 it is stated that "The Defendant will rely upon the entirety of the article and (to the extent that the Claimant relies upon comments, upon all comments visible at the material time)". The "material time" is not defined. Paragraph 40 then goes on to plead a single meaning in respect of "the statement complained of".
8. The Reply denies that there are any ways of viewing the comments except in chronological, reverse chronological, or "top first" order. At paragraph 42(b) (responding to the observation in paragraph 38.6 of the Defence), the Claimant states that "The meanings (and alternatives) pleaded at paragraph 10.4 APOC apply to the statement complained of, and paragraph 6.10 APOC identifies the statement complained of, and alternatives as to what the relevant publication includes. Accordingly, the Claimant's case is that the meaning remains the same regardless of what combination of paragraph 6.10.1-3 the ordinary reader is treated to have read (i.e., regardless of what combination of paragraph 6.10.1-3 are relied upon as forming the statement complained of)".
9. I understand that a TPI had been applied for in 2022 (before the APOC were filed) but that this was refused by Griffiths J because of a concern about potential disputes over what should count as relevant contextual material when determining meaning etc. After service of the Reply, the idea of a TPI was revived. The Claimant has shown me correspondence between July 2023 and January 2024. In these exchanges, the Claimant consistently took the position that, since there had been no challenge to paragraph 11 of the APOC, there was now no dispute that the relevant context for each statement complained of was the material set out in Annex 3. By contrast, the Defendant, while not engaging with this argument, consistently contended for a provision in the order for a TPI directing that the hearing bundle should contain "any relevant contextual material (to be agreed if possible; if disputed by one party, it should be identified as such)." This stand-off continued until a hearing before Master Gidden in April 2024 when, the Claimant tells me (and the Defendant does not dispute), the agreed position presented to the Court was that "there was no dispute about context anymore; and that there will be issues about the words complained of depending on what further words have been added which are issues that can be considered for the TPI". Master Gidden therefore ordered the TPI to go ahead with the bundle limited to the statements of case and his order.
10. In his skeleton for the July 2024 hearing, the Claimant addressed the meaning of the Article. He then continued "the meaning and alternatives pleaded at APOC, para 10.4 are conveyed by the article alone, and with the comments…The comments are not relied on for any distinct meanings. In this regard, C's approach to publication 4 corresponds to that of D…".
11. The Defendant's skeleton argument said, "C's approach [of pleading a combination of different "statements" and attaching one meaning] is problematic in that it necessarily implies both that each of the statements pleaded at [6.10.1] and [6.10.2] (which are manifestly distinct in nature and text) bear the same meaning, and that when these statements are combined they also bear that same meaning. This is not understood." It continued, "An additional issue is how (if at all) the deletion of the comment quoted at APoC [6.6]( …or the challenge by D which prompted its removal) are said to bear on C's pleaded meaning…".
12. The extent to which the parties were in fact at odds about how to approach the comments emerged more clearly in the course of the July 2024 hearing. I explained in my First Judgment at [60]-[72] why I considered it impossible to give rulings in respect of the comments. I made an order dated 1 August 2024, in terms agreed between the parties, setting out a process to be followed should the Claimant wish to pursue his case in respect of any of these comments. The Order also stated "Costs of the Preliminary issues in the Case" and provided that "The costs incurred in any steps taken pursuant to paragraph 2 above [i.e. the process I had set out] be reserved to the hearing/determination of the Preliminary Issues in relation to the Comments".
13. On 4 September 2024, pursuant to the process set out in my Order of 1 August 2024, the Claimant filed a further statement of case (CFSOC). The CFSOC indicated an intention to seek rulings on 4 of the comments. It treated each comment as a separate statement. It put forward 3 alternatives as to what counted as context for each comment, variously "any thread in which the comment post is published", additionally the Article (although the Claimant's primary case was that the article was not admissible context because it would not be seen by all readers), and/or additionally "all the comment posts published when the [statement complained of] was published (regardless of whether they appeared above the [statement complained of]". This latter alternative case appeared to be at odds with CFSOC paragraph 18 where it was stated "What, if any, comment posts are seen beyond the thread in which the [statement complained of] is published, and in what order, depends on the variables set out in the preceding section in terms of how the comments post is accessed and the options selected. It is therefore not part of the publication and/or relevant context." An annexe was provided, identifying the time of the comments complained of and those other comments that the Claimant contended were or might be relevant context. The CFSOC also contained a lengthy pleading as to how Substack comments work.
14. The Defendant's further statement of case in response (DFSOC) disputed aspects of the Claimant's account of how Substack comments work. It invited the Court to treat, as context for each of the statements complained of, any thread in which the statement appears, the Article, and "such other comments as would have appeared above/before the specific comment complained of (ie those which a reader would have had to pass over to reach the comment complained of)".
15. Both parties were therefore relying on comments that fell outside the thread in which one of the statements complained of appeared (a "thread" being a sub-group of closely related comments consisting of replies and retorts triggered by a particular comment). Yet the disputes about how Substack comments worked meant that there was no consensus as to which of these allegedly contextual comments would have been seen by all readers, or all readers at any particular point in time.
16. Having considered correspondence from the parties, I directed a further hearing. The Claimant had now identified 4 comments as distinct statements complained of, but it was clear that there remained substantial disputes about what should be regarded as context and that those were in some respects insoluble while there remained a dispute about how Substack displayed comments. It would not have been possible for me to fairly resolve these disputes purely on the contents of the Further Statements of Case.
17. In the early hours of 18 January 2025, the Claimant sent the Defendant a draft of a proposed agreed document called "How comment posts work on Substack – draft agreed explanatory document" aimed at resolving the outstanding disagreements that were apparent from the CFSOC and DFSOC. The Defendant, having consulted an IT specialist, raised some objections but ultimately agreed the substance of the Claimant's draft and it was finalised on 24 January 2025 (reaching me the next day, about 30 minutes before the hearing). To summarise this very dense document, the salient points that emerge are as follows: (a) Substack comments can be viewed in a variety of different ways and whether or not a reader viewing one particular comment will also see some other comment will depend on a number of variables, including – if they are viewing it on the comments page of the Substack website - the settings they have chosen; (b) when viewing comments on the comments page of the Substack website, readers will initially be given access to 16 comments (and associated threads) selected according to their settings, and will then be given a "load more" button, allowing them to choose to see additional comments; (c) there is an exception to this high degree of variability in that, when a reader views a "thread", it will always display the initial comment and the responses and retorts in the thread in chronological order, regardless of how the reader is viewing the thread and what settings they had chosen.
18. In short, what this explanatory document established was that a comment could only be safely regarded as relevant context for one of the comments complained of if it appeared in the same thread as the comment complained of and was visible there at the same time as the comment complained of. Other comments (i.e. those made in relation to the Article but not forming part of the same thread as the comment complained of) fell to be disregarded, because the variability in the way that other comments might be displayed makes it impossible to say that all readers would have seen them (or that they should be deemed to be part of a single "publication"), even during a particular time period.
19. At the same time as sending the draft proposed explanatory document (i.e. the early hours of 18 January 2025) the Claimant also sent the Defendant an amended further statement of case (CAFSOC). The CAFSOC reduced the number of comments complained of from 4 to 3 and made various other adjustments. The primary case on context now advanced by the Claimant was that the only admissible contextual material was the content of any thread in which the comment complained of appeared (but not other comments outside that thread) and (in a reversal of his previous primary case) the Article. The CAFSOC continued to run an alternative case that all the comments that had been published by the time that one of the comments complained of was published were relevant context for that comment (regardless of how they were displayed) notwithstanding the repetition, at paragraph 18 of the CAFSOC, of an averment that comments falling outside a particular thread could not be regarded as admissible context.
20. The Defendant responded to the CAFSOC in his skeleton argument. The Defendant accepted that comments within the same thread could be considered as context for any comment within that thread (where those comments and the comment complained of were visible at the same time) and relinquished reliance on other comments (i.e. those falling outside the thread).
21. At the hearing, the Claimant did not press his alternative case. He confined his case on context to the Article itself and (in respect of the two comments that formed part of a thread) the other comments in the thread.
22. Following the hearing on 25 January 2025, I was finally able to rule on the preliminary issues in relation to the three remaining comments of which complaint was made. See my Second Judgment.
23. It is fair to say that, in the correspondence I have been shown between August 2024 and January 2025, it was the Claimant who was taking the initiative, first to agree a methodology for identifying the specific time at which a comment was posted and second, in exploring the workings of the Substack comment feature.

Legal principles

Pleading statements and context

24. I have touched on this in my First and Second Judgments but it is convenient to restate the principles here.
25. In a libel action, it is entirely up to the claimant to decide what statement (i.e. set of words and images) they wish to complain about. Once they have made that choice, CPR PD 53 para 4.2 (reflecting long-established common law rules) sets out how it must be pleaded:

4.2 The claimant must set out in the particulars of claim –

(1) the precise words of the statement complained of […]

(2) when, how and to whom the statement was published […]

(3) the facts and matters relied upon in order to satisfy the requirement of section 1 of the Defamation Act 2013 [serious harm […]

(4) the imputation(s) which the claimant alleges that the statement complained of conveyed […]

26. Before an effective TPI can take place, there must be clarity not only as to what statement or statements the Claimant is complaining about, but also as to the contextual material (if any) that needs to be taken into account in order to determine the preliminary issues. Admissible contextual material consists of (a) matters of common knowledge; (b) any additional text or images that, for the purposes of the rule in Charleston v News Group Newspapers Ltd [1995] 2 AC 65, constitute the "publication" within which the statement complained of is situated; and (c) any further extraneous material that could reasonably be expected to be read by all publishees, or at least all publishees during an identified time period: see Riley v Murray [2020] EMLR 20 at [16]-[17] (Nicklin J) and my Second Judgment at [23]-[26].
27. A party who wishes to rely on contextual material must identify it in their statement of case: Hijazi v Yaxley-Lennon [2020] EWHC 934 (QB) at [14] (Nicklin J). If a party wishes to rely on contextual material that was only available during a certain time period, then they will have to identify the time period and aver that, during that time period, it fell to be treated as part of the "publication" (in the Charleston sense) or would have been read by all publishees during that time period: see my Second Judgment at [27(2)].

Costs of TPIs

28. The usual order for costs following a TPI in a libel claim is "costs in the case": there may be no clear winner and, even if there is, that party may not ultimately win at trial. In a case where all issues are dealt with in a single trial, issue-based costs orders relating to meaning (etc) would rarely be made and the situation should be no different just because the Court has brought forward the determination of those issues to a TPI. However, a different approach may be appropriate where a party has adopted an unreasonable stance that has caused unnecessary costs to be expended (e.g. by running an argument on meaning that was hopeless as a matter of law): see Sharif v Associated Newspapers Ltd [2021] EWHC 343 (QB) at [41]-[47] (Nicklin J).

The Parties' submissions

29. I deal with the Defendant's case first, since that is the agreed order in which I received submissions. Mr McCormick KC submits that all of the costs involved in preparing for and conducting the January 2025 hearing should be paid by the Claimant because they are attributable to the Claimant's failure properly to plead and present his case in advance of the hearing in July 2024. He submits that this is obvious from the additional pleading that the Claimant felt constrained to include in the CFSOC and then the CAFSOC. He complains also about the lateness of the CAFSOC which, he says, included significant changes to the Claimant's case and only arrived once a considerable amount of work had been done in preparing to meet the case set out in the CAFSOC.
30. For the Claimant, Miss Skinner KC submits that I should make the usual "costs in the case" order. She says that the Claimant's stance on the issue of meaning was a reasonable one (unlike the example given in Sharif). She accepts that the parties share responsibility for the fact that I was unable to deal with the comments in my First Judgment but argues that this does not justify a departure from the usual order. She points out that the Defendant did not articulate a challenge to the adequacy of the Claimant's pleaded case until immediately before the July 2024 hearing and neither was he in a position to assist with the factual issues surrounding the workings of Substack, which he could have investigated just as well or better than the Claimant. She says that the defects that I identified in APOC paragraph 6.10 in my First Judgment were not causative of the problems that arose because the real problem was the lack of an agreed position on what counted as relevant context, not the definition of "the statement complained of". She invites the inference that the Defendant simply did not foresee or appreciate these difficulties. She says that this undermines the Defendant's stance that the Claimant should be punished for unreasonable conduct. She emphasises that, once a further process to address the comments became necessary, it was the Claimant who took the initiative in terms of putting the Court in a position where it could make a fair determination, and that the Defendant was less than co-operative in that exercise.

Discussion and conclusions

31. In my judgement this is a case in which it is appropriate to depart from the usual approach set out in Sharif. As I have already explained in paragraph 2 of my Second Judgment, I was unable to complete my task following the July 2024 hearing because the parties' cases in respect of the comments were too unclear. That lack of clarity lay both in the pleadings and in the factual uncertainty as to how Substack comments appeared to readers (and hence which comments would have been seen by all readers and could qualify as admissible context). It was unreasonable to put the Court in this position and it led to a wholly avoidable second hearing and all the costs associated with preparing for and attending it. The case for a discrete and immediate costs order of some sort is much stronger than in the example given in Sharif. In that hypothetical scenario, the Court had at least managed to complete its task of determining the preliminary issues, albeit that the process had cost more because of a party taking an unreasonable stance. In the present case, the conduct of the parties meant that I could not complete my task.
32. The possible orders that fall to be considered are (a) an order that each party bear their own costs of this exercise (which would be appropriate if I took the view that they bore equal responsibility) and (b) an order that one party pay all or a proportion of the other party's costs (which would be appropriate if I were to conclude that one party had behaved more unreasonably than the other, or that their unreasonable conduct had a greater causative effect).
33. In my judgement, it is the Claimant who must accept the bulk of the responsibility for the difficulties that arose in this case. The problem started with the APOC (not pleaded by Miss Skinner). It was not permissible to describe the "statement complained of" in the multiple alternative ways that were pleaded in APOC 6.10. It is the Claimant's duty to choose what set of words (or sets of words) he wants to complain about and identify them clearly. The Court has no role in choosing between alternative formulations so long as each statement and its publication is properly identified in accordance with CPR PD 53 para 4.2. The Claimant's approach was doubly objectionable here because, in some of his formulations of "the statement complained of", important elements of that "statement" changed over the period of publication, as comments were added and deleted. That made it impossible to comply with CPR 4.2(2) which requires the Claimant to specify "when…the statement was published".
34. I discern, from Reply paragraph 42, that what the Claimant may have been trying to do here was to put forward alternative cases as to what the "publication" (in the Charleston sense) consisted of, i.e. what should be considered as relevant context. But that is a separate and distinct pleading task that comes after the initial and critical step of identifying the statement or statements on which a claimant founds their case. Running the two things together creates confusion and obstructs the fair disposal of proceedings.
35. In my judgement, the only acceptable way to advance a case founded on the comments would have been to identify each comment of which complaint is made as a separate "statement complained of", for which proper particulars of the dates of publication could then be given. Had this been done, it would have brought into sharp focus the question of what could qualify as admissible contextual material for any individual comment. For this reason, I reject Miss Skinner's submission that the unhappy pleading of APOC 6.10 was a red herring, unrelated to the problems that ensued. It was the root cause of them.
36. APOC paragraph 11 is also objectionable in that it purports to identify as relevant context all the comments posted in relation to the Article over a period of some 4 days, including comments that could only be accessed by a reader clicking the "load more" button. That is not a pleading that discloses reasonable grounds for reliance on these 54 comments as context. First, some of these comments will obviously not have been available to all readers during the period of publication complained of, because they will have postdated the particular comment complained of and will therefore not have been seen by readers who read the comment complained of close to the time it was initially posted. Second, the multifarious ways in which comments may be displayed and the fact that this is sometimes contingent on a reader pressing a "load more" button, mean that, even in relation to a particular point in time, it is impossible to say that all these comments would have been seen by all readers. Only comments that formed part of the same thread as the comment complained of could sensibly be relied upon as admissible context. That was indeed the position the parties reached at the January 2025 hearing. I accept that, once the difficulty came to light at the July 2024 hearing, the Claimant went to considerable lengths to clarify the factual position, but this is really just mitigation. The true position ought to have been established before pleading the APOC.
37. There was also a degree of unreasonableness in how the Claimant proceeded after my First Judgment. The CFSOC still lacked clarity. The CAFSOC were served at the last minute and still included an internal contradiction as to the relevance of comments other than those contained in a single thread. By this point the Defendant had spent time responding to the CFSOC in the DFSOC and was well advanced on his skeleton argument for the second hearing.
38. However, there was also unreasonable conduct on the part of the Defendant. In my First Judgment at [71], I held that the Defendant had not "acquiesced" in Claimant's approach (i.e. through his conduct, precluded himself from now challenging how the Claimant was putting his case). Nevertheless, the Defendant's response was curiously passive. There were telltale signs in the Defence, and in what was said to Master Gidden, that the parties were not in fact ad idem, but the Defendant's approach seems to have been to gloss over the lurking difficulties under a veneer of ostensible agreement. For the reasons I have given, parts of APOC paragraphs 6 and 11 were very probably amenable to striking out under CPR 3.4(2)(1)(a), (b) and/or (c) but no such application was made. Neither did the Defendant seek clarification of the Claimant's case under CPR Part 18. The Defence merely made observations on the oddity of APOC 6.10 and did not distinctly admit or deny the case on context pleaded at APOC 11. The Defendant was also unforthcoming in correspondence as to why, in the draft directions for a TPI, he was apparently seeking to keep open the possibility of a dispute about context, a stance the Defendant then appears to have abandoned in front of Master Gidden (other than to say that, "there will be issues about the words complained of depending on what further words have been added which are issues that can be considered for the TPI").
39. Furthermore the Defendant chose to plead a positive case on context and was obliged to do so in terms that were clear and properly arguable, just as the Claimant was. Paragraph 38.7 of the Defence fell short in this regard ("The Defendant will rely upon the entirety of the article and (to the extent that the Claimant relies upon comments, upon all comments visible at the material time)". The "material time" was not defined. Further, as was the case with the Claimant, the Defendant was well aware that what comments were "visible" at any one time was likely to differ from reader to reader. Yet no attempt was made to address this in the Defence and the position remained unclear at the July 2024 hearing. As was true for the Claimant, had the Defendant investigated these matters in a timely manner, it would have become clear that the only comments that could safely be relied upon as context were comments in the same thread as the comment complained of.
40. So, it was only in his skeleton for the first hearing, and then at the hearing and thereafter that the Defendant really began to develop his objections to how the Claimant was putting his case. An earlier focus on these issues by both parties would have assisted the Court to deal with the TPI at a single hearing.
41. Drawing the threads together, there is fault on both sides but the Claimant's conduct was significantly more unreasonable, and contributed more significantly to the problems that ensued, than the Defendant's conduct. To reflect this balance of responsibility, I shall order that the Claimant pay the Defendant 50% of his costs incurred in following the process set out in paragraph 2 of my Order of 1 August 2024, including 50% of his costs of attending the January 2025 hearing. The costs of amending the APOC, the Defence and the Reply in light of my determination of the preliminary issues shall be costs in the case in the normal way.
42. The Defendant has filed a costs schedule with a grand total of £70,287.60, 50% of which would be £35,143.80. That is still a significant sum and I note that the total sum greatly exceeds an estimate given by the Defendant in August 2024 (though possibly for good reason). Assessing the reasonableness and proportionality of these costs in the context of this case is not straightforward. I therefore decline to make a summary assessment but must make an order for a payment on account unless there is good reason not to do so (CPR 44.2(8)). The Claimant (having had the opportunity to do so) has not objected to a payment on account, should that issue arise. Accordingly, and directing myself by the well-known principles set out in Excalibur Ventures LLC v Texas Keystone Inc [2015] EWHC 566 (comm), I order a payment on account in the sum of £23,000. I will order that sum to be paid within 28 days, unless the parties agree, or persuade me, that some other date for payment should be set.
43. I am conscious that, when ordering the TPI, Master Gidden capped each party's costs at £35,000 + VAT. I do not think that I need to decide for now how this interacts with the costs order I am making, although my provisional view is that the costs cap would apply only to the one-day TPI anticipated in Master Gidden's order, not the additional costs that arose thereafter. It is a matter that can be explored in detailed assessment at the end of these proceedings, should the need arise.

Conclusion

44. For these reasons, the Claimant must pay the Defendant 50% of his costs of the steps taken pursuant to paragraph 2 of my Order of 1 August 2024, including 50% of his costs of the hearing on 25 January 2025. The Claimant must make a payment on account of £23,000 within 28 days of the date of the order recording my decision, or such different date as the parties agree or can persuade me to adopt. I shall ask the parties to draw up a draft order.