The High Court set aside a third-party notice against Hatty Limited after the defendants accepted that the company was the wrong party to join. The court declined to amend the notice to name J Hatty & Company, the UK-based partnership the defendants said had arranged their insurance, and gave them time to consider what motion to bring next.
The dispute arises from Nigel Morrow’s claim that he suffered severe personal injuries in November 2012 while volunteering with Fields of Life Trust Limited during construction of a school in Uganda. He issued a personal injuries summons on 6 March 2015. The judgment does not determine that claim.
In December 2016, the first defendant sought permission to issue and serve a third-party notice on the insurance broker it claimed had arranged its personal-injury insurance. The defendants’ solicitor said the application was initially drafted naming J Hatty & Co. After the plaintiff’s solicitor advised that Hatty Limited was the correct entity, the defendants searched for and proceeded against Hatty Limited. The judge described this as a mistake in which the defendants intended to join the broker but proceeded against a different company, believing it to be the broker.
Hatty Limited applied to have the notice set aside under Order 16, rule 8(3) of the Rules of the Superior Courts. The defendants and Hatty Limited agreed it was the wrong party. The court granted the application, finding that the defendants’ claim against Hatty Limited did not fall within the categories allowed by Order 16, rule 1.
The defendants also asked the court to change the third party’s name from Hatty Limited to J Hatty & Company. The judge said an application to correct party names under Order 63, rule 1(15) should first be made to the Master of the High Court. But, applying the Supreme Court’s decision in Sandy Lane Hotel Ltd v Times Newspapers Ltd, he concluded that this was not a clerical error or a correctable naming error: it arose from a lack of knowledge or wrong information. The court therefore held that the rule could not be used to make the requested change.
The judgment noted that the defendants might seek to join individual partners of J Hatty & Co under Order 15. It did not decide whether such an application would succeed. The judge cautioned that any delay in serving third-party proceedings could then become an issue. As the defendants had not settled how they wished to proceed, the court gave them time to consider the judgment and any further motion.