The High Court increased the counsel’s fees allowed to Michelle Quinn after finding that the Taxing Master had undervalued the pre-trial work in her medical negligence case and that the resulting decision was unjust to her.
Mr Justice Michael Peart delivered the ruling on 30 November 2005. The review concerned brief fees only. The Taxing Master had allowed €26,000 for senior counsel and €17,333 for junior counsel, after revising an initial allowance of €22,500 and €15,000. The fees claimed were €47,615.18 and €31,743.45 respectively.
Quinn’s negligence claim had succeeded at trial in March 2002, when she was awarded €300,000 in damages. The trial judge found, on the expert evidence, that a neurectomy had been the wrong treatment and that she had not given informed consent to it. The judge also applied the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur to the earlier appendectomy. The costs order included the costs of the action, to be taxed and ascertained, including reserved costs and costs of issues.
In reviewing the taxation, Justice Peart said section 27 of the Courts and Court Officers Act 1995 empowered the Taxing Master to examine the work actually done and assess a fee that was fair and reasonable. The High Court could intervene only if the allowance was wrong to the point of being unjust; the review was not simply a fresh assessment of the fee.
The Taxing Master had relied in part on comparable cases, the fact that one liability expert was called at trial, and his view that the brief fee covered preparation and the first day in court. But senior counsel’s detailed account described years of investigation, extensive discovery, medical research and preparation for cross-examining several possible defence experts. Justice Peart said the Taxing Master had not given sufficient weight to that pre-trial work, including the need to revisit discovery examined nearly three years before trial.
The court considered a senior counsel fee of €37,500 justifiable in the circumstances. It increased the junior counsel fee to €25,000 by the same margin; the defendant had not sought a cross-review of the two-thirds calculation. Justice Peart held that requiring Quinn to pay the difference between the claimed senior counsel fee and the taxed allowance herself would be unjust. He ordered the fees increased accordingly.