Solid groundwork has been carried out in APIL to develop a campaign to persuade the Government against raising the small claims court limit for personal injury cases. As new president of this 5,000 strong organisation, I support this campaign to persuade the Government that such a move would be nothing short of a disaster for access to justice.

The suggestion that the limit should be raised was first mooted by the Better Regulation Task Force – the independent advisory group charged with looking at the regulatory aspects of litigation and compensation. One of the recommendations made by the task force was that research should be conducted into the impact of raising the small claims court limit for personal injury cases. The Department for Constitutional Affairs responded positively to this suggestion, and called upon all parties to submit evidence about the pros and cons of increasing the limit.

APIL developed its own concerted campaign – including research which has since been presented to the Government – in an attempt to highlight the very real problems that raising the limit would have on injured people.

APIL vehemently believes there is no place for personal injury cases in the small claims court. Presently, only personal injury claim which could lead to a payment of general damages for pain and suffering less than £1000 are subject to the small claims procedure, where no legal costs are recoverable. But personal injury claims involve complex special procedural requirements compared with most other claims, as well as complex evidence which almost always demand legal guidance and advice. The costs regime in the small claims track does not provide for this facility.

In addition, relegation of personal injury claims into the small claims track would fail to ensure that litigants are on an equal footing when most personal injury claims are made against businesses or insured defendants who are, more often than not, legally represented even in the small claims court. This obviously tilts the playing field against the claimant and risks the negligent party avoiding its liability and responsibility.

APIL commissioned a MORI poll at the beginning of the year to find out how the public would feel about pursuing a claim should the limit be raised. The results of the poll made it even more apparent that access to justice would be seriously affected if the Government decides to raise the limit.

MORI interviewed more than 2,000 adults across Great Britain. The poll found the majority of those surveyed would not seek justice through the courts if the limit were to be raised. 64 per cent of people said they would be unlikely to pursue their case without an independent solicitor, and 80 per cent of people believed that without an independent solicitor to help them they would not receive the right amount of compensation from an insurer.

It is wholly unacceptable to expect an injured person to run a case. Most people will know nothing about having to obtain medical reports, for example, let alone building a case to prove the other side injured them through negligence. How can someone with no legal training be expected to work out how much compensation they will need for future care, or the amount of earnings they may be entitled to claim through being unable to work? We know from the MORI poll that 74 per cent people felt they would not be able to work out how much compensation they would be entitled to, if they had to work it out without the help of an independent solicitor.

To support the MORI poll, APIL conducted its own research amongst its membership, and found that if the limit were to increase, 70 per cent of personal injury claims would be forced into the small claims court. The impact on justice – and indeed solicitors’ businesses - would be devastating.

All of this evidence points to the fact that people would simply not pursue their rights if the limit were to be increased: there would be too many hoops for injured people to jump through to obtain compensation.

In the review of Lord Woolf, a special limit for personal injury cases was won, as a reflection that ours is a technical area with many pitfalls for unrepresented litigants in person, when they are faced with the experience of institutional defendants with resources on the other side. This unequal playing field offended his overriding objective, hence the special rule. In the years since the new civil procedure rules came into operation, nothing, least of all the value of money in these days of low inflation, has changed – the arguments for the present small claims limit for personal injury cases remain as powerful today as they were 6 years ago. For access to justice to remain available to all injured people, the small claims limit should remain as it is now.

Allan Gore QC, president, Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL)