> Rob, is not one problem with your analysis of the Sienkiewicz case that if

> the wrong committed was a breach of contract prior to 1984 the plaintiff

> is long out of time under the limitations legislation?

A good question, the answer to which is no. The time limit for all actions

for personal injuries, whether arising from breach of contract or

otherwise is three years from either the date the cause of action arose,

or three years from knowledge (of, roughly speaking, injury). See

Limitation Act 1980, s 11.

Now, you might object that this is not an action for personal injuries at

all, but an actio for the lost chance of avoiding such injuries. I think

you can read the Limitation Act 1980 broadly, but if you can't that is a

problem for a claim based upon negligence, breach of contract, or breach

of statutory duty.

(A more difficult problem arises where the claim is for other forms of

loss, such as economic loss, as in Henderson v Merrett. I have an answer

for that in my book, but some won't like it.)

I tend to agree that my analysis as to why Barker and the current law is

right and the critics of it wrong cannot be extracted directly from the

judgments. (If the law was crystal clear and explicable just from reading

court judgments, what is the point of us? We aren't just journalists).

That said, I think the blame for that lies with counsel and the weak way

the issues were presented to the court, rather than with the judges.

As for this case, regardless of your view of Barker etc, the correct

answer was just to read out the provisions in section 3.

> And can anyone enlighten a confused colonial as to why Lord Clarke of

> Stone-cum-Ebony is still delivering a judgment in the Court of Appeal when

> I thought his Lordship had been appointed to the Supreme Court?

I assume the hearing took place before he was bumped up. If not, their

Lordships (sorry the Justices) do sometimes go back to the Court of Appeal

as 'super subs' when the House's (sorry, Supreme Court's) list allows this

and the Court of Appeal have a need.

Rob

--

Robert Stevens

Professor of Commercial Law

University College London