Out of the jurisdiction without permission

Kola v Nesheim [2006] All ER (D) 40 (Oct)

The claimant’s solicitors served proceedings under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 in Norway, without permission. By the time the oversight was discovered, both the limitation period under the 1975 Act and the period for service out of the jurisdiction had expired. There were competing interests between observance of the CPR and the desirability of allowing claims to proceed without the parties becoming embroiled in costly procedural warfare. The court granted retrospective permission to serve out of the jurisdiction because refusing to do so would have placed greater importance upon disciplining lawyers for procedural failures than the pursuit of justice. In any event, if retrospective permission had been refused, the claimant would probably have succeeded in an application to bring proceedings out of time under s4 of the 1975 Act.