Ogden Tables Delay

In Wells (17/LL p63) the House of Lords said “It goes without saying that the sooner the Lord Chancellor sets the rate the better”, referring to the rate of return obtainable from specific Index-Linked Government Stock when using the Ogden Tables in calculating damages for lifetime care, loss of earnings and pensions etc for catastrophically injured victims in accident cases. The Damages Act 1996 gives the Lord Chancellor the power, but not the duty, to set the rate; if he does not, it is left to the courts. The rate was set at 3% pending the Lord Chancellor setting it. Writing in Quantum of 13 December, Sir Michael Ogden complained that although in April 1999 his working party recommended that the rate should be 2%, which in his view it should have been for the whole of 1999, nothing has happened. The difference between 2% and 3% can result in a loss to a victim exceeding £200,000. Sir Michael could obtain from the Lord Chancellor’s Department no estimate of the likely publication date of a consultation paper, and if there is to be no consultation he calls on the Lord Chancellor to set a rate at once.