Bott & Co Solicitors Ltd v Ryanair DAC [2019] EWCA Civ 143

Discussion of when an equitable lien arises in favour of a solicitor doing work on behalf of a client. The judgment raises the question whether, in the case of a solicitor providing services in relation to ADR, before a claim has been issued, there is an entitlement in favour of the solicitor to an equitable lien.

The judgment refers to the Supreme Court judgment in Gavin Edmondson Solicitors Ltd v Haven Insurance Co Ltd [2018] UKSC 21, [2018] 1 WLR 2052 where, as the judge recalls [at para 49] none of the claimants had actually issued proceedings. All the claims were settled through the RTA Protocol; apparently at Stage 1. The fact that no proceedings had actually been issued was not fatal to the existence of the equitable right. Lord Briggs said at [35]: "Provided that the debt has arisen in part from the activities of the solicitor there is no reason in principle (and none has been suggested) why formal proceedings must first have been issued, all the more so in modern times when parties and their solicitors are encouraged as a matter of policy to attempt to resolve disputes by suitable forms of ADR, and when pre-action protocols of widely differing kinds have been developed precisely for that purpose."

The Court, in this case, concluded, at para 53:  "Accordingly, it seems to me that the services that will attract the protection of equity are services of the kind that a solicitor would perform in conducting litigation or contemplated litigation."  However, it then went on to say at para 56:  "The equitable right may well arise in the case of costs incurred in ADR. But, as the acronym makes clear, ADR is appropriate when there is a dispute to resolve. Unless and until Ryanair refuses a claim, there is no dispute."