Mulderrigs Blog

Jonathan Djanogly is the Justice Minister in charge of a major overhaul of the so-called “compensation culture”.

So it may or may not surprise you to hear that the Guardian is now reporting that Mr Djanogly has failed  to declare his connection to Claims Management Companies.

Would you believe that Mr Djanogly’s children are shareholders in two “Claims Management Companies” owned by his brother-in-law. Amazin’ innit!

Now I know what Mulderrigs bring to the table when dealing with accident victims. The lawyers in my company are experts in Personal Injury law and over the years we have used our expertise to help thousands of accident victims recover compensation.

We have often stepped in and won major settlements for badly injured clients after other lawyers told them they had no case.

Sure, we advertise in the press and on the web, but despite all our advertising most clients come to us because they have been recommended by someone who used us in the past.

Everyone of our cases has to be proved to an exacting standards and we are up against top notch lawyers who are appointed by the insurance industry, and we are very proud of what we have achieved for many of our clients.

So we’ve got no truck with ill-informed  journalists and politicians who talk about “ambulance chasers” and “the compensation culture. What they should be doing is firing missiles at the “Claims Management” industry.

Lawyers are very closely regulated by the Solcititors Regulation – If we step out of line we would expect to get in trouble.

But  so-called “Claims Management Companies”….honestly, what do they add….what service do they offer. And why would any solicitor with an ounce of professional self-respect be buying cases from them?

The right thing for the Justice Secretary to do is regulate these people out of existence – Ban them advertising for claims and they”ll be left with nothing to sell to solicitors…..it’s not rocket science!

I wrote to  Lord Young last year telling him this shortly before he had to fall on his sword for his rather unfortunate  “never had it so good” views on the recession.

I suggested to Lord Young that the way to regulate the Personal Injury “market” is to ban claims management firms from advertising, and ban them from selling claims to solicitors. Would you believe I’m still waiting for a reply.

The solution is to restrict advertising to expert solicitors – those solicitors who have demonstrated a level of expertise…It would do away with “referral fees” at a stroke, and it would ensure that the publice end up in the care of a genuine expert.

But now we discover that the Justice Minister, the man charged with making the decision has his fingers in a”Claims Management” pie.

Honestly, if you submitted it as fiction a publisher would laugh at you!

Paul Mulderrig

Press release: 22 September 2011

Paul Mulderrig has welcomed government attempts to ban referral fees for insurance companies who pass on details of accident victims, but says the steps announced by the Justice Secretary Kenneth Clarke don’t go far enough.

“I think the public will welcome the news that insurance companies such as Admiral will no longer be able to sell details of injured claimants. But what I would really like to see is a complete ban on so-called “claims management companies” being allowed to advertise,” says Paul who has worked in personal injury claims for more than 25 years.

“These people are not proper lawyers, they are simply marketeers with an eye to the main chance. Their business model seems to be to contact accident victims and then sell their details to the highest bidder.

“This proposed clampdown is a start, but it doesn’t go nearly far enough. It does nothing to address the distasteful “claims industry” tactics of door-stepping, text messaging, cold calling or accosting people as they leave the supermarket.

“There’s really no need for these companies to exist at all, and it would solve most of the problems if the only people allowed to advertise for personal injury services were properly qualified and properly regulated solicitors.

“Mulderrigs have been involved in personal injury law for many years , but we have never paid for a referral and we never will!

“We give objective legal advice and our clients come direct to us, usually after a recommendation.

“The recent media reports have given a misleading impression that the whole dubious practice of payments for referrals will be outlawed by banning insurance company but the sad truth is that they are just the tip of the iceberg.”

Mulderrigs have a team of solicitors specialising in personal injury accident compensation claims, medical negligence claims and claims for professional negligence.

For the past 10 years we have received the Law Society’s Lexcel award for practice management standards which is awarded to solicitors who meet the highest management and customer care standards.  We are also also appointed to the panel of legal experts approved by the brain injury association, Headway.

Paul Mulderrig

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Picture shows:

Paul Mulderrig

Wednesdaymorning found me helping out at the 3rd Annual Law Conference for the 6th Form students of Bacup & Rawtenstall Grammar School (BRGS).

Four of the Mulderrig offspring and many of my old friends attended BRGS, so I’ve always had a soft spot for the place.

Three or four years ago the head of the 6th Form, Trevor Elkington collared me and said he was keen to stage a law conference for the students. He told me that they’ve been doing a similar thing succesfully for several years for the wannabe-doctors, and wanted to stage an event for students who are considering studying Law at university.

The general idea of the event is to give the students a clear idea of the amount of hard work that goes into qualifying as a solicitor  or a barrister, and the remarkably high level of  “A” level success that’s now required  in order to get into a decent college.

There’s no point asking the students to listen to an old f&rt like me – we had black & white TV back when I qualified - so we got three past pupils who are currently studying Law at university, along with a trainee solicitor and trainee barrister. Each of them gave a short talk to the students about their difficult path into the profession, and then faced a barrage of questions.

The 6th Form students then presented a moot (a mock trial) invovling an alleged criminal assault. Students had been appointed to fill all of the roles – from court clerk & jury members through to prosecution & defence barristers – and  the quality of their presentation was just outstanding, a real credit to Mrs Reynard & Mrs Taylor who teach the Law course.

We also had another practical session – “What would you do if you were at Mulderrigs on work-experience and a guy walked in asking for advice about a serious accident?”  I came away from that session thinking you’d probably get better advice in the 6th Form than you would from me!

It’s remarkably difficult to find an initial opening into the legal profession these days, so it’s always feels great to be able to help out in any small way.  I got a massive buzz from working with these bright and enthusiastic young people…they were a real credit to BRGS, and I hope they’ll let me go back and do the whole thing again next year.

I’ve got absolutely no doubt that, out of the 30 people who attended the conference several will go on to great things in the legal profession……Some of the others might have to get proper jobs!

Over the years we have found that most of our clients are far more concerned about recovering from their injuries than they are about getting any compensation. And that’s particularly true of our footballer clients and the other sportsmen and women we represent.

After an accident, the insurers for the responsible party have a legal duty to investigate whether they can help with rehabilitation and/or treatment, and at Mulderrigs we have been very succesful at making sure insurance companies meet that obligation. 

In some cases it may involve just a few sessions of physiotherapy to help with recovery, but in other cases we often obtain very substantial payments from insurers to cover the cost of surgery that becomes necessary after an accident.

Mr Rishton is a young footballer from Norfolk who was badly injured as a result of a reckless challenge. We have just obtained an interim payment of £14,500.00 so that our can have an operation carried out privately by a top specialist, rather than waiting for months on an NHS waiting list.  (The name of our client has been changed).

What happens to an injured worker if the employer doesn’t have Employers’ Liability Insurance?

This is a potentially serious problem – If there is no insurance in place it may be impossible for an injured worker to get any compensation at all.

Under the Employers’ Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Act 1969 employers have a duty to display their insurance details in a place where you can see them. Most employers display the details in the canteen, or another place where they are easy to see.

Employers who don’t have valid insurance can be fined upto £2,500.00 for every day without insurance. They can also be fined upto £1,000.00 for failing to display details of their insurance. But that won’t get an injured worker any compensation if a stupid employer hasn’t arranged insurance, and we know this has happened to a number of people in recent months. Right here in Rossendale a couple of our clients were left high & dry in relation to accidents at work when the company they had worked for – a fireplace company called Petra Hellas – went out of business without having had any Employers’ Liability Insurance in place.

So, don’t wait until it’s too late – Check now to make sure your employers have a valid and up to date insurance certificate on display. Or it could be you that ends up with your head in your hands.

“People are free to choose their own solicitor when making a claim for compensation after an accident, and they certainly don’t have to put up with a so-called “panel” solicitor appointed by their own insurers.”

So said specialist personal injury solicitor Paul Mulderrig of Mulderrigs Ltd, who are campaigning to raise the public’s awareness of their freedom to choose their own lawyer.

“After an accident lots of people find that their car insurers or house insurers try to insist on sending them to a so-called “panel” solicitor. These firms often deal with cases entirely by post, without ever seeing their clients face to face and in my view, clients deserve better.

“In one recent case we took over from “panel” solicitors who had strongly advised our client to settle their case on “50-50” terms, but after we had sent just one extra letter the other side accepted 99% responsibility for the accident!

“In another, tragic, case we took over from “panel” solicitors in the case of a young motorcyclist who had been paralysed by his injuries, but they had written to him wishing him a “speedy recovery”.

“Sadly, we have been involved in many other similar cases.

“In 99% of cases it is against both the English and the European law for insurers to try to restrict a person’s choice of solicitor. People are free to use their insurance cover to instruct whichever lawyer they choose and I would urge them to take control of their cases and choose their own solicitor.

“After a serious accident people deserve to receive the specialist advice of an expert who will travel to meet them at home and show a genuine interest in their case. In any case involving a serious injury I urge people to find a genuine specialist lawyer.

“The Law Society’s website www.lawsociety.org contains a helpful search tool, you should make sure that the solicitor dealing with your case is a member of the Law Society’s Personal Injury Panel, and you should also check that the law firm hold the Law Society’s LEXCEL quality mark.

If you’ve had a bad experience at the hands of a “panel” solicitor who was appointed by your insurance company please let us hear about it.

An open letter to Rt Hon Lord Young
House of Lords
Westminster
5th October 2010

Dear Lord Young
I have seen the news coverage of your proposals for regulation of the so-called “compensation culture”.

I have been qualified as a solicitor for twenty-three years, and have run my own practice since 1989. Throughout that time I have specialised in personal injury claims on behalf of injured claimants, and I was first appointed to the Law Society’s PI Panel in 1992.

Coincidentally, my career has run almost perfectly in parallel with the relaxation in the rules regarding advertising by solicitors. During that time I have witnessed a number of high profile marketing disasters of the type which have no doubt influenced your views:-

1.
Claims Direct used a massive budget to advertise widely on TV for a shoddy service which resulted in many thousands of accident victims being massively overcharged.

2.
The Accident Group hired teams of untrained people to loiter in town squares and supermarket car parks to accost members of the public. Unsurprisingly, the company took on many thousands of claims which had no realistic prospect of success. When the balloon went up with that company the owner fled the UK and their staff were fired by text message.

3.
More recently the MOJ and the Claims Standard Council have started to certify claims management companies. These organisations generally have no legal qualifications of any kind and serve only to insert a commercial middle-man between the public and the expert lawyer they need to consult. Their only contribution to the process is to drive up the cost of litigation because many lawyers (not including my company) have fallen into the trap of paying huge “referral fees”.

I agree with you that steps ought to be taken to improve things for the public good. However, despite these problems, the so-called “compensation culture” is no more than a media-led myth.

The law which governs injury compensation claims has been well settled for many years. Injured claimants must prove their claims to a very exacting standard against insurers who are powerful and effective opponents.

Insofar as there is a culture which encourages safety in the workplace or in organised public events, the principal consequence is that there are now thousands of workers who are still alive who might otherwise have suffered fatal accidents, and thousands of others who still have the requisite number of working arms, legs, fingers and toes.

There is no culture, caused either by lawyers or by the HSE which prevents or discourages fun-days, cheese rolling events or school sports days. Purely by way of an example, my ten year old son has Down’s syndrome, but took a skiing trip to Switzerland this year. It’s much closer to the truth to observe that sensible and safe activities sometimes fall victim to the kind of politically correct nonsense from ill-informed public servants that means we now have chairpersons rather than chairmen, and have schools prevented from teaching children about Baa Baa Black Sheep.

A blanket ban on advertising of personal injury services would deny access to justice to many people who have a legitimate and urgent need for expert advice.

A simple and sensible proposal

The Lord Chancellor’s Dept was warned by the Law Society more than twenty years ago to restrict or prohibit the involvement of non-lawyers in personal injury claims. If that advice had been heeded at the time, we would not have ended up in this mess.

In my view there are a number of simple and sensible steps which could be taken to improve matters:-

A.
Outlaw claims management companies immediately. They don’t have any of the requisite professional skills, they are not regulated with any force.

B.
Restrict personal injury advertising to those solicitors who can properly demonstrate professional expertise in that field of law – Members of the Law Society’s Personal Injury Panel and/or firms with the Law Society’s LEXCEL quality mark. (Yes, my firm would qualify on both counts, but so would many other legitimate personal injury lawyers).

If advertising is restricted to qualified solicitors you would immediately gain control via the code of conduct which binds all solicitors.

If advertising is restricted to proven experts it can only improve the position for accident victims who have legitimate cases.

C.
Outlaw the payment of referral fees by solicitors to claims management companies, and impose suitably strict sanctions. The Law Society has repeatedly stepped back from addressing this issue; referral fees serve only to add a layer of substantial and pointless expense to the process.

I hope that you will find the time to read this correspondence, and that my comments will give you some cause for thought.

If I can assist you in your deliberations I would be happy to help in any way that I can.

Yours sincerely,

Paul Mulderrig
Mulderrigs Solicitors Ltd