A man who sued his former school for damages, alleging that it was negligent for not preventing him from being bullied as a child, has seen the court award a ‘third party costs order’ against his parents in the sum of £1 million.
A third party costs order is an order by the court which makes a third party (i.e. someone who is not party to the formal proceedings) liable for legal costs should they be awarded. Such orders are made where the litigation is being pursued by a person on behalf of someone else or where the third party is closely involved with the outcome of the proceedings, such as by funding them. They are designed to protect the position of the other side in the dispute.
In the case in point, the claimant, an unemployed 25-year-old graduate, dropped his case against his former school, which he had attended for eight years, two weeks into a legal dispute that had by then cost the school more than £250,000 in legal expenses.
In the British system of justice, the loser normally pays the costs of the winner and third party costs orders, although fairly rare, are a protection for litigants to help ensure that if they are successful in court, they do not find they are still out of pocket when victorious against someone who has no means themselves but whose own costs are being funded by a third party.