It goes without saying that litigation is under pressure – it is sometimes difficult to remember the number and extent of the changes in the legal landscape since May 1997.
It is not just a matter of the Woolf reforms and the introduction of the Civil Procedure Rules, with their emphasis on the active management of litigation by the court and the possibility of a mediated settlement. Much of that is salutary, particularly the checking of the costs pendulum, which had, perhaps, swung too far in the opposite direction; since 1997, civil legal aid has been all but withdrawn from Chancery litigation.
