L73 Response Not Accepted Self-assessed

Civil Procedure Rules on Costs

Recommendation

The Civil Procedure Rules should be amended to require the court, when considering the appropriate order for costs at the conclusion of proceedings, to take into account the availability of an arbitral system set up by an independent regulator itself recognised by law. The purpose of this recommendation is to provide an important incentive for every publisher to join the new system and encourage those who complain that their rights have been infringed to use it as a speedy, effective and comparatively inexpensive method of resolving disputes.

Published Evidence Summary
The following publicly available evidence relates to this recommendation:
According to UK Parliament (24 May 2024), this recommendation was not implemented, and the Civil Procedure Rules were never amended to require courts to consider the availability of an arbitral system from an independent, law-recognised regulator when making costs orders. According to gov.uk (29 November 2012; UK Parliament, 24 May 2024), Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, which would have provided the mechanism for this, was never commenced and was repealed by Section 50 of the Media Act 2024.
How was this assessed?
Assessed by gemini-2.5-flash on 19 Mar 2026
Checked data held on this site (government responses, progress updates, independent evidence)
External sources searched: www.gov.uk, www.legislation.gov.uk, hansard.parliament.uk
Jurisdiction
UK-wide
Response
Not Accepted
Not Accepted UK Government
29 Nov 2012

This recommendation was not implemented. The government did not formally respond to civil justice recommendations in the Prime Minister's statement of 29 November 2012. Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013, which would have created a costs incentive mechanism, was enacted but never commenced. On 1 March 2018, the Secretary of State announced that Section 40 would not be commenced and would be repealed. Section 40 was repealed by Section 50 of the Media Act 2024 (Royal Assent 24 May 2024). Source: https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/leveson-consultation-response

Read Full Response
Note: PM David Cameron responded to all 92 recommendations with a single statement accepting them "in principle" or "in part". No per-recommendation response was published.
Published Evidence

Published assessments of implementation progress from inspectorates, select committees, official progress reports, and other sources. Check the source type badge to see whether each assessment is independent or government self-reported.

Not Implemented
24 May 2024
UK Parliament legislation

Section 40 of the Crime and Courts Act 2013 would have amended cost considerations to account for regulatory membership. Section 40 was never commenced and was repealed by the Media Act 2024 (Section 50, Royal Assent 24 May 2024).

View detailed findings

The Civil Procedure Rules were never amended. Section 40 was repealed without ever being used.

Media Act 2024 - repeal of Section 40 View Source
Source
Report An Inquiry into the Culture, Practices and Ethics of the Press 29 Nov 2012
Responsible Bodies
UK Government Primary
Recommendation age 13.3 yrs
Last formal update 4863 days ago