CH-2025-000032 - [2025] EWHC 2988 (Ch)

I should start by saying that I was presented with a number of bundles containing contemporaneous documents and correspondence. Save that it was accepted that all of the same were “in evidence”, it was unclear to me whether the same had all been properly adduced by way of being exhibited to witness statements. Further, some documents that had been before the Judge were apparently left out of the appeal bundles by Prudential on the basis that they were “not relevant”. Mr Dewji lodged a supplementary bundle of documents. Some had apparently been before the Judge (though how they had been adduced into evidence was unclear to me) and others had not.

Ms Cumming’s witness statement also had a large exhibit but that exhibit was not produced in the bundles before me as an exhibit. Further, references in her witness statement to specific pages of the exhibit to her witness statement were not accompanied by cross references to the relevant documents as appearing in the application bundles.

The overall effect was that I was unable readily to identify what had been before the Judge, whether there were any new documents placed before me, which documents had been before the Judge but were not before me and, for the main part, which party had put which documents before the court. This was wholly unsatisfactory.

The only witness statement before the court was that of Ms Cumming. This meant that Mr Dewji had not placed his own testimony before the court and instead there were times when it seemed to be suggested that his evidence was (at least in part) as set out or referred to in the correspondence without being properly confirmed by way of signed witness statement, containing the required statement of truth.