CL-2018-000297, CL-2018-000404, CL-2018-000590, - [2025] EWHC 2979 (Comm)

After a long trial conducted between 9 April 2024 and 10 April 2025, I gave judgment in these consolidated Claims on 2 October 2025: [2025] EWHC 2364 (Comm). The orders to be made on that judgment and applications consequential to it were considered at the judgment hearing, which took up two full days.

The judgment concluded that SKAT had not made good any of the claims it pursued at trial upon which liability was in issue, and quantified SKAT’s entitlement under a default judgment against one defendant (Syntax GIS Ltd).

The order dated 3 October 2025 made on the judgment and consequential applications (‘the Order’) defined the ‘Liability Defendants’ as the trial defendants identified in paragraph 30 of and Appendix 1 to the judgment, other than Syntax and the six defunct corporate defendants referred to in the judgment at [612]. Paragraph 1 of the Order, then, gave judgment for the Liability Defendants, and each of them, dismissing all claims against them in these proceedings, and finally dismissed all of those claims.

One application made at the hearing was an application by SKAT, the scope of which I identify below, for permission to appeal that general dismissal of its claims. I refused that application, stating my sufficient conclusion for that purpose that there was, in my view, no more than a fanciful prospect of success for SKAT in seeking to overturn the conclusion in the judgment that it had not been misled.

Pursuant to CPR 52.12(2)(a), I directed that any appellant’s notice for an appeal by SKAT against paragraph 1 of the Order was to be filed in the Court of Appeal within 28 days after I handed down further reasons in writing for my refusal of permission. This further judgment, handed down remotely, sets out those further reasons. By my calculation, the last date for SKAT to file any appellant’s notice against paragraph 1 of the Order is therefore now 12 December 2025.

I decided to use written reasons to be handed down later for a fuller explanation of my decision to refuse permission to appeal, firstly, so as not to take up time at the hearing, at which there was much else to deal with and a strong general interest in dealing with everything (if possible) without a further hearing. Secondly, I wanted to reflect on how much more I could and should say about SKAT’s proposed grounds of appeal. Thirdly, the proposed appeal for which SKAT sought permission cast something of a spotlight on some of the issues raised at trial with which I did not deal in the judgment, either at all or fully, because they did not arise for determination, SKAT’s claims having failed for logically prior reasons.

In relation to that third aspect, SKAT encouraged me to consider supplementing the judgment in the interests of at least reducing, if not eliminating, the scope for an appeal to result, if successful, in some need for further proceedings in this court. It was also recognised by SKAT that if I felt it appropriate to supplement the judgment, that might affect the prospects of there being any successful appeal and, therefore, might be relevant to the final decision that SKAT must make on the extent of and grounds for any appeal for which it now seeks permission from the Court of Appeal, if it does make such an application.