The Judgment
7.Media obtained judgment in default in September 2016 – whether in default of filing an acknowledgment of service or a defence is not clear, but it doesn’t matter. The trial before the District Judge and his judgment, from which this is the appeal, concerned only damages. He awarded Media £250 in damages plus £3 interest, applying the ‘user principle’. He declined to award additional damages pursuant to s.97(2)(b) of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. The District Judge also declined to award Media any sum in costs. In fact he took the view that Mr Price’s conduct on behalf of Media had been in breach of the overriding objective and so ordered that Media should pay a proportion of Mr Bowen’s costs, namely his travelling costs incurred attending the trial, £164.10. Mr Bowen was ordered to pay the balance of £88.90 to Media. 8.“…one of the rare cases where the court should mark its disapproval of the litigation conduct of a successful party by ordering that he pay a portion of his opponent’s costs”