One of the UK's top judges has said that active case management is the best way to avoid expensive, drawn-out disputes such as the BCCI collapse.

Speaking at the KPMG Forensic Annual Law Lecture last night (29 March), the Master of the Rolls, Sir Anthony Clarke, said the principles of case management should be adapted to each stage of a dispute to avoid costly, large-scale cases.

Clarke suggested methods including identifying the real issues between parties, limiting documents, short written openings, limited cross-examining and co-operation between advocates from different parties.

He added: "It is important for the civil justice system as a whole [that] issues raised by the 'supercases' in respect of the proper application of… effective and appropriate case management apply to the system as a whole."

Clarke added that although he supported the Woolf reforms, he believed they should be enforced more 'robustly'.

The speech comes as the commercial court working party, chaired by Mr Justice Richard Aikens, gets ready to unveil its report on how to avoid lengthy, high-profile cases such as BCCI.

Clarke said: "We cannot but benefit from the work being carried out by Mr Justice Aikens' working party to see how case management can be improved in the future."

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