GRG-type claim against Barclays struck out

In Portland Stone Firms Ltd and others v Barclays Bank plc, KPMG LLP and others [2018] EWHC 2341 (QB), Adam Kramer, instructed by Addleshaw Goddard LLP for the bank, successfully obtained summary judgment against the Claimants’ claim in conspiracy, deceit and breach of contract worth over £10m, and refused permission for all amendments as having no real prospect of success.

The Claimants’ claim was explicitly modelled on the Tomlinson and Large Report findings against the Royal Bank of Scotland, but the inference that similar behaviour went on in Barclays was found to be impermissible and that allegation should never have been pleaded. More generally, the Judge, Stuart-Smith J, conducted a detailed examination of the primary pleaded facts from which dishonesty was said to be inferred, finding the inference to be unsupported by those primary facts as pleaded in light of the circumstances and the documentary evidence already available. Criticism was also made of the over-lengthy Particulars of Claim and the succession of attempts by the claimants to improve them, and of the contract claim modelled on the term implied in PAG v RBS.

For the full judgment, please click here.