How will Labour act in the reform of the Limitation Period for Abuse Claims?

The limitation period is the period of time within which a party must bring a claim. Limitation periods apply to all sorts of claims. The reason we have limitation periods is to prevent claims being brought too long after the event. It attempts to balance the right of the party wanting to claim and the interests of the Defendant where it may be unfair on them to defend cases a long time after what happened has taken place. 

For a long time, the courts applied a six year limitation period in relation to non-recent child sex abuse claims. Very few Claimants were able to bring a claim within that period as most were only able to disclose the abuse and consider claiming many years later. The limitation period could only be avoided if the Claimant could show that the sexual abuse was the result of systemic negligence which meant that a three year time limit applied that was extendable.  

Jordans Solicitors acted on behalf of a Claimant whose claim was involved in a number of combined cases which came before the House of Lords in 2008 on the issue of limitation. The court concluded that a three year time limit applied which would not start to run until the Claimant reached the age of 18. The court could then disapply the primary limitation period even though the claim had not been brought in time and would focus on whether there could be a fair trial and the reasons for the delay in bringing the claim. This was a landmark decision for Claimants but still made it very difficult for Claimant’s to succeed when claiming a long period out of time.  

The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse sat for some seven years and concluded that the issue of limitation operated unfairly in relation to the victims and survivors of non-recent child sexual abuse. Research had found that on average it takes a survivor and victim of child sex abuse 26 years to disclose the sexual abuse. In 2022, the inquiry recommended that the government remove the three year limitation period and shift the limitation burden on to the Defendant to show that a fair trial is not possible.  

It was generally hoped that those changes would significantly help claimant’s where the fact of the abuse was not in issue and where vicarious liability was admitted. 

However, in May 2024 the previous government started a consultation process on it which Jordans Solicitors took an active part in and which closed on 10 July 2024. There was of course a change of government during the process and we have urged the new government to remove the limitation period as recommended by IICSA and as has already happened in Scotland in 2017 and in other countries.

This has of course all been reported on widely in the media and a lot of my clients are following it very closely. One client feels so strongly that the current limitation rule is unfair that they have contacted their local GP to demand immediate action from the government. They feel that they have been made to wait long enough for justice and that action should be taken now. 

However, there was no reference to any limitation reform in the King’s Speech on 17 July 2024 when 40 bills were announced on a wide range of issues which the new government plan to introduce in the coming months. The government can introduce bills that were not included in the speech but it is a concern in view of the delays since the inquiry report that any changes appear not to be a priority for the new government