Secretary of State for Health and Social Care v Primer Design Limited & Anor

Summary judgment for the Claimant was refused.

The court found that the Defendants had a real prospect of successfully arguing that the high failure rate resulted from factors other than defects in the kits themselves, such as user error or software issues. The joint expert statement, while showing a high failure rate, did not definitively establish the cause.

The Defendants' application for an extension to file a full expert report (including agreed matters) was granted.

The court considered a full report from the Defendant's expert would be more helpful to the court's understanding of the issues, especially considering the Claimant's expert's report's possible incompleteness and the need for fair cross-examination.

The Claimant was given an additional two weeks to file a further expert report in response.

To ensure fairness, given the extension granted to the Defendants, and to allow the Claimant's expert to address points raised in the Defendant's report.

Permission was granted for the Defendants to submit a further short statement from Dr. Birnie at trial.

The statement addressed a factual point (viscosity of the optimiser) relevant to the case and that the Defendants hadn't anticipated needing to address before.