City Council Sues Itself, Seeks Costs for Frivolous Lawsuit

The Islington Council issued a parking ticket to itself, then decided to pursue itself at the Parking Adjudicator and asked for costs against itself. From the article: "In 2007, an Islington officer ticketed an Islington vehicle, but the department that got the ticket appealed. Because the department is not a different entity, in legal terms the council was appealing a ticket it got from the council, and under the rules above, the council was hearing its own appeal. After the council rejected its appeal, it then appealed again to the Parking Adjudicator. But having appealed, it then presented no evidence, and the Adjudicator voided the ticket. Feeling its appeal had been an outrageous waste of time, the council asked for costs, thus accusing itself of having acted frivolously, vexatiously and/or wholly unreasonably toward itself. The Adjudicator declined to award costs, pointing out that '[t]he legal status of the two parties in this appeal amounted to one and the same.'"

Litigation-Happy Society...

[lag10]

Where even the government will stop at nothing to sue itself.

Someone's billing extra hours

[Valdrax]

The best part of the whole mess is that the council had to pay two legal teams extra money to fight whether or not the council paid for its own costs or... paid for its own costs.

Re:

[Rene S. Hollan]

It's not unusual for one party to pay two legal teams to argue amongst themselves. When I divorced, because my then-wife did not work, I had to pay BOTH attorneys. It was quite surreal.

normal madness,

[hazbeen]

having spent many years living under islington council I would say this behaviour is normal. Its what you get when you allow a place to be run by a bunch of egomaniac middle managers with little accountability.