Adam Hughes & Ors v World Rugby Limited & Ors

Facts

The claimants are approximately 1,000 former rugby players from both codes, rugby union and rugby league, women and men, many of whom played at the pinnacle of their sport. They allege that collision forces sustained during matchplay and training caused concussive and sub-concussive brain damage, producing neurological injuries including Persistent Post Concussion Syndrome, Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, Early Onset Dementia, Parkinson's Disease, Epilepsy and Motor Neurone Disease. The defendants are the governing bodies of the two codes, who are said to have owed a duty to protect players from neurological injury, to have failed to reduce the risk and to have failed to warn players of it. The claims are strenuously defended, the governing bodies disputing the nature and scope of the duty, causation, and relying on limitation and volenti. Senior Master Cook, as managing Master, has actively case managed the claims, the central issue to date being disclosure of medical records and of the "testing process" documents described in the witness statement of the claimants' solicitor Mr Richard Boardman of Rylands Garth. Disclosure orders were not complied with, unless orders followed, and the claimants' appeal against those case management decisions was dismissed by Dexter Dias J. The defendants then applied for declarations that the defaulting claims stood struck out; the claimants applied for relief from sanction.