The Court refused the defendants' application to tender a late expert report on the dangerousness of competitive sailing for the purposes of the s 5L Civil Liability Act 2002 obvious risk defence. The Court held that the defendants' assumption that the plaintiff would tender his own expert's report did not constitute exceptional circumstances under UCPR 31.28(4)(a), and that identifiable prejudice to the plaintiff existed because his counsel had conducted cross-examination of the defendants' witnesses consistently with the decision not to rely on that report. The defendants' failure to qualify their own expert on a defence that had been pleaded for over two years was fatal to the application.
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