The Supreme Court has resolved uncertainty as to the test that
must be met when seeking to set aside a judgment on the grounds
that it was obtained by fraud. Overturning the Court of
Appeal's decision, it confirmed that there is no need to
demonstrate that the evidence of fraud could not have been obtained
with reasonable diligence at the time of the earlier trial: Takhar v Gracefield
Developments Ltd [2019] UKSC 13.
The question of whether there is a "reasonable
diligence" requirement in cases involving fraud had been the
subject of conflicting authority in the lower courts in recent
years. It reflects a tension between, on the one hand, the public
policy in favour of the finality of litigation and, on the other,
the desire to do justice in individual cases and not permit
fraudsters to benefit from their misuse of the court system. The
Supreme Court's decision comes down in favour of the latter in
this context, and to that extent can be seen as an illustration
