"Whether an amendment should be granted is a
matter for the discretion of the trial judge and
he should be guided in the exercise of the
discretion by his assessment of where justice
lies. Many and diverse factors will bear upon
the exercise of this discretion... But justice
cannot always be measured in terms of money and
in my view a judge is entitled to weigh in the
balance the strain the litigation imposes on
litigants, particularly if they are personal
litigants rather than business corporations, the
anxieties occasioned by facing new issues, the
raising of false hopes, and the legitimate
expectation that the trial will determine the
issues one way or the other. Furthermore to
allow an amendment before a trial begins is
quite different from allowing it at the end of
the trial to give an apparently unsuccessful
defendant an opportunity to renew the fight on
an entirely different defence.
Another factor that a judge must weigh in the
balance is the pressure on the courts caused by
the great increase in litigation and the
consequent necessity that, in the interests of
the whole community, legal business should be
conducted efficiently. We can no longer afford
to show the same indulgence towards the
negligent conduct of litigation as was perhaps
possible in a more leisured age. There will be
cases in which justice will be better served by
allowing the consequences of the negligence of
the lawyer to fall upon their own heads rather
than allowing an amendment at a very late stage
of the proceedings."