In a writ of waste the waste assigned was in respect of a house, twenty oaks, forty cart-loads of clay.
Markham. Clay cannot be called waste.
To which it was said by the Court that it is waste in as much as the soil is made poorer by removal of the clay.
Markham. As for the house, it was so ruinous and rotten that it was about to fall down and so it was demolished and rebuilt (judgment if action lies etc.); as for the oaks they were cut down for timber for the house and the timber was used in the house as for posts, spars and panels (judgment if action lies etc.); as for the clay he dug this out of the soil to take for the house. Judgment if action etc.
Danvers (not admitting that the house was ruinous or rotten): the previous house was forty-eight feet in length and forty feet wide and the new house is forty-eight feet in length; and in so far as he has thereby admitted waste we ask that he be treated as confessing etc.
Markham. The new house is as good and as profitable as the old one was.
NEWTON, J. How can it be thought that a house forty-eight feet long and forty feet wide will be of as great value and as profitable as a house that is eight foot wide and of the appropriate width? And as Danvers well said when the defendant demolished the house that was his folly because in this case he must make a new house of the same length and width as the other, but if the house had fallen down and he had erected a new one he would not have had to erect it to the same dimensions as the old house.
Markham. We tell you that we demolished the house with the assent and by the agreement of the plaintiff and erected a new one as good and profitable as the old one, ready etc.
Danvers. We hold to the plea as we pleaded it etc.
NEWTON, J. You say well.
Markham. We ask for judgment etc. and ask that he be barred.
And thus they demurred for judgment and then nothing was entered of this save a licence to imparl.
Citations:
[1443] [Co. Litt. 53a (c)]
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Dayani v London Borough of Bromley TCC 25-Nov-1999
LA Tenant liable for permissive waste
The local authority was tenant of properties which it sub-licensed to homeless persons for three years was liable for having allowed the properties to deteriorate. It was claimed that they were liable for permissive waste as tenants for a fixed . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Landlord and Tenant
Updated: 06 May 2022; Ref: scu.196983