‘claim for professional negligence in connection with a property transaction. It raises questions as regards whether there was professional negligence, whether there was any resulting loss, and, if so, whether damages are to be calculated on the basis of the balance of probabilities or loss of a chance. ‘
Freedman J
[2019] EWHC 1326 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 06 July 2022; Ref: scu.638213
Appeal by the claimant against the decision of a Social Security Appeal Tribunal and it relates to a certificate in respect of compensation recovery.
[1996] NISSCSC C1/96(CRS)
Northern Ireland
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.240639
Forbes J
[2006] EWHC 820 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.240427
Damages for breach of restrictive covenant.
[2006] EWCA Civ 225
England and Wales
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.239212
The claimant said that the defendant had accused her of falsifying hospital waiting statistics. The defendant pleaded justification.
Held: There were stark differences in the evidence given by different witnesses. Nevertheless the evidence that there had been wrongdoing was sufficient. Though not all the imputations had been proved to be true, in the light of what had been shown, the remaining untrue implication could not further damage the claimant’s reputation.
Gray J
[2006] EWHC 386 (QB), [2006] 1 All ER 154
England and Wales
Cited – In re H and R (Minors) (Child Sexual Abuse: Standard of Proof) HL 14-Dec-1995
Evidence allowed – Care Application after Abuse
Children had made allegations of serious sexual abuse against their step-father. He was acquitted at trial, but the local authority went ahead with care proceedings. The parents appealed against a finding that a likely risk to the children had still . .
Cited – Nina Naicker Gow v Dr Rosemary Harker CA 31-Jul-2003
The defendant had taken a blood sample. The claimant asserted that because the needle had been inserted incorrectly she had suffered damage to her wrist.
Held: Guidance from cases involving allegations of fraud could be relevant when assessing . .
Cited – Armagas Ltd v Mundogas SA (‘The Ocean Frost’) HL 22-May-1985
Ostensible authority creates estoppel
Apparent authority as agent can arise where an employer by words or conduct has represented that his employee, who has purported to act on behalf of the employer, is authorised to do what he is purporting to do. Ostensible authority depends on a . .
See Also – Henry v British Broadcasting Corporation QBD 11-Nov-2005
. .
See Also – Henry v British Broadcasting Corporation QBD 2-Dec-2005
The defendant reported an enquiry as to the alleged falsification of waiting list figures at a local hospital. It argued for a Reymolds qualified privilege and justification. . .
Cited – Garrett v Halton Borough Council CA 16-Mar-2007
The defendants argued that the conditional fee agreement in use by the claimant’s solicitors was void and so in breach of the rules.
Held: In assessing whether there was any ‘interest’ for the purposes of the Regulation, the court looked to . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.238933
Tomlinson J
[2006] EWHC 102 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.238554
Peter Smith J
[2006] EWHC 184 (Ch)
England and Wales
Cited – Tilling v Whiteman HL 1980
Lord Scarman said: ‘Preliminary points of law are too often treacherous short cuts. Their price can be, as here, delay, anxiety and expense.’
Lord Wilberforce said: ‘The judge took what has turned out to be an unfortunate course. Instead of . .
See Also – WWF – World Wide Fund for Nature (Formerly World Wildlife Fund); World Wildlife Fund Inc v World Wrestling Federation Entertainment Inc CA 27-Feb-2002
The claimant sought enforcement of a contract restricting the use by the appellant defendant of the initials ‘WWF’ in their trading. The agreement had been reached in settlement of an action for breach of the claimant’s trade mark rights. The . .
See Also – World Wide Fund for Nature (Formerly World Wildlife Fund), World Wildlife Fund Incorporated v World Wrestling Federation Entertainment Incorporated – Intervener Jakks Pacific Llc CA 27-Mar-2003
. .
Appeal from – WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) and Another v World Wrestling Federation Entertainment Inc CA 2-Apr-2007
The parties had disputed use of the initals WWF, with a compromise reached in 1994 allowing primary use by the Fund with restricted use by the Federation. The Federation now appealed an award of damages made after a finding of a breach of the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.238543
LT COMPENSATION – planning permission – discontinuance order – preliminary issue – airfield – scope and effect of planning permissions granted under s73A of Town and Country Planning Act 1990 – whether conditions would continue to bind adjoining land the subject of an earlier, less restrictive planning permission – issue estoppel – abuse of powers – held conditions would not continue to bind adjoining land – held compensating authority estopped from so contending.
[2006] EWLands LCA – 73 – 2002
England and Wales
Cited – Newbury District Council v Secretary of State for the Environment HL 1980
Issues arose as to a new planning permission for two existing hangars.
Held: The appeal succeeded. The question of the validity of conditions attached to planning permissions will sometimes be a difficult one. To be valid, a condition must be . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.238408
(Antigua and Barbuda) The Board was asked as to the damages to be awarded after the defendant had built a wall which encroached on the claimant’s land and appropriated some 455 square feet. Aggravated damages had been awarded. The court was asked whether the damages should reflect the increase in value of the defendant’s property rather than the strict value of the land itself.
Held: This was not an occasion when the building of the wall had been accompanied by high handed or other reprehensible behaviour, and aggravated damages were not justified.
Tthe proper starting point was the value of the land encroached upon, which was assessed at $30 per square foot, totalling $13,650. However, the judge was right to take into account the extent to which the piece of land encroached upon had enhanced the amenities of the respondent’s own house. By building his wall on the appellant’s land and thereby (permanently) incorporating a piece of the appellant’s land into his garden, the respondent had given the expropriated land a value to himself considerably in excess of its value simply as 455 square feet of an undeveloped plot. The proper question to ask was how much the appellant could reasonably have sought from the respondent as the price of the land incorporated wrongly into his garden. The value to the respondent of the land as part of his garden would have been at least double its value as an undeveloped plot.
Lord Hope of Craighead, Lord Scott of Foscote, Lord Walker of Gestingthorpe, Baroness Hale of Richmond, Lord Mance
[2006] UKPC 3, [2006] 1 EGLR 75, (2006) 22 Const LJ 187, [2006] 15 EG 136
Cited – Star Energy Weald Basin Ltd and Another v Bocardo Sa SC 28-Jul-2010
The defendant had obtained a licence to extract oil from its land. In order to do so it had to drill out and deep under the Bocardo’s land. No damage at all was caused to B’s land at or near the surface. B claimed in trespass for damages. It now . .
Cited – Ramzan v Brookwide Ltd ChD 8-Oct-2010
The claimant owned a flying freehold room butting into the defendant’s property. Whilst the claimant’s property was unoccupied, the defendant broke through into the room, blocked off the door to the claimant’s property, and included the room in the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.238310
The claimant companies had paid corporation tax under rules which had later been found to be discriminatory. They now sought repayment by virtue of double taxation agreements with the countries in which the parent companies were based.
Held: The double agreements required the taxation provisions should not treat worse ‘other similar enterprises of that first-mentioned state’ in the UK. The claimant had submitted that ‘other similar enterprises’ had to refer to the UK subsidiaries of UK parent companies. The Revenue contended that it was the group which was being referred to. That submission was not accepted. To limit the availability of group income elections to subsidiaries of UK companies would be a discriminatory breach.
However section 788 did not operate to incoporate the double taxation agreements into UK law, and therefore there was no remedy available to the taxpayers.
The question how restitutionary relief should be assessed was not settled by La Pintada, as the claim was not for an entitlement to interest, as creditors, on a debt or on damages by way of compensation for loss of the use of the money that was unjustly demanded and retained by the defendant.
The role of pleadings has not been abolished by the CPR. Mummery LJ said: ‘While it is good sense not to be pernickety about pleadings, the basic requirement that material facts should be pleaded is there for a good reason – so that the other side can respond to the pleaded case by way of admission or denial of facts, thereby defining the issues for decision for the benefit of the parties and the court. Proper pleading of the material facts is essential for the orderly progress of the case and for its sound determination. The definition of the issues has an impact on such important matters as disclosure of relevant documents and the relevant oral evidence to be adduced at trial. In my view, the fact that the nature of the grievance may be obvious to the respondent or that the respondent can ask for further information to be supplied by the claimant are not normally valid excuses for a claimant’s failure to formulate and serve a properly pleaded case setting out the material facts in support of the cause of action. If the pleading has to be amended, it is reasonable that the party, who has not complied with well known pleading requirements, should suffer the consequences with regard to such matters as limitation.’
Lord Justice Lloyd Lord Justice Mummery Lord Justice Sedley
[2006] EWCA Civ 25, Times 10-Feb-2006, [2006] STC 606, [2006] BTC 266, 8 ITL Rep 819, [2006] STI 32, [2006] Eu LR 755
Income and Corporation Taxes Act 1988 788(3)
England and Wales
Cited – Metallgesellschaft Ltd and Others v Inland Revenue Commissioners and Another Hoechst Ag and Another v Same ECJ 8-Mar-2001
The British law which meant that non-resident parent companies of British based businesses were not able to recover interest on payments of advance corporation tax, was discriminatory against other European based companies. Accordingly the law was . .
Cited – NEC Semi-Conductors Limited and Other Test Claimants v The Commissioners of Inland Revenue ChD 24-Nov-2003
UK companies were subsidiaries of companies resident abroad, and complained that they were unable to make group income elections.
Held: The prohibition infringed non-discrimination provisions of double taxation agreements – non-discrimination . .
Cited – President of India v La Pintada Compagnia Navigacia SA (‘La Pintada’) HL 1985
The house decided against altering the rule in Page -v- Newman. ‘The common law does not award general damages for delay in payment of a debt beyond the date when it is contractually due’ The power given to the court under s 35A is discretionary. It . .
Cited – Rhone-Poulenc Rorer International Holdings Inc and Another v Yeda Research and Development Co Ltd ChD 16-Feb-2006
The patent application had been presented to the European Patent Office and granted only after 13 years. The claimant now appealed refusal to allow amendment of its claim to allow a claim in its sole name. The defendant argued that it was out of . .
Appeal from – Boake Allen Ltd and others v Revenue and Customs HL 23-May-2007
The revenue appealed against a decision that provisions which did not allow the defendants, as companies with foreign parents, the right to make group income elections which would have allowed them to pay on their profits to their parent companies . .
Cited – Sempra Metals Ltd v Inland Revenue Commissioners and Another HL 18-Jul-2007
The parties agreed that damages were payable in an action for restitution, but the sum depended upon to a calculation of interest. They disputed whether such interest should be calculated on a simple or compound basis. The company sought compound . .
Cited – Test Claimants In The Franked Investment Income Group Litigation v Inland Revenue SC 23-May-2012
The European Court had found the UK to have unlawfully treated differently payment of franked dividends between subsidiaries of UK companies according to whether all the UK subsidiaries were themselves UK based, thus prejudicing European . .
Cited – Benedetti v Sawiris and Others SC 17-Jul-2013
The claimant appealed against reduction of the sum awarded on his claim for a quantum meruit after helping to facilitate a very substantial business deal for the defendants.
Held: The correct approach to the amount to be paid by way of a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.238206
It was not appropriate to make any reduction in the damages multiplier for future loss of earnings to reflect the possibility that the pursuer might marry and have children.
[1985] 1 WLR 963
England and Wales
Cited – Gregg v Scott HL 27-Jan-2005
The patient saw his doctor and complained about a lump under his arm. The doctor failed to diagnose cancer. It was nine months before treatment was begun. The claimant sought damages for the reduction in his prospects of disease-free survival for . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.222513
Application for further interim payment of damages.
Lambert DBE J
[2019] EWHC 1466 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.638219
Warby J
[2019] EWHC 1321 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.638218
RACE DISCRIMINATION – Injury to feelings
RACE DISCRIMINATION – Other losses
Race discrimination – injury to feelings and other (non-pecuniary) losses
The Claimant had pursued ET proceedings, complaining of various acts of harassment because of race in respect of six incidents during her employment and from the fact and manner of her dismissal. Finding that the claim in respect of matters arising during the course of the Claimant’s employment had been brought out of time, the ET upheld the Claimant’s complaint of racial harassment in respect of her dismissal. At the subsequent Remedies Hearing, the ET found that the Claimant’s injury to feelings fell to be considered within the middle of the middle Vento band and made an award of pounds 16,000 under this head. It separately considered her claim for aggravated damages, finding that the Respondent’s failure to respond to the Claimant’s grievance/appeal, its subsequent conduct of the ET litigation (its initial maintenance of the lie that she had been dismissed because of redundancy; its failure to respond to disclosure requests; its late alteration of its case to allege dismissal because of suspected theft) and its failure to apologise, had aggravated her injury to feelings, warranting an award of pounds 5,000 under this head. Having found that the Claimant had suffered medical depression for three months, the ET also made an award for personal injury in the sum of pounds 3,000. Standing back to consider the overall award made for non-pecuniary damages, the ET was satisfied that this was an appropriate sum. It then went on to make an uplift of 25% in respect of the Respondent’s breach of the ACAS Code given its failure to respond to the Claimant’s grievance/appeal.
The Respondent appealed, contending the awards made were manifestly excessive, the personal injury award failed to take into account the Claimant’s other complaints of discrimination (for which the Respondent had not been found liable) and the ET had double-counted the factors taken into account and/or had taken into account irrelevant factors.
Held: allowing the appeal in part
Injury to feelings
The fact that the ET’s finding of unlawful discrimination related to an isolated event – the Claimant’s dismissal – did not mean it was required to assess the award for injury to feelings as falling within the lowest Vento bracket: the question was what effect had the discriminatory act had on the Claimant? On the ET’s findings of fact in this case, it had permissibly concluded that this was a serious matter (something acknowledged by the Respondent) that gave rise to an injury to feelings award falling within the middle of the middle Vento bracket. Moreover, in reaching that decision, the ET had been careful not to double-count matters that it subsequently considered relevant to the question of aggravated damages, personal injury or any ACAS uplift. It had, further, not taken into account irrelevant factors when it referred to the Claimant’s grievance, her notification to ACAS or the pursuit of her ET proceedings; these were potentially relevant matters to which the ET was entitled to refer when testing whether the Claimant had genuinely been aggrieved by the Respondent’s discriminatory conduct. There was, therefore, no proper basis on which the EAT could interfere with the award made.
Aggravated damages
As for the aggravated damages award, other than a question as to whether this double-counted the Respondent’s failure to respond to the grievance/appeal (given the ET’s subsequent award of a 25% ACAS uplift), the ET’s reasoning made clear that it had been careful to have regard only to matters occurring after the dismissal, which had not been taken into account in assessing the initial injury to feelings suffered by the Claimant or her personal injury.
Personal injury
Similarly, when considering the claim in respect of personal injury, the ET had been astute not to allow double-recovery for factors already taken into account under other heads. As for the evidence supporting its award in this regard, the ET had noted that there was no basis for thinking that the other matters of which the Claimant had complained (for which the Respondent had not been held liable) had caused her to suffer depression; in the circumstances it had not erred in law in failing to apportion some element of the three-month period of medical depression to some other, earlier cause.
Totality
Standing back and considering the totality of the sums awarded, given the particular facts of this case (where the Claimant had, out of the blue, been summarily dismissed from a job in a career in which she had invested much in terms of time and money, for which she had worked hard and which she reasonably considered to be a long-term employment; where the reason for the dismissal had been an obvious lie; where the Claimant had faced managerial intimidation when she sought to contest the reason given for her dismissal), it could not be said that the award made was manifestly excessive such as to allow the EAT to interfere.
Double-counting
The only point on which a question of double-counting arose related to the regard given to the Respondent’s failure to respond to the Claimant’s grievance/appeal. Having already considered this relevant to the award for aggravated damages, the ET subsequently returned to the point when deciding whether it was appropriate to make an uplift of 25% for the Respondent’s breach of the ACAS Code. Although the Respondent had not appealed against the ACAS uplift, it had questioned the aggravated damages award in this respect. Given that the ET decided to make an ACAS uplift in respect of the grievance/appeal, the question whether this gave rise to double-recovery in relation to the aggravated damages award was a relevant matter that ought properly to have been considered by the ET. As the ET had failed to have regard to this issue, the appeal would be allowed to this limited extent.
The parties having consented to the EAT itself determining the question thus identified, further submissions were heard as to whether the ET’s award for aggravated damages should be reduced. Although, as the Claimant contended, it might be considered that the other matters taken into account under this head justified the sum awarded, it was apparent that the ET had also had regard to the failure to respond to the grievance/appeal and, as such, it was appropriate to reduce the award in this respect to avoid double-counting. Of the various factors that had led to the aggravated damages award, however, this was a relatively minor matter and the award would be reduced only by the sum of pounds 1,000.
[2019] UKEAT 0267 – 18 – 2802
England and Wales
Updated: 05 July 2022; Ref: scu.637640
(Supreme Court of Canada) A catastrophically injured plaintiff claimed for loss of earnings both during the period she would live and during the period in which, as result of the injury complained of, she would not live.
Held: It was well ‘established that a deduction for personal living expenses must be made from the award for lost earning capacity for the years she will actually live’ and ‘A number of considerations suggest that a deduction for personal living expenses should be made from the award for lost earning capacity during the ‘lost years’. The first is the fact that the projected earnings could not have been earned except on the supposition that the plaintiff would have been alive to earn them. There can be no capacity to earn without a life. The maintenance of that life requires expenditure for personal living expenses. Hence the earnings which the award represents are conditional on personal living expenses having been incurred. It follows that such expenses may appropriately be deducted from the award. Against this, it is argued that if Jessica had been born a millionaire, her personal living expenses during the ‘lost years’ would have been met from other sources. But this does not negate the fact that in order to earn income one must live and incur the attendant expenses.
It can be argued that not to make a deduction for personal living expenses is to introduce into the award for lost earning capacity for the ‘lost years’ a measure of overcompensation akin to the duplication which the law avoids in the case of an award for lost earnings during the plaintiff’s actual lifespan. This deduction has been justified for the years before the plaintiff’s actual projected death, on the ground that it avoids duplication between the award for cost of care and the award for lost earning capacity. But in fact, the ‘lived years’ and the ‘lost years’ cannot be so easily distinguished. The same reasoning applies to both: had the plaintiff been in a position to earn the monies represented by the award for lost earning capacity, she would have had to spend a portion of them for living expenses. Not to recognize this is to introduce an element of duplication and to put the plaintiff in a better position than she would have been in had she actually earned the monies in question.’
[1994] 1 SCR 114
Canada
Cited – O’Brien and others v Independent Assessor HL 14-Mar-2007
The claimants had been wrongly imprisoned for a murder they did not commit. The assessor had deducted from their compensation a sum to represent the living costs they would have incurred if living freely. They also appealed differences from a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.250030
EAT UNFAIR DISMISSAL: Compensation
Loss of pension rights can continue beyond loss of earnings. Tribunal entitled to differentiate between a final salary pension scheme and a money purchase scheme.
[2009] UKEAT 0277 – 08 – 1202
England and Wales
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.304519
Leave to appeal from level of damages award
[2002] EWCA Civ 1272
England and Wales
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.217430
The claimant had incurred costs in defending an action brought by the respondents in breach of an exclusive jurisdiction agreement. They appealed a judgement against them.
Held: The claim for the costs must succeed. The jurisdiction in which the claim had been brought was one which did not award costs save exceptionally. That rule did not apply in the jurisdiction agreed for, and the claim would put the claimant in the position he would have been in had the other followed the contract.
Lord Phillips MR, Lord Justice Schiemann, And, Lord Justice May
Times 10-Dec-2001, Gazette 17-Jan-2002, [2001] EWCA Civ 1755, [2002] 1 WLR 1517, [2002] CLC 314, [2002] 1 All ER 693
England and Wales
Compared – Berry v British Transport Commission CA 1961
The plaintiff had been prosecuted by the defendant for pulling the emergency cord on a train without proper cause. After acquittal and payment of part of her costs, she sued for malicious prosecution, saying the damages were the part of her defence . .
Cited – Botham v The Ministry of Defence QBD 26-Mar-2010
The claimant had been employed by the MOD. He was summarily dismissed for gross misconduct, and he was then placed on the list of persons unsuitable for work with children. He succeeded at the Tribunal in a claim for unfair and wrongful dismissal. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.166931
Cranston J
[2008] EWHC 1172 (QB)
Civil Liability (Contribution) Act 1978
England and Wales
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.268689
In the course of an application for an interim injunction to prevent the Defendant dismissing the Claimant until disciplinary proceedings had been completed, the Judge considered the adequacy of damages as an alternative remedy: ‘On the other hand, if no injunctive relief is granted and if (as seems likely) the Trust does summarily dismiss Mr Gryf-Lowczowski, he would be confined to a claim for damages for wrongful or unfair dismissal. The former would be limited to the contractual notice period of three months; the latter is statutorily capped at andpound;56,000. I am unable to accept that in the circumstances of the present case such a remedy in damages is adequate.’
Gray J
[2005] EWHC 2407 (QB), (2006) 87 BMLR 46, [2006] IRLR 100, [2006] Lloyd’s Rep Med 199, [2006] ICR 425
England and Wales
Cited – Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust QBD 31-Jul-2009
The claimant, a consultant surgeon had been subject to disciplinary proceedings by his employer. They were however conducted in a manner which breached his contract. The GMC had summarily dismissed the same allegations. The claimant now appealed . .
Followed – Kircher v Hillingdon Primary Care Trust QBD 13-Jan-2006
. .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.235126
The court considered the damages to be awarded to a whistle blower on dismissal.
Held: The employee was entitled to damages for injuries to his feelings up to the point of his dismissal. Where there was available any adjustment in respect of any advanced payment there should equally be an increase in rate for any delay in payment.
Times 14-Nov-2005, [2005] EWCA Civ 1547
Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998 5
England and Wales
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.235147
Lord Osborne and Lady Cosgrove And Lord Philip
[2005] ScotCS CSIH – 73, 2006 SC 178, [2005] CSIH 73
Cited – Ocean Leisure Ltd v Westminster City Council LT 31-Dec-2003
LT COMPENSATION – injurious affection – hoardings erected in street during construction works outside shop premises – preliminary issue – whether claim under Compulsory Purchase Act 1965 s 10 valid – held . .
Cited – Star Energy Weald Basin Ltd and Another v Bocardo Sa SC 28-Jul-2010
The defendant had obtained a licence to extract oil from its land. In order to do so it had to drill out and deep under the Bocardo’s land. No damage at all was caused to B’s land at or near the surface. B claimed in trespass for damages. It now . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.234483
Measurement of damages for repudiatory breach.
The parties had entered into a charter which was intended to last seven years. The charterers broke the charterparty. A war later occurred which would have cut the contract short in any event.
Held: The damages should reflect the owners’ appeal failed. The damages were to be limited to the sum which would have been payable had the contract continued until the subsequent presumed frustration by the war. The damages should reflect the actual loss which would have been suffered.
Auld, Tuckey, Mance LJJ
Times 21-Oct-2005, [2005] EWCA Civ 1190, [2006] 1 WLR 533
England and Wales
Appeal from – Golden Strait Corporation v Nippon Yusen Kubishika Kaisha; ‘the Golden Victory’ TCC 15-Feb-2005
The parties had agreed a charterparty. The defendant repudiated the charter, but the Gulf War in 2003 meant that the the contract would have been frustrated in any event shortly afterwards.
Held: The assessment of damages for repudiation of a . .
Appeal from – Golden Strait Corporation v Nippon Yusen Kubishka Kaisha (‘The Golden Victory’) HL 28-Mar-2007
The claimant sought damages for repudiation of a charterparty. The charterpary had been intended to continue until 2005. The charterer repudiated the contract and that repudiation was accepted, but before the arbitrator could set his award, the Iraq . .
Cited – Bunge Sa v Nidera Bv SC 1-Jul-2015
The court considered the effect of the default clause in a standard form of contract which is widely used in the grain trade. On 10 June 2010 the respondents, Nidera BV, whom I shall call ‘the buyers’, entered into a contract with the appellants, . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.231461
(Bahamas) The defendant police had appealed the quantum of damages awarded to the claimant for assault and battery and false imprisonment and malicious prosecution, saying that she had been doubly compensated. The claimant now appealed reduction of her damages. The Bahamian police had subjected her to ‘Gestapo like tactics.’
Held: The several heads of damages did not co-incide with each other. Though the judge had not made quite clear how the damages claim had been calculated it remained clear that she had taken the correct approach, the inference of duplication was unsound, and the award was re-instated. The Board upheld the award of vindicatory damages, in order ‘to vindicate the right of the complainant . . to carry on his or her life in the Bahamas free from unjustified executive interference, mistreatment or oppression’
Lord Scott said: ‘The purpose of a vindicatory award is not a punitive purpose. It is not to teach the executive not to misbehave. The purpose is to vindicate the right of the complainant . . to carry on his or her life in the Bahamas free from unjustified executive interference, mistreatment or oppression. The sum appropriate to be awarded to achieve this purpose will depend upon the nature of the particular infringement and the circumstances relating to that infringement. It will be a sum at the discretion of the trial judge. In some cases a suitable declaration may suffice to vindicate the right; in other cases an award of damages, including substantial damages, may seem to be necessary.’
Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead, Lord Hoffmann, Lord Scott of Foscote, Lord Walker of Gestingthorpe, Baroness Hale of Richmond
[2005] UKPC 38
Cited – Rookes v Barnard (No 1) HL 21-Jan-1964
The court set down the conditions for the award of exemplary damages. There are two categories. The first is where there has been oppressive or arbitrary conduct by a defendant. Cases in the second category are those in which the defendant’s conduct . .
Cited – Attorney General of Trinidad and Tobago v Ramanoop PC 23-Mar-2005
(Trinidad and Tobago) A police officer had unjustifiably roughed up, arrested, taken to the police station and locked up Mr Ramanoop, who now sought constitutional redress, including exemplary damages. He did not claim damages for the nominate torts . .
Cited – Cassell and Co Ltd v Broome and Another HL 23-Feb-1972
Exemplary Damages Award in Defamation
The plaintiff had been awarded damages for defamation. The defendants pleaded justification. Before the trial the plaintiff gave notice that he wanted additional, exemplary, damages. The trial judge said that such a claim had to have been pleaded. . .
Cited – Ashley and Another v Chief Constable of Sussex Police HL 23-Apr-2008
The claimants sought to bring an action for damages after a family member suspected of dealing drugs, was shot by the police. At the time he was naked. The police officer had been acquitted by a criminal court of murder. The chief constable now . .
Cited – Subiah v The Attorney General of Trinidad and Tobago PC 3-Nov-2008
(Trinidad and Tobago) The Board considered the extent of damages for infringement of the claimant’s constitutional rights. He had been on board a bus. He complained when a policeman was allowed not to buy a ticket. The same constable arrested him as . .
Cited – Takitota v the Attorney General and others PC 18-Mar-2009
(Bahamas) The applicant a tourist had been wrongfully detained in appalling conditions in the Bahamas for over eight years after he lost his documents. He now appealed against an award of $500,000 dollars compensation.
Held: ‘it would not be . .
Cited – Lumba (WL) v Secretary of State for The Home Department SC 23-Mar-2011
The claimants had been detained under the 1971 Act, after completing sentences of imprisonment pending their return to their home countries under deportations recommended by the judges at trial, or chosen by the respondent. They challenged as . .
Cited – Takitota v The Attorney General and Others PC 18-Mar-2009
Bahamas – The claimant appeald as to the amount of compensation awarded to him for his unlawful detention for over eight years, in appalling prison conditions. The Court of Appeal categorised his treatment not only as ‘less than humane’ but as a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.231106
(French Text) Grand Chamber. In the context of unreasonable delay in violation of article 6(1), there was a strong but rebuttable presumption that excessively long proceedings would occasion non-pecuniary damage.
(2006) 45 EHRR 207, 36813/97, [2004] ECHR 412
European Convention on Human Rights
See Also – Scordino v Italy (No. 2) ECHR 15-Jul-2004
. .
Cited – Faulkner, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for Justice and Another SC 1-May-2013
The applicants had each been given a life sentence, but having served the minimum term had been due to have the continued detention reviewed to establish whether or not continued detention was necessary for the protection of the pblic. It had not . .
See Also – Scordino v Italy (3) ECHR 17-May-2005
ECHR Judgment (Merits and Just Satisfaction) – Violation of P1-1; Just satisfaction reserved. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.230579
An executrix ran a business which had been left to her and her sister.
Held: She was accountable in principle for profit, though the claim failed for other reasons: ‘What, then, is the proper method of assessing the accountability? Counsel for the defendant submits that one must look to see what is pleaded and what has been proved at the trial. One must then take those assets of the estate, or the benefits which have been so pleaded and proved at the hearing to have flowed to the defendant by reason of her position as a trustee of the estate, and value those benefits. Counsel for the plaintiff says, on the other hand, that that would be an impossible inquiry and that one must make the defendant accountable for the whole business and its profits, making allowances for the time, energy and skill that the defendant has expended, the assets she has brought in, the testator’s debts that she has paid, and, of course, her mother’s annuity.’ there was no general rule, save that a trustee may not make a profit out of his trust. It all depended on the facts. On the facts, he held that the executrix had reincarnated the testator’s own business, and hence the second method of framing the account was the correct one.
Upjohn J
[1958] 1 WLR 815, [1958] 2 All ER 336
England and Wales
Cited – Ultraframe (UK) Ltd v Fielding and others ChD 27-Jul-2005
The parties had engaged in a bitter 95 day trial in which allegations of forgery, theft, false accounting, blackmail and arson. A company owning patents and other rights had become insolvent, and the real concern was the destination and ownership of . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 04 July 2022; Ref: scu.230344
Post judgment assessment of damages.
Cockerill J
[2019] EWHC 725 (Comm)
England and Wales
See Also – Marino v FM Capital Partners Ltd CA 2016
The test for proprietary injunctions the courts impose a stricter test on defendants wishing to use assets falling within the scope of the injunction to pay legal fees. . .
See Also – FM Capital Partners Ltd v Marino and Others ComC 11-Jul-2018
Claims for conspiracy to injure . .
See Also – FM Capital Partners Ltd v Marino and Others ComC 9-Oct-2018
Proceedings to enforce court judgment . .
See Also – FM Capital Partners Ltd v Marino and Others ComC 31-Oct-2018
. .
Cited – FM Capital Partners Ltd v Marino and Others ComC 1-Nov-2018
consequentials hearing . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 03 July 2022; Ref: scu.637499
Assessment of damages for infringing use of image on website – post judgment reconsideration
[2015] EWHC 2632 (IPEC)
England and Wales
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.552727
[2010] NIQB 88
Northern Ireland
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.424817
Continuing battle between insurance companies and credit hire companies for credit hire charges following road traffic accidents.
[2010] NIQB 74
Northern Ireland
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.424816
McKenna J
[2008] EWHC 1262 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.270292
The claimant sought damages for her rape by the defendant. After his conviction and having served his sentence, the defendant won substantial sums on the lottery.
Held: The sums paid by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board were not paid by the defendant tortfeasor, but by the british taxpayer, and it would be contrary to notions of restorative justice to permit a Defendant to place any great weight on a payment which he did not make and has not offered to pay back to the CICA.
Coulson J
[2008] EWHC 1573 (QB)
England and Wales
See Also – A v Hoare HL 30-Jan-2008
Each of six claimants sought to pursue claims for damages for sexual assaults which would otherwise be time barred under the 1980 Act after six years. They sought to have the House depart from Stubbings and allow a discretion to the court to extend . .
Cited – Coad v Cornwall and Isles of Scilly Health Authority CA 17-Jul-1996
A nurse suffered a back injury in 1983 in the course of her employment. She left the employment of the health authority in either 1990 or 1991. The judge had accepted her evidence that she did not know that she had a right of action against her . .
See Also – A v Hoare QBD 14-Oct-2005
The defendant had been convicted and sentenced for the attempted rape of the claimant. He had subsequently won a substantial sum on the lottery, and she now sought damages. He replied that the action was statute barred being now 16 years old. The . .
Cited – AT and others v Dulghieru and Another QBD 19-Feb-2009
The claimants had been subject to unlawful human trafficking. Their abductors had been imprisoned, and they now sought damages. The court was asked now to assess the damages to be awarded for sexual enslavement. Each claimant suffered chronic post . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.270819
When calculating losses of earnings, the court must allow for National Insurance contributions which would have had to have been paid by the plaintiff.
[1963] 1 WLR 418
England and Wales
Cited – O’Brien and others v Independent Assessor HL 14-Mar-2007
The claimants had been wrongly imprisoned for a murder they did not commit. The assessor had deducted from their compensation a sum to represent the living costs they would have incurred if living freely. They also appealed differences from a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.250040
[2005] EWCA Civ 1420
England and Wales
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.235242
LT COMPENSATION – compulsory purchase – houses in disrepair – owner of intermediate long leasehold interest not responding to CPO – value – comparable transactions – Land Compensation Act 1961 Part 1 – compensation
[2005] UKLands ACQ – 5 – 2004
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.229247
The claimant partnership had sought a contribution from the defendants to the damages awarded against it.
Held: The section made allowance for non-causative factors when calculating a contribution, but the extent to which they should be allowed for was restricted.
Arden, Keene LJJ
[2005] EWCA Civ 962, Times 19-Sep-2005
Civil Liability (Contribution) Act 1978
England and Wales
Binding – Re-Source America International Ltd. v Platt Site Services Ltd. and Another, Barkin Construction Ltd CA 2-Jun-2004
‘Section 2 of the 1978 Act is not expressed exclusively in terms of causative responsibility for the damage in question, although obviously the court must have regard to this, as the section directs, and it is likely to be the most important factor . .
Cited – Madden v Quirk QBD 1989
The plaintiff had been riding as a passenger in the open part of a pick up truck which crashed.
Held: The passenger contributed significantly (85%) to his own injuries by choosing an unsafe mode of travel. . .
Cited – Carisbrooke Shipping Cv5 v Bird Port Ltd ComC 13-Sep-2005
. .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.229023
Copyright was claimed in a draft legal agreement. Infringement was established, but the court was asked to look at the assessment of damages.
Held: ‘what is the basis upon which damages for breach of copyright are awarded? The question cannot be answered without consideration of the nature of the wrongdoing which breach of copyright represents. The nature of the wrong is clear enough. In a case where the copyright work is a written document, it consists in the unauthorised use of the actual text of the document. It does not consist in pirating the idea or ideas to be found in the text.’ The claimed loss was not attributable to any breach of copyright: not because it was unforeseeable or otherwise too remote . . . but because in principle . . . it lies beyond the scope of protection which the law of copyright affords.’ The judge had lost hold of the distinction between the loss which flowed from the copying of the text and that which flowed from the copying of the ideas. The appeal succeeded.
[2005] EWCA Civ 931
England and Wales
Cited – Sutherland Publishing Co Ltd v Caxton Publishing Co Ltd CA 1936
. .
Cited – Paterson Zochonis and Co v Merfarken Packaging Ltd CA 1986
The normal measure of damages for copyright infringement is the amount by which the copyright is depreciated, by the infringement, as a chose in action. . .
Cited – Work Model Enterprises Limited v ECO System Limited 1996
There had been an admitted infringement of copyright by a competitor who copied the claimant’s brochure.
Held: The infringement did not cause the lost sales which were the result of legitimate competition. . .
Cited – Gerber Garment Technology Inc v Lectra Systems Ltd ChD 30-Jan-1995
A prior art recital in a Patent application is strong but rebuttable evidence of the state of knowledge. . .
Cited – Jolley v Sutton London Borough Council HL 24-May-2000
An abandoned boat had been left on its land and not removed by the council. Children tried to repair it, jacked it up, and a child was injured when it fell. It was argued for the boy, who now appealed dismissal of his claim by the Court of Appeal, . .
Cited – Gerber Garment Technology Inc v Lectra Systems Limited Lectra Systemes SA CA 18-Dec-1996
The plaintiffs claimed damages for patent infringement. Some of the lost profits for which the plaintiff company claimed damages were suffered by subsidiary companies in which it held all the shares.
Held: When a shareholder has a cause of . .
Cited – South Australia Asset Management Corporation v York Montague Ltd etc HL 24-Jun-1996
Limits of Damages for Negligent Valuations
Damages for negligent valuations are limited to the foreseeable consequences of advice, and do not include losses arising from a general fall in values. Valuation is seldom an exact science, and within a band of figures valuers may differ without . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.228963
Assessment of damages following child abuse by Catholic priest.
Held: General damages of andpound;50,000 were in line with Coxon and were approved. A had not been shown to be, and is not, incapable of managing his affairs. The court differed from the conclusion of the Court of Protection. Damages should be awarded on the basis that a special needs trust was established for the claimant. He could only recover for the cost of personal care by his family were this went significantly beyond the normal incidents of care within a family.
Christopher Clarke J
[2005] EWHC 1361 (QB)
England and Wales
Cited – Coxon v Flintshire County Council CA 13-Feb-2001
The guidelines on damages for psychiatric damage did not apply to the damages claims of those who had been subjected to sexual abuse whilst children in local authority care homes. The injury in these cases was of a different character, and the . .
Cited – Firth v George Ackroyd Junior Ltd 2000
. .
Cited – Ryan v Liverpool Health Authority 2001
. .
Cited – Masterman-Lister v Brutton and Co, Jewell and Home Counties Dairies (No 1) CA 19-Dec-2002
Capacity for Litigation
The claimant appealed against dismissal of his claims. He had earlier settled a claim for damages, but now sought to re-open it, and to claim in negligence against his former solicitors, saying that he had not had sufficient mental capacity at the . .
Cited – Bell v Todd 2001
. .
Cited – Russell Mitchell v Ryan Alasia 2005
The court considered whether the claimant, whom the Court of Protection had decided was a patient and in respect of whom a Receiver had been appointed, was and would continue to be one. The court concluded that, in the context of pursuing his claim . .
Cited – Giambrone and others v Sunworld Holidays Ltd CA 18-Feb-2004
Many holidaymakers had suffered gastro-enteritis and sued for compensation. They had sought a sum to reflect the value of gratuitous care.
Held: Save in more serious cases, awards for children suffering gastro-enteritis and cared for by their . .
Cited – The Catholic Child Welfare Society and Others v Various Claimants and The Institute of The Brothers of The Christian Schools and Others SC 21-Nov-2012
Law of vicarious liability is on the move
Former children at the children’s homes had sought damages for sexual and physical abuse. The court heard arguments as to the vicarious liability of the Society for abuse caused by a parish priest visiting the school. The Court of Appeal had found . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.228280
ECHR (French Text) Judgment (Merits and Just Satisfaction) – Preliminary objection rejected (non-exhaustion of domestic remedies); Violation of Art. 6-1; Non-pecuniary damage – financial award; Costs and expenses partial award – Convention proceedings.
65075/01, [2004] ECHR 615
European Convention on Human Rights
Cited – Giuseppina And Orestina Procaccini v Italy ECHR 29-Mar-2006
The complainants said that the damages awarded for the delay in hearing their civil case were derisory. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.227787
ECHR Judgment (Merits and Just Satisfaction) – Violation of Art. 5-1 with regard to one applicant; Violation of Art. 5-5 with regard to one applicant; Violation of Art. 6-1+6-3-c with regard to four applicants; Non-pecuniary damage – financial award (with regard to one applicant); Non-pecuniary damage – finding of violation sufficient (with regard to four applicants); Pecuniary damage – claim rejected; Costs and expenses partial award.
The applicant said that he had been unlawfully detained in prison for two days.
Held: He was awarded 5,000Eur.
Casadevall P
58927/00, (2005) 41 EHRR 23, 47676/99, 58923/00, [2005] ECHR 144, [2006] RA 384
European Convention on Human Rights
Cited – Faulkner, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for Justice and Another SC 1-May-2013
The applicants had each been given a life sentence, but having served the minimum term had been due to have the continued detention reviewed to establish whether or not continued detention was necessary for the protection of the pblic. It had not . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.227476
ECHR Judgment (Merits and Just Satisfaction) – No violation of Art. 5-1-e; Violation of Art. 5-4; Violation of Art. 5-5; No separate issue under Art. 13; Non-pecuniary damage – financial award; Costs and expenses partial award – Convention proceedings.
The complainant had been subject to detention in a mental hospital. She now complained that there had been a twelve month delay between a decision that she should be released subject to conditions, and the fulfillment of those conditions and her release.
Held: The delay was unreasonable, and since the law provided no means of compensation, a breach had occurred of her article 5.5 rights. It could not be excluded that the applicant would have been released earlier from detention in a psychiatric hospital if the procedures had been in conformity with article 5(4). The delay had been of about 12 months. The award was 6000Eur.
517/02, (2006) 42 EHRR 2, Times 28-Jul-2005, [2005] ECHR 411
Cited – Faulkner, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for Justice and Another SC 1-May-2013
The applicants had each been given a life sentence, but having served the minimum term had been due to have the continued detention reviewed to establish whether or not continued detention was necessary for the protection of the pblic. It had not . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.227204
The parties were neighbours. Mature trees had been damaged which had provided a screen against pylons. The cost of one directly equivalent tree would be andpound;400,000.
Held: In this case it was not possible to make an award which could restore the claimants to their position before the damage. It would be many years before replacement trees could regrow. ‘The fact that the claimants would prefer reinstatement with mature trees (rather than with young trees) is not a good reason for rejecting the option of reinstatement with young trees if that is what a reasonable person would choose to do if he was laying out his own money.’ The claimants should not have been denied at least the cost of replacing the lost trees with young whips. To those would be added an increased award of general damages. The judge had awarded aggravated damages. That award also would be increased. The defendants were well aware of the effect of their intimidatory behaviour, and that element of the award was increased to andpound;4,000.
Lord Justice Chadwick, Lord Justice Longmore and Lord Justice Carnwath
[2005] EWCA Civ 762
England and Wales
Cited – Farmer Giles Ltd v Wessex Water Authority and another 1990
The court looked at the measure of damages in relation to damage to land: ‘The award, particularly when contrasted with the cost of full reinstatement, in my judgment, also passes the test of reasonableness. I add that test of reasonableness because . .
Cited – Scutt v Lomax CA 4-Feb-1999
The claimant sought damages for trespass to two plots comprising about one fifth of an acre. They had over many years gardened it and tended it. The defendant had bulldozed the entire area.
Held: The diminution in the value of the land was not . .
Cited – Rookes v Barnard (No 1) HL 21-Jan-1964
The court set down the conditions for the award of exemplary damages. There are two categories. The first is where there has been oppressive or arbitrary conduct by a defendant. Cases in the second category are those in which the defendant’s conduct . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.227086
[2005] EWHC 1053 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.227001
Request for judicial review of refusal to pay compensation for wrongful detention in prison after end of sentence.
Bennett J
[2004] EWHC 3084 (Admin)
European Convention on Human Rights 5(5)
England and Wales
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.226917
Warren J
[2006] EWHC 62 (Ch)
England and Wales
Updated: 01 July 2022; Ref: scu.238347
[2003] EWCA Civ 505
England and Wales
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.181152
Field J
[2011] EWHC 534 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.430616
Spencer J
[2011] EWHC 243 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.428710
The court considered the quantification of damages after a successful claim by the estate of a man who had died from mesothelioma.
Hamblen J
[2008] EWHC 3033 (QB)
Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1934, Fatal Accidents Act 1976
England and Wales
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.278793
The claimant sought payment for damages to his property after he had hired it out to a film production company.
Held: the claim for repair of damage to the driveway did not include any element of improvement.
Derek Sweeting QC
[2008] EWHC 2494 (QB)
England and Wales
Cited – Harbutt’s Plasticine Ltd v Wayne Tank and Pump Co Ltd CA 1970
The plaintiffs’ factory in an old mill, burned down because Wayne Tank had installed a pipeline made of unsuitable and dangerous plastic material and wrapped in heating tape attached to a useless thermostat. It had been switched on and the plant . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.277902
The local authority sought repayment from a negligent hospital of the cost of services it had had to provide to an injured patient. They said that the hospital had failed to advise the patient to resume taking warfarin when her operation was postponed, with the result that she suffered a stroke, which rendered her incapable of looking after herself and required institutional care funded by her local authority. They said that the duty owed by the Trust was a duty not to treat or fail to treat the patient in such a way that she would foreseeably suffer injury, which would cause financial loss to the council in the provision and the care it was obliged to provide.
Held: The claim failed. Though the loss was reasonably foreseeable, but (by a majority) there was not a sufficient degree of proximity between the parties to found the duty of care and it was not fair, just and reasonable to impose such a duty on the Trust.
Buxton LJ said on the issue of reasonable foreseeability: ‘The level of certainty required for an outcome to be deemed, after the event, to have been foreseeable is to a large extent a matter of impression.’
Buxton LJ, Clarke LJ, Ouseley J
[2005] EWCA Civ 596, Times 28-Jun-2005
England and Wales
Cited – Bourhill v Young’s Executor HL 5-Aug-1942
When considering claims for damages for shock, the court only recognised the action lying where the injury by shock was sustained ‘through the medium of the eye or the ear without direct contact.’ Wright L said: ‘No doubt, it has long ago been . .
Cited – Jolley v Sutton London Borough Council HL 24-May-2000
An abandoned boat had been left on its land and not removed by the council. Children tried to repair it, jacked it up, and a child was injured when it fell. It was argued for the boy, who now appealed dismissal of his claim by the Court of Appeal, . .
Cited – Caparo Industries Plc v Dickman and others HL 8-Feb-1990
Limitation of Loss from Negligent Mis-statement
The plaintiffs sought damages from accountants for negligence. They had acquired shares in a target company and, relying upon the published and audited accounts which overstated the company’s earnings, they purchased further shares.
Held: The . .
Cited – West Bromwich Albion Football Club Ltd v El-Safty QBD 14-Dec-2005
The claimant sought damages from the defendant surgeon alleging negligent care of a footballer. The defendant argued that he had no duty to the club as employer of his patient who was being treated through his BUPA membership. It would have created . .
Cited – Hone v Six Continents Retail Ltd CA 29-Jun-2005
The employer appealed a finding that it was liable in damages for negligence to the claimant, and employee who suffered psychiatric injury cause by stress at work. He said he had been left to work very excessive hours, between 89 and 92 hours a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.226311
A covenant prevented new building other than for a garage. The owner proposed a three-car garage extension, but with a play-room above, for the applicant’s own use. The relevant property of the objector was not her own house, but consisted of a driveway, and a plot of land on which she hoped to be allowed to build a house. The development had proceeded without obtaining a modification. High Court proceedings for breach of the covenant were adjourned, at the appeal stage, to allow an application to the tribunal under section 84. The principle of modification was agreed, so that the only issue was compensation. The main issues were, first, the impact of the development on the objector’s property, and, secondly, whether she was entitled to compensation assessed, as she claimed, on the negotiated share basis.
Held: The President described the impact on her plot as ‘minimal’, and concluded that there should be no compensation.
[2004] EWLands LP – 34 – 2003
England and Wales
Cited – Stokes v Cambridge Corporation LT 1961
The tribunal considered case concerned 5.1 ha of land with an assumption of planning permission for industrial development under Planning legislation. There was only one possible access over adjoining land in different ownership.
Held: When . .
Cited – Winter and Another v Traditional and Contemporary Contracts Ltd CA 7-Nov-2007
The land-owners applied for a variation of a restrictive covenant to allow them to put a second house on their plot. They had bought out the right of the original builder, but a neighbour also had the benefit of the covenant. They now appealed the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.225825
LT COMPULSORY PURCHASE – Compensation – dwellinghouse and adjoining land – whether property value agreed – whether acquiring authority estopped from denying that the value is the ‘agreed’ figure – whether damage to property after valuation date to be reflected in compensation – whether claimants’ company suffered loss as a result of compulsory acquisition – whether surveyors’ fees should be limited to Ryde’s scale (1996) – other detailed disturbance items considered – compensation awarded andpound;618,945.
[2003] EWLands ACQ – 69 – 2001
See Also – The Secretary of State for Transport v Christos, Christos CA 25-Jul-2003
. .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.225776
LT COMPENSATION – injurious affection – hoardings erected in street during construction works outside shop premises – preliminary issue – whether claim under Compulsory Purchase Act 1965 s 10 valid – held claimant entitled to compensation for any diminution in rental value.
[2003] EWLands LCA – 30 – 2003, [2004] R and VR 145
Compulsory Purchase Act 1965 10
England and Wales
Appeal from – Westminster City Council v Ocean Leisure Limited CA 21-Jul-2004
The claimant company owned property next to land which had been acquired to build a new bridge across the Thames. It sought compensation for disturbance to its business from the works.
Held: The state of the law was complicated and . .
Cited – Logan v Scottish Water OHCS 1-Nov-2005
. .
Cited – Moto Hospitality Ltd v Highways Agency LT 28-Jul-2006
LT COMPENSATION – injurious affection – Compulsory Purchase Act 1965 s 10 – preliminary issue – motorway service area – junction alterations affecting trade – whether damage suffered as result of ‘works’ – . .
Cited – Moto Hospitality Ltd v Secretary of State for Transport CA 26-Jul-2007
The company sought damages to its business on a motorway service station when works closed an access road.
Held: The Secretary of State’s appeal succeeded. A claim for compensation under section 10 had not been established, at least in respect . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.225783
LT COMPENSATION – limitation – Compulsory Purchase (Vesting Declarations) Act 1981 section 10(3) – advance payment and negotiations on disturbance compensation after 6 years – whether waiver or estoppel prevented acquiring authority from relying on limitation – held that it did not
[2000] EWLands ACQ – 10 – 1999
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.225577
The court undertook an enquiry as to damages: ‘(1) Damages were to be assessed liberally on the basis of such inferences as the evidence justified.
(2) Damages were to be assessed by reference to two periods, November 1992 to February 1996 and March 1996 to March 1997. The difference between them is that in the latter period but not the former Mr Blayney was incorporating Welsh gold which the judge considered to be an important selling point.
(3) Damages were to be assessed by reference to the profit Mr Blayney would have made in respect of such of the sales of infringing articles effected by Clogau as he could show he would have made but for the infringement.
(4) In the absence of any evidence as to an appropriate rate of royalty for sales of infringing articles by Clogau which Mr Blayney could not show he would have made but for the infringement Mr Blayney was not entitled to damages.
(5) Mr Blayney had not made out a case for an award of additional damages under s.97(2) Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.’
Kim Lewison QC
[2002] FSR 14
Copyright Designs & Patents Act 1988
England and Wales
Appeal from – Blayney (T/A Aardvark Jewelry) v Clogau St David’s Gold Mines Ltd and others CA 16-Jul-2002
. .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.276907
Someone who agrees to procure that someone else performs a contractual obligation is required first to attempt to ensure that that person complies with the obligation, but if he fails to comply then he must pay damages calculated by the amount that ought to have been paid by the third party.
Lewison J
[2004] 2 BCLC 464
England and Wales
Cited – Nearfield Ltd v Lincoln Nominees Ltd and Lincoln Trust Company Ltd ChD 9-Oct-2006
The claimant sought to enforce a joint venture agreement under which a loan had been made. They said the defendant had accepted an obligation to secure repayment or indemnify them. The defendant said it had adopted only an administrative role.
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 June 2022; Ref: scu.245257
The claimant had been dismissed by reason of disability and so was entitled to compensation for the associated psychological injury. She was then dismissed unfairly, and the employer sought to argue that the dismissal constituted a novus actus and ended the period for which she was entitled to compensation for loss of earnings.
Held: An employer who had unfairly dismissed a claimant could not rely upon its wrongful act to minimise the claimant’s compensation.
Rix LJ said that: ‘There was the clearest evidence in this case that the psychiatric harm caused by the act of discrimination and its impact on the respondent’s ability to work continued far beyond the date of the unfair dismissal and in the absence of a fair dismissal we see no reason why the chain of compensation should be broken at that date.
I agree. Indeed, despite the skill and enthusiasm with which Mr Underwood has presented his submissions, the argument that the Prison Service’s own act of unfair dismissal can be said to break the chain of causation is very puzzling to me. This is the language of new intervening act, but I do not understand how it is said that the unfair dismissal is an ‘intervening’ act, when it is the act of the tortfeasor itself. Nothing in the submissions began to explain this to me; indeed, we were not shown any authority or learning on the concept of new intervening act. McGregor on Damages, 17th edn, 2003, speaks in this context of the intervening acts of a third party (at paras 6-031ff) and of the claimant (at paras 6-057ff) but not of the tortfeasor. Nor do I understand why the mere act of dismissal, even if it were justified which of course it was not, could do more to wash away the long-lasting effects of the prior discriminatory act than merely to prevent the damages for loss of earnings being measured by a comparison with earnings under the old employment.’
and he went on to distinguish such a case from one in which the claimant’s employment had come to an end by reason of a repudiatory breach of contract of the claimant: ‘Of course, if a claimant commits a repudiatory breach of his own contract of employment, thereby entitling a defendant employer to terminate that contract by dismissing him, then it is possible, if necessary, to describe that as a new intervening repudiation as bringing the contract to an end, does not make his reaction the critical new act: it is the repudiatory conduct of the claimant which is significant, unless perchance it is waived. In any event, the repudiatory conduct might have taken place even prior to the tort of discrimination and be discovered only later: but if the contract was already potentially doomed to be lost upon discovery of the repudiatory conduct, then again the claimant has lost the value of that contract, once the employer had acted as he was entitled to do properly to accept the repudiation as bringing the contract to an end.’
Rix, Wall, Hooper LJJ
[2005] EWCA Civ 467, [2005] ICR 1206, [2005] IRLR 568
England and Wales
Appeal from – HM Prison Service v Beart EAT 14-Sep-2004
EAT Disability Discrimination – Compensation . .
See Also – H M Prison Service v J A Beart EAT 13-Mar-2002
EAT Disability Discrimination – Disability . .
See Also – Beart v HM Prison Service CA 23-Jan-2003
. .
Cited – Osei-Adjei v RM Education Ltd EAT 24-Sep-2013
EAT DISABILITY DISCRIMINATION – Compensation
The Claimant suffered an act of disability discrimination by reason of the Respondent’s failure to make a reasonable adjustment. He was for a time unfit to work . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.224382
[2002] EWCA Civ 1572
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.217679
The claimant suffered head injuries in a car accident. The defendant appealed the award of damages, on the basis that the claimant had made exaggerated loss of earnings claims, and should have received only reduced, ‘Manchester’ damages. The claimant had never paid tax or national insurance, but lived a lifestyle suggesting income.
Held: The judge had eventually found evidence to support part of the claim, and had made an award supported by that evidence. He had been awarded a sum for care. He was now violent and potentially aggressive. The judge’s award was not so wrong as to be capable of being set aside on appeal. The judge had correctly reduced the multiplier to allow for the uncertainties of the evidence.
Lord Justice Ward Lord Justice Sedley And Mr Justice Sumner
[2002] EWCA Civ 591
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.170272
The claimant owned land from which he took silage. It was next to land belonging to one defendant and let to the other as a golf range. The claimant sought damages for nuisance for the 1,000 golf balls a year escaping onto his land. The judge said it was nuisance, ordered the erection of a fence, and awarded damages for the loss of grazing. The defendants appealed.
Held: Nuisance was established, but the fence would only protect even part of the land affected by the escape, and should not be imposed. Nor could damages be awarded for loss of grazing for the entire land when only a certain area was affected. Nevertheless damages were available, and the case was remitted to the County Court.
Pill, Tuckey, Jonathan Parker LJJ
Gazette 10-Jan-2002, [2001] EWCA Civ 2101, [2002] 1 WLR 1828
England and Wales
Cited – Estate Acquisition and Development Ltd v Wiltshire and Another CA 4-May-2006
The defendants appealed a decision that they had no sufficient reason for not attending court on the day of the trial.
Held: The fact that the defendants had a continuing commercial relationship with the claimants was not enough to justify an . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.167421
A valuable cargo was stolen whilst being transported. Part of the journey was by road, and part by air. The carriers sought to limit their liability, because of the provisions of the Act and Convention. It was argued that that did not apply, because part of the journey had been by air, and part only by road. Did liability depend upon the carrier having explicitly contracted to transport part way by road, and could a convention contract include a part transport by means other than road?
Held: The Convention applied to a ‘contract for the carriage of goods by road’. Authority established that the Convention applied where the carrier either promised unconditionally to carry by road, and on a trailer, possibly reserving an option to transport by different means for all or part of the way and left the means open, so that carriage by road was a possibility. It applied here, and remained open to the claimants to argue under article 29 that the limitation should not apply because of the way it had happened.
Lord Justice Aldous, Lord Justice Mance and Lord Justice Latham
Times 18-Apr-2002, [2002] EWCA Civ 350, [2002] 2 Lloyd’s Rep 25, [2002] 1 WLR 2678, [2003] 1 All ER 873, [2002] 2 All ER (Comm) 392
Convention on the Contract for the International Carriage of Goods by Road Art 1, 17, 29, Carriage of Goods by Road Act 1965
England and Wales
Cited – Datec Electronics Holdings Ltd and others v United Parcels Services Ltd HL 16-May-2007
The defendants had taken on the delivery of a quantity of the claimant’s computers. The equipment reached one depot, but then was lost or stolen. The parties disputed whether the Convention rules applied. UPS said that the claimant had agreed that . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.169835
The claimant had been awarded substantial damages for injuries received in a road traffic accident. He had been able to work in a reduced capacity, but claimed he would need assistance. The appeal alleged that the judge had wrongly allowed for the fact that the claimant would be living in the US, that the claim for support was unsustained on the evidence, and the wrong multiplier had been used, not allowing for a medium term rehabilitations. The first appeal ground was not made out from the judgment. The assessment that the claimant would need longer term care was reasoned and based upon the evidence. Though these matters remain one of impression, the judge’s assessment of the multiplier needed adjustment, from 22 to 17.
Lord Justice Henry, Lord Justice Dyson, And, Mr. Justice Harrison
[2002] EWCA Civ 19
England and Wales
Cited – Goldfinch v Scannell 1993
. .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.167470
When considering the statutory right to rescind for innocent misrepresentation, the representation should be interpreted to bear the meaning in which it would reasonably be understood by the claimant, the natural and ordinary meaning which would be conveyed to a normal person.
The Vice-Chancellor, Lord Justice Chadwick, And, Lord Justice Rix
[2002] EMLR 510, [2002] EWCA Civ 15
England and Wales
See Also – Spice Girls Ltd v Aprilia World Service Bv ChD 24-Feb-2000
Disclosure Duties on those entering into contract
The claimants worked together as a five girl pop group. The defendants had signed a sponsorship agreement, but now resisted payment saying that one of the five, Geri, had given notice to leave the group, substantially changing what had been . .
See Also – Spice Girls Ltd v Aprilla World Service BV ChD 5-Apr-2000
It was possible through conduct to make representations which could induce the other party to enter into a contract. Here the contract was entered into at a time when one of the group had decided to leave, but in the period before the contract had . .
Appeal from – Spice Girls Ltd v Aprilla World Service BV (No 3) ChD 20-Jul-2000
After trials and hearings as to the facts, as to damages, and as to costs, and where the parties had previously been shown draft judgments, and been invited to comment, the applicants sought to appeal, on the grounds that losses which had been . .
Cited – Crystal Palace FC (2000) Ltd v Dowie QBD 14-Jun-2007
The parties had agreed a compromise on the leaving of the defendant as manager. The club now said that the agreement had been obtained by fraudulent misrepresentation. He had been released but had said he had not had contact with another London club . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.167469
The claimant sought as part of his damages the cost of the care provided by family members. Counsel for the defendant raised issues about tax, national insurance and travel and other costs which a professional carer would have to bear, which led the court to reject any precise method of approach. The court should avoid a strait-jacket, such as might happen if it was said that the a proper recompense for services provided gratuitously by a family carer had to be assessed in a particular way or ways. Circumstances vary enormously. If a caring relative has given up employment to care for the claimant gratuitously, it might be appropriate to assess the proper recompense for the services provided by reference to the carer’s lost earnings. If the carer has not given up gainful employment the task remains to assess proper recompense for the services provided.
Judge Prosser, May LJ
[2001] EWCA Civ 1657, [2002] PIQR Q5
England and Wales
Cited – Willbye (By Her Mother and Next Friend) v Gibbons CA 19-Mar-2003
Both parties appealed against the lower court’s orders. The claimant, a child was injured by a car driven by the defendant, who had been found 25% responsible. The claimant had suffered head injuries, and subsequently epilepsy.
Held: The award . .
Cited – Giambrone and others v JMC Holidays Ltd (Formerly Sunworld Holidays Ltd) QBD 20-Dec-2002
. .
Cited – Giambrone and others v Sunworld Holidays Ltd CA 18-Feb-2004
Many holidaymakers had suffered gastro-enteritis and sued for compensation. They had sought a sum to reflect the value of gratuitous care.
Held: Save in more serious cases, awards for children suffering gastro-enteritis and cared for by their . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.166823
Reparation – Railway Accident – Nervous Shock – Document Discharging All Claims – Consideration Inadequate.
A person was injured in a railway accident. Nine days after he accepted pounds 27 from the railway company, and granted a discharge ‘in full of all claims competent to him in respect of injury and loss sustained.’ Eighteen months afterwards he brought an action for damages against the railway company, who pleaded that the action was barred by the discharge. After a proof, the Lord Ordinary awarded the pursuer pounds 500 as damages. This award was affirmed by the Second Division, on the ground that it was a reasonable sum.
Held that the document was in terms a final discharge, and that there was no evidence to support the contention of the pursuer that he did not understand the document as a final discharge, or that he had told the representative of the railway company that if he did not recover he would still hold them liable.
Earl of Selborne and Lords Watson, Bramwell, Macnaghten, and Morris
[1891] UKHL 921
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.636783
Lady Justice Nicola Davies DBE
[2018] EWCA Civ 2609
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.630708
Michael Harris J
[2006] EWHC 3751 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.279541
[2006] EWHC 860 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.279535
Application for leave to appeal award of compensation by Lands Tribunal.
Sir Christopher Staughton
[2005] EWCA Civ 1096
England and Wales
Appeal from – Boland v Welsh Development Agency LT 18-Mar-2005
COMPENSATION – compulsory acquisition – valuation – cleared site – planning permissions for housing association development and for elderly persons units – value of land – claim for loss of profit from prospective development – held compensation . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.230026
Leveson J
[2005] EWHC 192 (QB)
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.223862
Calculation of compensation in unfair dismissal cases where the employer fails to comply with an order for reinstatement.
[2005] EWCA Civ 217
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.223576
Appeal against heads of damages awarded on finding of unfair dismissal.
Rimer J
[2005] UKEAT 0693 – 04 – 1102, [2005] ICR 896
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.223097
The second defendant had received large numbers of stolen books and sold them from his stall. An application for compensation was made at his trial. Compensatory and exemplary damages were sought, but the court had to consider how to estimate the losses and unlawful gains. The defendant argued that since he had been imprisoned, exemplary damages were inappropriate. The question was whether there was a risk of double jeopardy, paying both damages and compensation.
Held: The assessment of damages was difficult, but the situation fell with the second limb of Rookes v Barnard so as to allow exemplary damages. Even after such an award it was likely that the full benefit taken by the defendant was not accounted for. Appeal dismissed
Lord Justice May Lord Justice Sedley Lord Justice Rix
[2005] EWCA Civ 197, Times 15-Apr-2005
Powers of Criminal Courts Act 2000 130
England and Wales
Cited – Rookes v Barnard (No 1) HL 21-Jan-1964
The court set down the conditions for the award of exemplary damages. There are two categories. The first is where there has been oppressive or arbitrary conduct by a defendant. Cases in the second category are those in which the defendant’s conduct . .
Cited – Kuddus v Chief Constable of Leicestershire Constabulary HL 7-Jun-2001
There is no rule of law preventing the award of exemplary damages against police officers. The fact that no case of misfeasance in public office had led to such awards before 1964, did not prevent such an award now. Although damages are generally . .
Cited – HM Attorney General v Blake (Jonathan Cape Ltd third Party intervening) HL 3-Aug-2000
Restitutionary Claim against Pofits from Breach
The author had written his book in breach of his duty of confidence. Having signed the Official Secrets Act, he accepted a contractual private law duty. After conviction as a spy, the publication of the book was in breach of the undertaking by not . .
Cited – Cassell and Co Ltd v Broome and Another HL 23-Feb-1972
Exemplary Damages Award in Defamation
The plaintiff had been awarded damages for defamation. The defendants pleaded justification. Before the trial the plaintiff gave notice that he wanted additional, exemplary, damages. The trial judge said that such a claim had to have been pleaded. . .
Cited – Kuwait Airways Corporation v Iraqi Airways Company and Others (Nos 4 and 5) HL 16-May-2002
After the invasion of Kuwait, the Iraqi government had dissolved Kuwait airlines, and appropriated several airplanes. Four planes were destroyed by Allied bombing, and 6 more were appropriated again by Iran.
Held: The appeal failed. No claim . .
Cited – Devenish Nutrition Ltd and others v Sanofi-Aventis SA (France) and others ChD 19-Oct-2007
The claimant sought damages for the losses it had suffered as a result of price fixing by the defendant companies in the vitamin market. The European Commission had already fined the defendant for its involvement.
Held: In an action for breach . .
Cited – AT and others v Dulghieru and Another QBD 19-Feb-2009
The claimants had been subject to unlawful human trafficking. Their abductors had been imprisoned, and they now sought damages. The court was asked now to assess the damages to be awarded for sexual enslavement. Each claimant suffered chronic post . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.223134
Waller, Wall, LLJ Blackburne J
[2005] EWCA Civ 156
England and Wales
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.222912
The parties had agreed a charterparty. The defendant repudiated the charter, but the Gulf War in 2003 meant that the the contract would have been frustrated in any event shortly afterwards.
Held: The assessment of damages for repudiation of a long-term charterparty must make allowance for the supervening event, to allow the importance of achieving an assessment of damages and compensation which more properly reflected the actual loss which could be seen to have been suffered. There was no separate standard of proof. No member of the court in the Mihailis Angelos had claimed to lay down a general rule applying in all cases in repudiation where there was an available market.
The Honourable Mr Justice Langley
[2005] EWHC 161 (Comm), Times 04-Mar-2005, [2005] 1 All ER (Comm) 467
England and Wales
Cited – Maredelanto Compania Naviera SA v BergbauHandel GmbH (The Mihalis Angelos) CA 1-Jul-1970
The parties had agreed a charterparty. The ship was to sail to Haiphong to load a cargo for delivery in Europe. The charterer had a right to cancel if the vessel was not ready on a certain date, but a few days earlier they repudiated the charter. . .
Cited – B S and N Limited (BVI) v Micado Shipping Limited (Malta) (‘The Seaflower’) CA 22-Nov-2000
. .
See Also – Nippon Yusen Kubishiki Kaisha v Golden Strait Corporation ComC 17-Jan-2003
The parties entered into a charterparty. The court was now asked how that might be determined under its terms. . .
Appeal from – Golden Strait Corporation v Nippon Yusen Kubishika Kaisha; ‘the Golden Victory’ CA 18-Oct-2005
Measurement of damages for repudiatory breach.
The parties had entered into a charter which was intended to last seven years. The charterers broke the charterparty. A war later occurred which would have cut the contract short in any event.
At First Instance – Golden Strait Corporation v Nippon Yusen Kubishka Kaisha (‘The Golden Victory’) HL 28-Mar-2007
The claimant sought damages for repudiation of a charterparty. The charterpary had been intended to continue until 2005. The charterer repudiated the contract and that repudiation was accepted, but before the arbitrator could set his award, the Iraq . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.222781
Each of the claimants sought damages alleging that having been negligently exposed to asbestos in their working lives, they had developed pleural plaques which had arisen from the ingestion of asbestos.
Held: The court could infer permanent penetration by asbestos fibres from the presence of such plaques, but that could not per se found a cause of action. Nevertheless with the other factors enumerated, an award of damages could, and would in these cases be made.
Holland The Honourable Mr Justice Holland
Times 22-Mar-2005, [2005] EWHC 88 (QB)
England and Wales
Appeal from – Johnston v NEI International Combustion Ltd; Rothwell v Chemical and Insulating Co Ltd; similar HL 17-Oct-2007
The claimant sought damages for the development of neural plaques, having been exposed to asbestos while working for the defendant. The presence of such plaques were symptomless, and would not themselves cause other asbestos related disease, but . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.222710
The defendants had installed a pig nut hopper for the plaintiffs, but failed to provide adequate ventilation, causing the nuts to go sour, and the pigs to be poisoned.
Held: Remoteness of damage is a question of law. The death of the pigs would have been within the contemplation of the parties when they made their contract, and damages were not too remote and were payable. ‘The court’s task, therefore, is to decide what loss to the plaintiffs it is reasonable to suppose would have been in the contemplation of the parties as a serious possibility had they had in mind the breach when they made their contract.’
Lord Denning MR, Orr, Scarman LJJ
[1978] QB 791, [1977] EWCA Civ 13
England and Wales
Cited – Jackson and Another v Royal Bank of Scotland HL 27-Jan-2005
The claimants sought damages, alleging that a breach of contract by the defendant had resulted in their being unable to earn further profits elsewhere. The defendant said the damages claimed were too remote. The bank had, by error, disclosed to one . .
Cited – Transfield Shipping Inc of Panama v Mercator Shipping Inc of Monrovia ComC 1-Dec-2006
The owners made substantial losses after the charterers breached the contract by failing to redliver the ship on time as agreed.
Held: On the facts found the Owners’ primary claim is not too remote. To the knowledge of the Charterers, it was . .
Cited – Kpohraror v Woolwich Building Society CA 1996
The Society, acting as a bank, had at first failed to pay its customer’s cheque for andpound;4,550, even though there were sufficient funds. The bank said that it had been reported lost. The customer sought damages to his business reputation.
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 June 2022; Ref: scu.222087
The court considered the liability of employers for stress injury to several employees.
Held: Though the principles of awarding damages for stress related psychiatric injury are the same as those for physical injury, the issues have still troubled the courts. The 16 issues identified in Hatton were not exhaustive. One of the appeals at issue in this case involved stress arising from one traumatic incident at work: ‘It is foreseeable injury flowing from the employer’s breach of duty that gives rise to the liability. It does not follow that because a claimant suffers stress at work and that the employer is in some way in breach of duty in allowing that to occur that the claimant is able to establish claim in negligence.’ Where an employer had knowledge that particular stresses carried with them the risk of psychiatric injury to employees, failure to implement recommended precautions against such injury could attract liability without any need to demonstrate knowledge that an employee was particularly vulnerable.
Lord Justice Tuckey Lord Philips Of Worth Matravers, Mr Lord Justice Scott Baker
[2005] EWCA Civ 6, Times 21-Jan-2005, [2005] ICR 782, [2005] IRLR 293, [2005] ELR 237, [2005] PIQR P19, (2005) 85 BMLR 136
England and Wales
Cited – Garrett v Camden London Borough Council CA 16-Mar-2001
The court considered a claim for work related stress. The claimant asserted that he had been harassed, intimidated and systematically undermined: ‘Many, alas, suffer breakdowns and depressive illnesses and a significant proportion could doubtless . .
Cited – Sutherland v Hatton; Barber v Somerset County Council and similar CA 5-Feb-2002
Defendant employers appealed findings of liability for personal injuries consisting of an employee’s psychiatric illness caused by stress at work.
Held: Employers have a duty to take reasonable care for the safety of their employees. There are . .
Cited – Barber v Somerset County Council HL 1-Apr-2004
A teacher sought damages from his employer after suffering a work related stress breakdown.
Held: The definition of the work expected of him did not justify the demand placed upon him. The employer could have checked up on him during his . .
Cited – Pratley v Surrey County Council CA 25-Jul-2003
The claimant sought damages for personal injury namely stress suffered in the course of her work as a care manager. She said that she had been overworked, and suffered depression when a proposal for reducing the work load remained unimplemented. The . .
Cited – Young v Post Office CA 30-Apr-2002
The claimant had been absent from work with a psychiatric illness. When he returned, the employers intended that he should work at his own pace and continue to do so for as long as he wished. In practice this arrangement was ignored and he worked . .
Cited – Bonser v UK Coal Mining Ltd CA 9-Jun-2003
The employer appealed a finding that it was responsible in negligence to a staff member for stress related injury at work. The claimant had worked in the coal industry for 20 years, but she had then been made redundant. The defendants took her on as . .
Cited – Croft v Broadstairs and St Peter’s Town Council CA 15-Apr-2003
The claimant acted as the town clerk. After an unexpected letter about her conduct there were meetings and correspondence. Her initial shock and distress were so exacerbated that she was rendered incapable of work through depression. The triggering . .
Cited – Banks v Ablex Ltd CA 24-Feb-2005
The claimant appealed denial of her claim for damages for psychological injury. She complained that her employer had failed to prevent her and other female employees being bullied by a co-worker, and they committed a breach of statutory duty in . .
Cited – Rothwell v Chemical and Insulating Co Ltd and Another CA 26-Jan-2006
Each claimant sought damages after being exposed to asbestos dust. The defendants resisted saying that the injury alleged, the development of pleural plaques, was yet insufficient as damage to found a claim.
Held: (Smith LJ dissenting) The . .
Cited – Majrowski v Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Trust CA 16-Mar-2005
The claimant had sought damages against his employer, saying that they had failed in their duty to him under the 1997 Act in failing to prevent harassment by a manager. He appealed a strike out of his claim.
Held: The appeal succeeded. The . .
Cited – D v Intel Corporation (UK) Ltd QBD 23-May-2006
The claimant sought damages for stress incurred at work. She had suffered post natal depression and received counselling through her work and recovered. She suffered a second bout of depression after the birth of another child, but again was thought . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 28 June 2022; Ref: scu.221524
[2003] EWCA Civ 1370
England and Wales
Updated: 28 June 2022; Ref: scu.220572
The claimant sought damages for breach of trust against the defendant solicitors, who had acted as trustees under deeds of trust. They claimed for losses incurred by way of penalties for the late payment of capital gains tax. The defendants said that there should be offset the sums earned by the unpaid tax by way of interest.
Held: Whether a breach of trust had occurred was to be decided as at the date of the alleged acts constituting the breach, but the damages fell to be caculated with respect to the situation as at the date of the hearing. Accordingly the sums received could be set off. Courts of equity did not award damages, but ordered restitution.
Richard Seymour QC, J
Times 07-Feb-2003
England and Wales
Cited – Target Holdings Ltd v Redferns (A Firm) and Another HL 21-Jul-1995
The defendant solicitors had acted for a purchaser, Crowngate, which had agreed to buy a property from a company called Mirage for andpound;775,000. Crowngate had arranged however that the property would first be passed through a chain of two . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 28 June 2022; Ref: scu.179023
Damages assessment
[2012] EWHC 2752 (QB)
England and Wales
Updated: 28 June 2022; Ref: scu.464822
[2005] EWCA Civ 1518
England and Wales
Updated: 28 June 2022; Ref: scu.235504
The claimant appealed the award of damages in his claim for defamation. The defendants had variously issued apologies. The claimant had not complained initially as to one publication.
Held: In defamation proceedings the damage to feelings is assessed as at the point of assessment, and conduct of the defendant after the publication may aggravate or mitigate the damage and therefore the award. The court could not say the awards were wrong. Appeals dismissed.
Lord Justice Auld Lord Justice May
[2004] EWCA Civ 1708, [2005] 1 All ER 1040
England and Wales
Cited – Horrocks v Lowe HL 1974
The plaintiff complained of an alleged slander spoken at a meeting of the Town Council. The council meeting was an occasion attracting qualified privilege. The judge at trial found that the councillor honestly believed that what he had said in the . .
Cited – Milne v Express Newspapers CA 28-May-2004
The claimant, having not accepted an offer to make amends, wanted to proceed to a jury trial. To be permitted to do so, he had to seek to establish that the defendants ‘knew or had reason to believe that the statement complained of . . was both . .
Cited – Dingle v Associated Newspapers HL 1964
The plaintiff complained of an article written in the Daily Mail which included the reporting of a report of a Parliamentary select committee. The reporting of the select committee’s report was privileged under the Parliamentary Papers Act 1840. At . .
Cited – Tolstoy Miloslavsky v United Kingdom ECHR 19-Jul-1995
The applicant had been required to pay andpound;124,900 as security for the respondent’s costs as a condition of his appeal against an award of damages in a defamation case.
Held: It followed from established case law that article 6(1) did not . .
Cited – Abu v MGN Ltd QBD 2003
There should be nothing in any sense ‘rough and ready’ about the assessment of the claimant’s reputation under the offer of amends procedure in the 1996 Act. If compensation is not agreed it should be determined by the court on the same principles . .
Cited – John v MGN Ltd CA 12-Dec-1995
Defamation – Large Damages Awards
MGN appealed as to the level of damages awarded against it namely pounds 350,000 damages, comprising pounds 75,000 compensatory damages and pounds 275,000 exemplary damages. The newspaper contended that as a matter of principle there is no scope in . .
Cited – Cleese v Clark QBD 2003
The court looked at the calculation of damages after an offer of amends under the Act by the defendant.
Held: Such calculations have to be linked to the very different circumstances of each case. Comparisons with awards after jury trial were . .
Cited – Mawdsley v Guardian Newspapers Ltd QBD 2002
The court asked whether the summary judgment procedure under sections 8 to 10 of the 1996 Act, with its ceiling of andpound;10,000, was appropriate in a case in which a jury after a trial might award andpound;30,000. He decided that it was . .
Cited – Gorman v Mudd CA 15-Oct-1992
The plaintiff, a Conservative MP, complained of a ‘mock press release’ written and circulated by the defendant, Mudd, a prominent member of the local community and chairman of the Billericay Conservative Businessman’s Association, to ninety-one . .
Cited – Bonnick v Morris, The Gleaner Company Ltd and Allen PC 17-Jun-2002
(Jamaica) The appellant sought damages from the respondent journalists in defamation. They had claimed qualified privilege. The words alleged to be defamatory were ambiguous.
Held: The publishers were protected by Reynolds privilege. The court . .
Cited – Kiam v MGN Ltd CA 28-Jan-2002
Where a court regards a jury award in a defamation case as excessive, a ‘proper’ award can be substituted for it is not whatever sum court thinks appropriate, wholly uninfluenced by jury’s view, but the highest award which a jury could reasonably . .
Cited – Kiam v Neill and Another (No 2) CA 26-Jul-1996
An allegation of insolvency was made against a well known businessman. An apology in agreed terms was published after 3 weeks.
Held: A jury award of 45,000 in damages was not excessive for a libel despite an apology having been given. The . .
Cited – Houston v Smith CA 16-Dec-1993
Doctors operated within the same building. The defendant falsely accused the plaintiff of harassing her and her staff, groping them and fondling them sexually. The allegation was made in the hearing of several of the plaintiff’s patients in the . .
Appeal from – Nail v Jones, Harper Collins Publications Ltd; Nail v News Group Newspapers Ltd, Wade etc QBD 26-Mar-2004
The claimant was upset by an article published by the defendant making false allegations that he had behaved in a sexually profligate manner many years earlier. When it was substantially repeated he sued.
Held: The words were defamatory. An . .
Cited – Bowman v MGN Ltd QBD 26-Apr-2010
The claimant complained of an article on the defendant’s web-site. The defendant offered an unqualified offer of amends. The court was asked to settle an amount of compensation. Though the article was removed within a few hours and upon receipt of . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.220494
Appeal against apportionment of liability
[2004] EWCA Civ 1629
England and Wales
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.219918
His Honour Judge Wilcox
[2004] EWHC 1748 (TCC)
England and Wales
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.219673
The employee had been found to be unfairly dismissed. The company did not re-engage him, and he sought as part of his damages, the lost earnings up to the date of the hearing. The employer said these should be included within the overall damages cap.
Held: The award of arrears was not ring fenced so as to be outside the statutory cap on damages. Any cap on damages would adversely affect some individuals, and appear unfair. S124 was explicit as to the situations where the cap would not apply.
Mummery LJ, Kay LJ, Gage LJ
Times 04-Nov-2004, [2004] EWCA Civ 1563
Employment Rights Act 1996 114 124
England and Wales
Appeal from – National Westminster Bank Plc v Parry EAT 5-Feb-2004
EAT Unfair Dismissal – Reason for dismissal . .
Cited – Selfridges Ltd v Malik EAT 24-Apr-1997
The statutory cap on damages awards in unfair dismissal cases included the award for lost earnings. . .
Appealed to – National Westminster Bank Plc v Parry EAT 5-Feb-2004
EAT Unfair Dismissal – Reason for dismissal . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.219422
EAT Sex Discrimination – Other losses – Sex discrimination – compensation. Deductions because of pre-existing condition and chance of further illness in any event
His Honour Judge Ansell
[2004] UKEAT 0280 – 04 – 1510, UKEAT/0280/04
England and Wales
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.219097
The employee was found to have been unfairly dismissed. The employer appealed the compensatory award which was based on his depressive illness. They said that the illness predated the dismissal.
Held: The EAT’s decision was set aside. In increasing the award, the EAT had misconstrued the representations made by the appellant’s solicitors, but should itself have remitted the case.
Lord Justice Clerk And Lord Maclean And Lord Hardie
[2004] ScotCS 230, 2005 SCLR 951
Scotland
Appeal from – Bruce v Dignity Funerals Ltd (Formerly SCI Funerals Ltd) EAT 22-Nov-2002
. .
Cited – Devine v Designer Flowers Wholesale Florist Sundries Ltd EAT 1993
The claimant’s dismissal caused her to suffer anxiety and depression which rendered her unfit for work.
Held: The fact that the employee’s incapacity was caused by the unfair dismissal did not necessarily mean that she was entitled to . .
Mentioned – Scottish Daily Record and Sunday Mail (1986) Ltd v Laird 1996
. .
Mentioned – Scottish Midland Co-operative Soc Ltd v Cullion 1997
. .
Cited – Leonard v Strathclyde Buses Ltd 1998
To receive a compensatory award, a claimant must provide proof of loss. Referring to Norton Tool, Lord Blofeld said: ‘The approach . . has, as we understand the position, governed the attitude of tribunals to compensation ever since. It is, in our . .
Cited – Meek v City of Birmingham District Council CA 18-Feb-1987
Employment Tribunals to Provide Sufficient Reasons
Tribunals, when giving their decisions, are required to do no more than to make clear their findings of fact and to answer any question of law raised.
Bingham LJ said: ‘It has on a number of occasions been made plain that the decision of an . .
Cited – Hardy v Polk (Leeds) Ltd EAT 2-Feb-2004
EAT Practice and Procedure – Bias, misconduct and procedural irregularity
The amount of the respondent’s entitlement to pay in lieu will be relevant to the question of any compensatory award. . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.218742
[2001] EWCA Civ 1602
England and Wales
See Also – Samuels and Another v Benning CA 22-May-2002
. .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.218462
[2002] EWCA Civ 1731
England and Wales
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.217716
[2002] EWCA Civ 1620
England and Wales
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.217695
A pregnant barmaid suffered nervous shock causing her to give premature birth as a result of the tortfeasor’s horse van bursting into her bar at the Bonner Arms in Bethnal Green from the roadway. The defendant pleaded that the damages claimed were too remote.
Held: In principle ‘terror wrongfully induced and inducing physical mischief gives a cause of action.’ The plaintiff could recover in respect of the physical consequences of ‘nervous shock’ caused by reason of ‘reasonable fear of immediate personal injury to oneself’.
Kennedy J considered the argument that fright, where physical injury is directly produced by it, cannot be a ground of action merely because of the absence of any accompanying impact, to be ‘both unreasonable and contrary to the weight of authority.’ The argument was unreasonable and contrary to the weight of authority, but he limited the type of shock for which damages were recoverable to that suffered from fear for oneself only: ‘The shock, where it operates through the mind, must be a shock which arises from a reasonable fear of immediate personal injury to oneself.’
Phillimore J, Kennedy J
[1901] 2 KB 669
England and Wales
Not Followed – Victorian Railway Commissioners v Coultas PC 21-Jan-1888
(Victoria) The appellant’s gatekeeper had negligently invited the plaintiffs to cross a railway line as a train approached. There was no collision, but the plaintiff sought damages for physical and mental injuries from shock.
Held: The . .
Cited – Wainwright and another v Home Office HL 16-Oct-2003
The claimant and her son sought to visit her other son in Leeds Prison. He was suspected of involvement in drugs, and therefore she was subjected to strip searches. There was no statutory support for the search. The son’s penis had been touched . .
Cited – Cooper v Caledonian Railway Co 1902
Recovery of damages for psychiatric injury. . .
Cited – Simmons v British Steel plc HL 29-Apr-2004
The claimant was injured at work as a consequence of the defender’s negligence. His injuries became more severe, and he came to suffer a disabling depression.
Held: the Inner House had been wrong to characterise the Outer House decision as . .
Cited – Simmons v British Steel plc HL 29-Apr-2004
The claimant was injured at work as a consequence of the defender’s negligence. His injuries became more severe, and he came to suffer a disabling depression.
Held: the Inner House had been wrong to characterise the Outer House decision as . .
Cited – Donachie v The Chief Constable of the Greater Manchester Police CA 7-Apr-2004
The claimant had been asked to work under cover. The surveillance equipment he was asked to use was faulty, requiring him to put himself at risk repeatedly to maintain it resulting in a stress disorder and a stroke.
Held: There was a direct . .
Cited – Rothwell v Chemical and Insulating Co Ltd and Another CA 26-Jan-2006
Each claimant sought damages after being exposed to asbestos dust. The defendants resisted saying that the injury alleged, the development of pleural plaques, was yet insufficient as damage to found a claim.
Held: (Smith LJ dissenting) The . .
Cited – French and others v Chief Constable of Sussex Police CA 28-Mar-2006
The claimants sought damages for psychiatric injury. They were police officers who had been subject to unsuccessful proceedings following a shooting of a member of the public by their force.
Held: The claim failed: ‘these claimants have no . .
Cited – Alcock and Others v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police QBD 31-Jul-1990
Overcrowding at a football match lead to the deaths of 95 people. The defendant’s employees had charge of safety at the match, and admitted negligence vis-a-vis those who had died and been injured. The plaintiffs sought damages, some of them for . .
Cited – Rhodes v OPO and Another SC 20-May-2015
The mother sought to prevent a father from publishing a book about her child’s life. It was to contain passages she said may cause psychological harm to the 12 year old son. Mother and son lived in the USA and the family court here had no . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.186860
Mervin Davies J
Unreported, February 1985
England and Wales
Cited – Wrotham Park Settled Estates v Hertsmere Borough Council CA 12-Apr-1993
Land had been purchased under compulsory purchase powers. It had been subject to restrictive covenants in favour of neighbouring land which would have prevented the development now implemented. The question was how the compensation should be . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.186381
The Act created a monopoly for the claimant for the delivery of post. It asserted that the defendant was acting in beach of that monopoly, and sought damages.
Held: The Act made no provision for a civil claim for damages for breach of the Act. Since the right was created by statute, and the statute provided a complete code for the right, it was not possible to use any of the exceptions in the Lonhro case to found a right to damages. The legislation granted an exclusive privilege, not an exclusive right. A privilege did not give rise to an entitlement to exclude anyone else from the privilege. It was up to Parliament to do so, not the claimant.
Jacob J
Times 24-Jan-2002, Gazette 21-Feb-2002
British Telecommunications Act 1981 66
England and Wales
Cited – Lonrho Ltd v Shell Petroleum Co Ltd (No 2) HL 1-Apr-1981
No General Liability in Tort for Wrongful Acts
The plaintiff had previously constructed an oil supply pipeline from Beira to Mozambique. After Rhodesia declared unilateral independence, it became a criminal offence to supply to Rhodesia without a licence. The plaintiff ceased supply as required, . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.167436
The applicants were farmers. Their cattle were destroyed after contracting foot and mouth disease. Their land was used for the burning of the carcasses of their animals, and of animals from neighbouring farms. They were compensated inter alia for the use of their land for burning the carcasses of their neighbours, but not their own animals.
Held: The Act did not contain a clear express power to compel the use of land for burning, but one was properly inferred. There was no obligation to pay compensation for the use of the claimants’ land for the burning of their own animal carcasses.
Judge Jack Beatson, QC
Times 22-Apr-2002, [2002] EWHC 831 Admin
Animal Health Act 1981 31 34(2) Sch 3
England and Wales
Cited – Regina v Richmond Upon Thames London Borough Council, ex parte McCarthy and Stone (Developments) Ltd HL 14-Nov-1991
A Local Authority was not able to impose charge for inquiries as to speculative developments and similar proposals, or for consultations, and pre-planning advice. There was no statutory authority for such a charge, and it was therefore unlawful and . .
Cited – Feakins and Another v Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Civ 1513) CA 9-Dec-2005
The department complained that the defendants had entered into a transaction with their farm at an undervalue so as to defeat its claim for recovery of sums due. The transaction used the grant of a tenancy by the first chargee.
Held: The . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.170067
[1997] EWCA Civ 2794
England and Wales
Cited – Heywood v Wellers CA 1976
The claimant instructed solicitors in injunction proceedings which they conducted negligently. The solicitors had put the case in the hands of an incompetent junior clerk. She sued acting in person, and succeeded but now appealed the only limited . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.143193
Scott J accepted Kirby as authority for the application of section 10 to works on land acquired by agreement. In an application for a declaration that land is not restricted by a covenant, the onus is on the plaintiff to prove that it is not so affected. It is not on the defendant to prove that it is affected.
Scott J
[1984] 1 WLR 1398, [1984] 3 All ER 632
England and Wales
Cited – Moto Hospitality Ltd v Secretary of State for Transport CA 26-Jul-2007
The company sought damages to its business on a motorway service station when works closed an access road.
Held: The Secretary of State’s appeal succeeded. A claim for compensation under section 10 had not been established, at least in respect . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.259684
[2001] EWCA Civ 1264
England and Wales
Updated: 27 June 2022; Ref: scu.218317