Halifax Building Society v Thomas and Another: CA 29 Jun 1995

Defrauded Mortgagee cannot take surplus on sale

A Building Society cannot keep any excess proceeds of sale of a house mortgaged to it by fraud. Policy was against unjust enrichment and will not allow a lender to take a profit from a fraudulent borrower.
Peter Gibson LJ said: ‘I remain wholly unpersuaded that in the circumstances of the present case the law should accord a restitutionary remedy to a secured creditor who has elected not to avoid the mortgage but to affirm it and has received full satisfaction thereunder. To my mind there is an inconsistency between a person being such a creditor and yet claiming more than that to which he is contractually entitled and which he has already fully recovered. Once the creditor has so elected and recovered in full, I do not see why the law should come to his aid to allow him to make a further claim. In re Simms; Ex parte Trustee [1934] Ch. 1 this court refused to allow a trustee in bankruptcy, who had elected to treat a receiver as a tortfeasor for converting to his own use the chattels of a bankrupt, to recover the profits made by the receiver as money had and received. The authority of that case is weakened by the reliance by this court on the now exploded implied promise theory, but I note that it is still cited in textbooks: see, for example, Chitty on Contracts, 27th ed. (1994), vol. 1, p. 1437, para. 29-052) and it serves to illustrate that not every action for an account of profits from a wrongdoer, even where there has been use of the plaintiff’s property, will be allowed, and that it may be barred when there has been an election for another remedy.
Further I am not satisfied that in the circumstances of the present case it would be right to treat the unjust enrichment of Mr. Thomas as having been gained ‘at the expense of’ the society, even allowing for the possibility of an extended meaning for those words to apply to cases of non-subtractive restitution for a wrong. There is no decided authority that comes anywhere near to covering the present circumstances. I do not overlook the fact that the policy of law is to view with disfavour a wrongdoer benefiting from his wrong, the more so when the wrong amounts to fraud, but it cannot be suggested that there is a universally applicable principle that in every case there will be restitution of benefit from a wrong. As Professor Birks says (An Introduction to the Law of Restitution, p. 24): ‘there are some circumstances in which enrichment by wrongdoing has to be given up. That is, the wrong itself is not always in itself a sufficient factor to call for restitution.’ On the facts of the present case, in my judgment, the fraud is not in itself a sufficient factor to allow the society to require Mr. Thomas to account to it.’
Glidewell LJ said: ‘The proposition that a wrongdoer should not be allowed to profit from his wrongs has an obvious attraction. The further proposition, that the victim or intended victim of the wrongdoing, who has in the event suffered no loss, is entitled to retain or recover the amount of the profit is less obviously persuasive.’ and
‘In order to succeed in this appeal, Mr. Waters is required to establish that the second proposition is correct, and that English law provides a mechanism by which it can be given effect. Despite his able argument, I cannot discern that there is any such general established principle. Indeed, Mr. Waters has to concede that there is no English authority upon which he can rely to establish his right to succeed either in the law of restitution, under the head of unjust enrichment, or in the law of constructive trusts. The sole American decision which appears to be directly in point, that of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Federal Sugar Refining Co. v. United States Sugar Equalization Board (1920) 268 F. 575, is not sufficiently persuasive to secure a visa for admission into English jurisprudence. Like Judge Maddocks, in the passage from his judgment quoted by Peter Gibson L.J., I cannot conclude that the principle for which Mr. Waters contends is at present established as part of our law.’

Glidewell LJ, Glidewell LJ
Independent 04-Aug-1995, Times 04-Jul-1995, [1996] Ch 217, [1995] EWCA Civ 21, [1995] 4 All ER 673, [1996] 2 WLR 63
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – David Macdonald v Geoffrey Myerson, John Callaghan, Derek A H Law CA 26-Jan-2001
The claimant had been involved in mortgage frauds, using the defendant firm of solicitors. He claimed an account following sales of the properties. At the time of the sales, the first defendant knew of the false identities used. The defendants . .
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 – 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 – Devenish Nutrition Ltd v Sanofi-Aventis Sa (France) and others CA 14-Oct-2008
The defendant had been involved in price fixing arrangements, and the claimant sought damages for breach of its proprietary rights. The claimant appealed refusal of an award an account of profits for what was akin to a breach of statutory duty.
Equity, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.81150

Jarvis v Swans Tours Ltd: CA 16 Oct 1972

The plaintiff had booked a holiday through the defendant travel tour company. He claimed damages after the holiday failed to live up to expectations.
Held: In appropriate cases where one party contracts to provide entertainment and enjoyment, including a contract for a holiday, damages can be recovered for mental distress and vexation. The damages awarded by the county court judge were inadequate. The descriptions in the brochure were representations or warranties, but after the 1967 Act, it was no longer necessary to decide which since damages were available for either. The measure of damages was the loss of entertainment and enjoyment which was promised, and not delivered.
Lord Denning said: ‘In a proper case damages for mental distress can be recovered in contract, just as damages for shock can be recovered in tort. One such case is a contract for a holiday or any other contract to provide entertainment and enjoyment. If the contracting party breaks his contract, damages can be given for the disappointment, the distress, the upset and frustration caused by the breach. I know that it is difficult to assess in terms of money, but it is no more difficult than the assessment which the courts have to make every day in personal injury cases for loss of amenity. Take the present case. Mr Jarvis has only a fortnight’s holiday in the year. He books it far ahead and looks forward to it all that time. He ought to be compensated for the loss of it . . Here Mr Jarvis’s fortnight’s winter holiday has been a grave disappointment. It is true that he was conveyed to Switzerland and had meals and bed in the hotel. But that is not what he went for. He went to enjoy himself with all the facilities which the defendant said he would have. He is entitled to damages for the lack of those facilities and for his loss of enjoyment.’
Edmund Davies LJ said: ‘The court is entitled, and indeed bound, to contrast the overall quality of the holiday so enticingly promised with that which the defendant in fact provided . . When a man has paid for and properly expects an invigorating and amusing holiday and, through no fault of his, returns home dejected because his expectations have been largely unfulfilled in my judgment it would be quite wrong to say his disappointment must find no reflection in the damages to be awarded.’

Lord Denning MR, Edmund Davies and Stephenson LJJ
[1973] 1 All ER 71, [1972] 3 WLR 954, [1973] QB 233, [1972] EWCA Civ 8
lip, Bailii
Misrepresentation Act 1967
England and Wales
Citing:
Not Followed – Hobbs v London and South Western Railway Co 1875
The court considered an application for damages for inconvenience in a breach of contract case: ‘for the mere inconvenience, such as annoyance and loss of temper, or vexation, or for being disappointed in a particular thing which you have set your . .
Cited – Bailey v Bullock 1950
The court awarded damages against solicitors for the inconvenience to the plaintiff of having to live in an overcrowded house. . .
Cited – Stedman v Swan’s Tours CA 1951
The plaintiffs sought damages for their disappointing holiday in Jersey. Instead of enjoying the superior rooms with a sea view in a first class hotel expected, the holiday party found that the rooms reserved for them were very inferior and had no . .
Cited – Bruen v Bruce (Practice Note) CA 1959
. .
Cited – Feldman v Allways Travel Service 1957
The claimant sought damages after a disappointing holiday.
Held: Such damages were capable of being awarded. . .
Not Followed – Hamlin v Great Northern Railway Co 19-Nov-1856
A plaintiff can recover whatever damages naturally resulted from the breach of contract, but damages cannot be given ‘for the disappointment of mind occasioned by the breach of contract.’ . .
Cited – Griffiths v Evans CA 1953
The parties disputed the terms on which the solicitor had been engaged, and in particular as to the scope of the duty undertaken by and entrusted to the solicitor as regards advising the client.
Held: Where there is a dispute between a . .

Cited by:
Applied – 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 . .
Cited – Wiseman v Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd QBD 29-Jun-2006
The claimant said that he was refused permission to board a flight by the defendants representative without paying a bribe, and was publicly humiliated for not doing so.
Held: Whilst the claimant could recover for his own additional expenses, . .
Cited – Yearworth and others v North Bristol NHS Trust CA 4-Feb-2009
The defendant hospital had custody of sperm samples given by the claimants in the course of fertility treatment. The samples were effectively destroyed when the fridge malfunctioned. Each claimant was undergoing chemotherapy which would prevent them . .
Cited – Milner and Another v Carnival Plc (T/A Cunard) CA 20-Apr-2010
Damages for Disastrous Cruise
The claimants had gone on a cruise organised by the defendants. It was described by them as ‘the trip of a lifetime.’ It did not meet their expectations. There had been several complaints, including that the cabin was noisy as the floor flexed with . .
Cited – Ruxley Electronics and Construction Ltd v Forsyth HL 29-Jun-1995
Damages on Construction not as Agreed
The appellant had contracted to build a swimming pool for the respondent, but, after agreeing to alter the specification to construct it to a certain depth, in fact built it to the original lesser depth, Damages had been awarded to the house owner . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Consumer, Contract, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.174316

Preston v City Electrical Factors Ltd and Another: QBD 13 Nov 2009

The claimant had received andpound;100,000 in interim payments on his personal injury claim, and now sought a further similar sum.
Held: The claim was thought substantial, but the defendants said that any final award would include an arrangement for continuing care, and a further payment would prejudice the court’s ability to make such an award. This was a case where a judge could not be expected to wish to make a Periodical Payments Order, and the Eeles principles did not apply. The order was made for a further payment on accunt.

Walker J
[2009] EWHC 2907 (QB)
Bailii
Damages Act 1996 2
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Tameside and Glossop Acute Services NHS Trust v Thompstone and others CA 17-Jan-2008
The court set out the legal principles applying when making a Periodical Payments Order in an award of damages for serious personal injury. The periodical payments payable to the claimant in respect of his care costs should be calculated by . .
Cited – Cobham Hire Services Ltd v Eeles CA 13-Mar-2009
The court was asked what is the correct approach to the making of an interim payment in a heavy personal injury claim where the damages, when finally assessed, are likely to include one or more periodical payments orders pursuant to section 2 of the . .
Cited – Rowe v Dolman CA 23-Jul-2008
The claimant had been very severely injured in a road accident. The court was asked to determine the effect on his life expectancy, the experts had diverged as to the appropriate range of life expectancy.
Held: The judge had assessed the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Personal Injury

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.379561

Lavarack v Woods of Colchester Ltd: CA 1967

Damages for wrongful dismissal could not confer on an employee extra benefits that the contract did not oblige the employer to confer. There is a clear distinction between expectations, however reasonable, and contractual obligations.
Diplock LJ said: ‘the first task of the assessor of damages is to estimate as best he can what the plaintiff would have gained in money or money’s worth if the defendant had fulfilled his legal obligations and had done no more. Where there is an anticipatory breach by wrongful repudiation, this can at best be an estimate, whatever the date of the hearing. It involves assuming that what has not occurred and never will occur has occurred or will occur, ie that the defendant has since the breach performed his legal obligations under the contract and, if the estimate is made before the contract would otherwise have come to an end, that he will continue to perform his legal obligations thereunder until the due date of its termination. But the assumption to be made is that the defendant has performed or will perform his legal obligations under his contract with the plaintiff and nothing more.’

Diplock LJ, Lord Denning MR, Russell LJ
[1967] 1 QB 278, [1966] EWCA Civ 4, [1966] 3 All ER 683, [1966] 1 KIR 312, [1966] 3 WLR 706
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Brace v Calder 1895
The dissolution of the employing partnership brings a contract of employment to an end.
Rigby LJ said: ‘a contract to serve four employers cannot, without express language, be construed as being a contract to serve two of them . . the . .

Cited by:
Approved – North Sea Energy Holdings Nv (Formerly Midland and Scottish Holdings Nv) v Petroleum Authority of Thailand CA 16-Dec-1998
The buyers repudiated an oil purchase agreement and the sellers accepted their repudiation. The sellers could not show that they would have been able to obtain the oil to sell.
Held: They were not entitled to substantial damages. . .
Cited – 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 – Blackpool and Fylde Aero Club Ltd v Blackpool Borough Council CA 25-May-1990
The club had enjoyed a concession from the council to operate pleasure flights from the airport operated by the council. They were invited to bid for a new concession subject to strict tender rules. They submitted the highest bid on time, but the . .
Cited – Nestle v National Westminster Bank CA 6-May-1992
The claimant said that the defendant bank as trustee of her late father’s estate had been negligent in its investment of trust assets.
Held: The claimant had failed to establish either a breach of trust or any loss flowing from it, though . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Employment, Contract

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.252494

Watts and Co v Morrow: CA 30 Jul 1991

The plaintiff had bought a house on the faith of the defendant’s report that there were only limited defects requiring repair. In fact the defects were much more extensive. The defendant surveyor appealed against an award of damages after his negligent survey of a property. The plaintiff sought damages for distress, and the cost of making good the defects. The appellant argued that he should pay or only the diminution in value of the house by reason of the existence of those defects.
Held: The correct level of damages to be awarded are for the diminution in value of the property with those faults, not the cost of repairing the faults. ‘A contract breaker is not in general liable for any distress, frustration, anxiety, displeasure, vexation, tension or aggravation which his breach of contract may cause to the innocent party. This rule is not, I think, founded on the assumption that such reactions are not foreseeable, which they surely are or may be, but on considerations of policy. But the rule is not absolute. Where the very object of a contract is to provide pleasure, relaxation, peace of mind or freedom from molestation, damages will be awarded if the fruit of the contract is not provided or if the contrary result is procured instead. If the law did not cater for this exceptional category of case it would be defective. A contract to survey the condition of a house for a prospective purchaser does not, however, fall within this exceptional category. In cases not falling within this exceptional category, damages are in my view recoverable for physical inconvenience and discomfort caused by the breach and mental suffering directly related to that inconvenience and discomfort. If those effects are foreseeably suffered during a period when defects are repaired I am prepared to accept that they sound in damages even though the cost of the repairs is not recoverable as such.’ Exceptions mayinclude ‘where the very object of the contract is to provide pleasure, relaxation, peace of mind or freedom from molestation’, but this is an ‘exceptional category’.

Bingham LJ, Sir Stephen Brown LJ, Bingham LJ
Gazette 08-Jan-1992, [1991] 4 All ER 939, [1991] 1 WLR 1421, [1991] EWCA Civ 9
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – County Personnel (Employment Agency) Ltd v Alan R Pulver and Co (a Firm) CA 1987
The claimant sought damages after his negligent solicitors had saddled him with a ruinous underlease. They had had to buy themselves out of the lease. The court considered the date at which damages were to be calculated.
Held: The starting . .
Cited – Hayes and Another v Dodd CA 7-Jul-1988
The court considered what damages might be paid for inconvenience and distress. . .
Cited – Syrett v Carr and Neave 1990
The plaintiff sought damages for a negligent survey.
Held: On the particular facts, it was reasonable for the plaintiffs not to sell but to repair the property and seek the cost of such repairs. . .
Cited – Dodd Properties (Kent) Ltd v Canterbury City Council CA 21-Dec-1979
The defendants had, in the course of building operations, caused nuisance and damage to the plaintiff’s building. The dispute was very lengthy, the costs of repair increased accordingly, and the parties now disputed the date at which damages fell to . .
Cited – Philips v Ward CA 1956
The Plaintiff had relied on a negligent survey to purchase a substantial Elizabethan property and land. The report did not mention that the timbers of the house were badly affected by death watch beetle and worm so that the only course left to him . .
Cited – Hayes and Another v Dodd CA 7-Jul-1988
The court considered what damages might be paid for inconvenience and distress. . .
Cited – Bliss v South East Thames Regional Health Authority CA 1985
General damages cannot be awarded for frustration, mental distress or injured feelings arising from an employer’s breach of the implied term of confidence and trust. Dillon LJ said that damages for mental distress in contract are limited to certain . .
Cited – Perry v Sidney Phillips and Son CA 1982
In 1982 the surveyor failed to observe serious defects, including a leaking roof and a septic tank with an offensive smell. The plaintiff purchaser could not afford major repairs and executed only minor repairs himself. At the date of the trial the . .

Cited by:
Cited – Farley v Skinner HL 11-Oct-2001
The claimant sought damages from the defendant surveyor. He had asked the defendant whether the house he was to buy was subject to aircraft noise. After re-assurance, he bought the house. The surveyor was wrong and negligent. A survey would not . .
Cited – Smith and Another v South Gloucestershire Council CA 31-Jul-2002
The claimants purchased land. The local search did not reveal a planning permission which affected the value of the property by applying an occupancy condition. He claimed compensation. Compensation was eventually agreed to be payable, but the . .
Cited – Dunnachie v Kingston Upon Hull City Council; Williams v Southampton Institute; Dawson v Stonham Housing Association EAT 8-Apr-2003
EAT Unfair Dismissal – Compensation
In each case, The employee sought additional damages for non-economic loss after an unfair dismissal.
Held: The Act could be compared with the Discrimination Acts . .
Cited – Ezekiel v McDade CA 1995
As a result of the negligence of their builders, the plaintiffs were rendered homeless persons living in single room council accommodation for a long period. The builder appealed an award of andpound;6,000.
Held: The award should be reduced to . .
Cited – Boynton and Another v Willers CA 3-Jul-2003
The appellants challenged a finding that they were liable for their builders’ bill.
Held: Work which had been rejected had not in fact been charged for. The defendant’s appeal on that point failed. The measure of damages for distress and . .
Applied – Hamilton Jones v David and Snape (a Firm) ChD 19-Dec-2003
The claimant was represented by the respondent firm of solicitors in an action for custody of her children. Through their negligence the children had been removed from the country. She sought damages for the distress of losing her children.
Followed – Verderame v Commercial Union Assurance Co Plc CA 2-Apr-1992
The insurance brokers, acting to arrange insurance for a small private limited company did not owe a duty in tort to the directors of that company personally. Where an action was brought in a tort and in breach of contract, damages could not be . .
Cited – Three Rivers District Council and others v Governor and Company of the Bank of England (No 6) HL 11-Nov-2004
The Bank anticipated criticism in an ad hoc enquiry which was called to investigate its handling of a matter involving the claimant. The claimant sought disclosure of the documents created when the solicitors advised employees of the Bank in . .
Cited – Wiseman v Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd QBD 29-Jun-2006
The claimant said that he was refused permission to board a flight by the defendants representative without paying a bribe, and was publicly humiliated for not doing so.
Held: Whilst the claimant could recover for his own additional expenses, . .
Cited – Johnson v Gore Wood and Co HL 14-Dec-2000
Shareholder May Sue for Additional Personal Losses
A company brought a claim of negligence against its solicitors, and, after that claim was settled, the company’s owner brought a separate claim in respect of the same subject-matter.
Held: It need not be an abuse of the court for a shareholder . .
Cited – Grobbelaar v News Group Newspapers Ltd and Another CA 18-Jan-2001
The claimant had been awarded andpound;85,000 damages in defamation after the defendant had wrongly accused him of cheating at football. The newspaper sought to appeal saying that the verdict was perverse and the defence of qualified privilege . .
Cited – Pegasus Management Holdings Sca and Another v Ernst and Young (A Firm) and Another ChD 11-Nov-2008
The claimants alleged professional negligence in advice given by the defendant on a share purchase, saying that it should have been structured to reduce Capital Gains Tax. The defendants denied negligence and said the claim was statute barred.
Cited – Yearworth and others v North Bristol NHS Trust CA 4-Feb-2009
The defendant hospital had custody of sperm samples given by the claimants in the course of fertility treatment. The samples were effectively destroyed when the fridge malfunctioned. Each claimant was undergoing chemotherapy which would prevent them . .
Cited – Milner and Another v Carnival Plc (T/A Cunard) CA 20-Apr-2010
Damages for Disastrous Cruise
The claimants had gone on a cruise organised by the defendants. It was described by them as ‘the trip of a lifetime.’ It did not meet their expectations. There had been several complaints, including that the cabin was noisy as the floor flexed with . .
Cited – Bacciottini and Another v Gotelee and Goldsmith (A Firm) CA 18-Mar-2016
A property subject to a planning condition was purchased by the appellant under the advice of the respondent, who failed to notify him of the existence of a planning condition. The judge had awarded the claimant pounds 250 being the cost of the . .
Cited – Downs and Another v Chappell and Another CA 3-Apr-1996
The plaintiffs had suceeded in variously establishing claims in deceit and negligence, but now appealed against the finding that no damages had flowed from the wrongs. They had been sold a business on the basis of incorrect figures.
Held: . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Negligence

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.90333

Admiralty Commissioners v SS Volute (Owners), The Volute: HL 1921

When assessing negligence the court must ask whether it was ‘so much mixed up with the state of things brought about’ by the defendant that ‘in the ordinary plain common sense of this business’ it must be regarded as having contributed to the accident. It is preferable to deal with causation as a question of fact ‘dealt with broadly, and upon common-sense principles as a jury would probably deal with it.’ There are cases where two acts of negligence ‘come so closely together, and the second act of negligence is so much mixed up with the state of things brought about by the first act that the party secondly negligent . . Might . . invoke the prior negligence as being part of the cause of the collision so as to make it a case for contribution.’

Lord Birkenhead LC
[1921] All ER Rep 193, [1922] 1 AC 129
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Parry v Cleaver HL 5-Feb-1969
PI Damages not Reduced for Own Pension
The plaintiff policeman was disabled by the negligence of the defendant and received a disablement pension. Part had been contributed by himself and part by his employer.
Held: The plaintiff’s appeal succeeded. Damages for personal injury were . .
Cited – St George v The Home Office CA 8-Oct-2008
The claimant was taken into prison. He was known to be subject to epilepsy, with high risks on withdrawal from drugs, but was allocated a high bunk. He had a seizure and fell, suffering head injuries. He sought damages in negligence. The defendant . .
Cited – Wooldridge v Sumner and Another CA 4-Jun-1962
The plaintiff photographer was injured when attending a show jumping competition at the White City Stadium. A horse caught him as it passed.
Held: The defendant’s appeal against the finding of negligence succeeded: ‘a competitor or player . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Negligence

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.237521

Copley v Lawn; Maden v Haller: CA 17 Jun 2009

The parties had been involved in a road accident. The insurer for the liable party offered a car for use whilst the claimant’s car was being repaired. The claimants had rejected that offer, and now appealed against a refusal to award them the cost of alternate car hire.
Held: The appeals succeeded. For such an offer to have effect, it must contain all such information as will be relevant for the claimants and their advisers or representatives to make a reasonable response. In this case, the letter did not include the cost to the defendant’s insurers of hiring the car. Even if the claimants had acted unreasonably, they should at least recover the actual reasonable cost of hire.

Lord Justice Waller, Lord Justice Longmore and Lord Justice Jacob
[2009] EWCA Civ 580, Times 15-Jul-2009, [2009] RTR 24, [2009] Lloyd’s Rep IR 496, [2009] PIQR P21, [2009] WLR (D) 200
Bailii, WLRD
England and Wales
Citing:
Approved – Evans v TNT Logistics Ltd 2007
(Pontypridd County Court) The court considered the treatment of rejection of the offer of a car to the claimant for use whilst his own car was being repaired after an accident.
Held: Although the offer of the defendant’s insurers could be . .
Cited – Dimond v Lovell HL 12-May-2000
A claimant sought as part of her damages for the cost of hiring a care whilst her own was off the road after an accident caused by the defendant. She agreed with a hire company to hire a car, but payment was delayed until the claim was settled.
Cited – Darbishire v Warran CA 30-Jul-1963
Damages were claimed for a damaged car.
Held: Pearson LJ said: ‘It is vital, for the purpose of assessing damages fairly between the plaintiff and the defendant, to consider whether the plaintiff’s course of action was economic or uneconomic, . .
Applied – Strutt v Whitnell CA 1975
The house sale contract provided for vacant possession on completion, notwithstanding that it was in fact occupied by a protected tenant who in the event declined to leave. The vendor offered to accept a reconveyance of the house, but that offer was . .
Cited – Sotiros Shipping Inc v Sameiet; The Solholt CA 1983
The seller had failed to deliver the vessel he had sold by the delivery date. The buyer cancelled and requested return of his deposit, also claiming damages because the vessel was worth $500,000 more on the delivery date than she had been when the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Road Traffic

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.347012

Bostridge v Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust: CA 10 Feb 2015

The claimant had been detained as a mental patient, but it was accepted that that detention had been unlawful as to over 400 days. The respondent argued that since he might have been detained in any event under other powers, he should receive only nominal damages. He now appealed asking for substantial damages.
Held: The appeal failed. ‘The tort of false imprisonment is compensated in the same way as other torts such as to put the claimant in the position he would have been in had the tort not been committed. Thus if the position is that, had the tort not been committed, the claimant would in fact have been in exactly the same position, he will not normally be entitled to anything more than nominal damages. The identity of the route by which this same result might have been achieved is unlikely to be significant.’ Nor was human rights law of assistance to the claimant.

Sir Terence Etherton Ch
[2015] EWCA Civ 79
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Christie v Leachinsky HL 25-Mar-1947
Arrested Person must be told basis of the Arrest
Police officers appealed against a finding of false imprisonment. The plaintiff had been arrested under the 1921 Act, but this provided no power of arrest (which the appellant knew). The officers might lawfully have arrested the plaintiff for the . .
Cited – Kuchenmeister v Home Office QBD 1958
The plaintiff, a German national landed at Heathrow airport en route to Dublin. The immigration officers, instead of refusing him leave to land (as they had been instructed to do), detained him at the airport until it was too late for him to catch . .
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 – Kambadzi (previously referred to as SK (Zimbabwe)) v Secretary of State for The Home Department SC 25-May-2011
False Imprisonment Damages / Immigration Detention
The respondent had held the claimant in custody, but had failed to follow its own procedures. The claimant appealed against the rejection of his claim of false imprisonment. He had overstayed his immigration leave, and after convictions had served a . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Health, Torts – Other, Damages

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.542438

Transport for London (London Underground Ltd) v Spirerose Ltd: HL 30 Jul 2009

Compulsory Purchase Compensation – Land As it Is

The House considered the basis of calculation of compensation on the compulsory purchase of land without planning permission, but where permission would probably be granted. The appellant challenged the decision which had treated the probability as equal to certainty.
Held: The appeal succeeded. The land should not be valued on the basis that it actually had planning permission for residential development. The CA had ‘assumed that a case in which the owner was unable to take advantage of any statutory assumption (whether under section 16 of the 1961 Act, or under a certificate of appropriate alternative development issued under section 17) was an anomaly to be remedied in the interests of fairness. But Parliament has enacted a statutory code of some complexity demonstrating that it does not regard all these cases as ‘materially similar.’ For the Court to try to correct the code in accordance with its perception of what is fair would amount to judicial legislation. It would upset the balance of the code which Parliament must be supposed to have considered carefully. ‘
Lord Collins said: ‘there is no basis in authority or in principle for the conclusion that it is open to the court in effect to establish an assumption that planning permission would be obtained, by analogy with the specific statutory rules which create the assumption.’
Lord Walker observed that the Pointe Gourde principle ‘is essentially concerned with statutory construction . . not . . with the meaning of a particular word or phrase which has appeared in a succession of statutes dealing with the same subject-matter, but with the general attitude and expectation with which the Court should approach a statute dealing with compensation for the compulsory acquisition of land operating, as it is put in Bennion, Statutory Interpretation, 5th ed (2008), p442, as a ‘special interpretative convention’.’

Lord Scott of Foscote, Lord Walker of Gestingthorpe, Lord Mance, Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury, Lord Collins of Mapesbury
[2009] UKHL 44, Times 17-Aug-2009, [2009] NPC 104, [2009] 4 All ER 810, [2009] PTSR 1371, [2009] RVR 225, [2009] 1 WLR 1797
Bailii
Land Compensation Act 1961 5(2)
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Stebbing v Metropolitan Board of Works 1870
In compensation for compulsory purchase (in this case, of graveyards), ‘value’ means value to the owner, not value to the purchaser. The graveyards were therefore of little or no value to the rector.
Cockburn CJ said: ‘When Parliament gives . .
Cited – In re Lucas and Chesterfield Gas and Water Board CA 1909
Land suitable for construction of a reservoir was the subject of a compulsory purchase for that purpose. The circumstances made it very unlikely that anyone other than the Water Board would have wanted, or been able, to construct the reservoir and . .
Appeal from – Transport for London v Spirerose Ltd (In Administration) CA 13-Nov-2008
The parties disputed the compensation to be awarded on the compulsory acquisition of land and in particular as to whether ‘the site should be valued on the basis (a) (as the tribunal held) of its full value with planning permission for a mixed use . .
At LT – Spirerose Ltd v Transport for London LT 16-Nov-2007
LT COMPENSATION – compulsory purchase – acquisition of former industrial premises – claim for loss of development value – valuation – planning permission in no-scheme world – whether planning permission that . .
Cited – Horn v Sunderland Corporation CA 1941
Compulsory Purchase Damages limited to Actual Loss
Rule (6) was designed to preserve the effect of the 19th Century case-law under the 1845 Act, by which personal loss caused by the compulsory acquisition was treated as part of the value to the owner of the land: ‘the owner in a proper case – that . .
Cited – Pointe Gourde Quarrying and Transport Co Ltd v Sub-Intendant of Crown Lands PC 29-Jul-1947
Under a wartime agreement in 1941 the UK government agreed to lease to the US Government land in Trinidad on which the US could establish a naval base. To do this the Crown acquired the Pointe Gourde land for its limestone quarry which would be used . .
Cited – Inland Revenue Commissioners v Clay CA 1914
The court considered the market value of a private residence. The evidence was that its value to persons wishing to use it as a private residence was 750 pounds. However, the house adjoined a nurses’ home the trustees of which wanted to extend their . .
Cited – Barras v Aberdeen Steam Trawling and Fishing Co HL 17-Mar-1933
The court looked at the inference that a statute’s draughtsman could be assumed when using a phrase to rely on a known interpretation of that phrase.
Viscount Buckmaster said: ‘It has long been a well established principle to be applied in the . .
Cited – Raza Narayana Gajapatiraju v Revenue Divisional Officer, Vizagapatan (The Indian Case) PC 1939
Land was to be acquired for anti-malarial works relating to a harbour development. Lord Romer rejected the suggestion in a compulsory purchase valuation that it would be possible to ascertain the potential special value of land to a ‘special . .
Cited – Camrose v Basingstoke Corporation CA 1966
Basingstoke was to be expanded to receive overspill population from London and the corporation contracted to purchase about 550 acres from a landowner on terms that the price would be assessed as though the land had been compulsorily acquired under . .
Cited – Waters and others v Welsh Development Agency HL 29-Apr-2004
Land was to be compulsorily purchased. A large development required the land to be used to create a nature reserve. The question was how and if at all the value of the overall scheme should be considered when assessing the compensation for this . .
Cited – Wildtree Hotels Ltd and others v Harrow London Borough Council HL 22-Jun-2000
The compensation which was payable for disturbance, when works were carried out on land acquired compulsorily, did not extend to the damage caused by noise dust and vibration arising from the works. Where however damage could be brought within the . .
Cited – Rugby Joint Water Board v Shaw-Fox HL 1973
The water board obtained a compulsory purchase order to buy agricultural land adjoining a reservoir. The land was subject to protected tenancies under the 1948 Act.
Held: (Majority) Because the land subject to notices to treat was required for . .
Cited – Wilson v Liverpool Corporation CA 1971
The claimants owned 74 acres of an area of 391 acres in Liverpool which the Corporation wanted to acquire for residential development. The authority acquired the land by agreement and made a compulsory purchase order in respect of the remainder.
Cited – Jelson Ltd v Blaby District Council CA 1977
A strip of land had been originally reserved for a road, and was subsequently sold to the council under a purchase notice. A claim for compensation was made. On appeal the Minister issued a nil certificate on the basis that the correct time at which . .
Cited – Waters and others v Welsh Development Agency CA 28-Jun-2002
The claimant’s land was subject to a compulsory purchase order to make land available for a scheme to make possible a much larger and more valuable scheme. He asserted that the compensation should be calculated in accordance with the value of the . .
Cited – Porter v Secretary of State for Transport CA 1996
Land had been compulsorily acquired for a road. The plaintiff was granted on appeal under section 18 of the 1961 Act a certificate of appropriate alternative development in respect of the land acquired, namely that the land acquired would have been . .

Cited by:
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 – J S Bloor (Wilmslow) Ltd v Homes and Communities Agency CA 22-May-2015
The land owner challenged the amount awarded on the compulsory purchase of land. Although agricultural, it had substantial hope value with possible residential development.
Held: The assessment of compensation should be remitted to the Upper . .
Cited – Homes and Communities Agency v JS Bloor (Wilmslow) Ltd SC 22-Feb-2017
Challenge to the sums awarded on compulsory acquisition of grazing land, but which land had a substantial hope value for residential development.
Held: The tribunal’s application of these difficult provisions to the complex facts of this case . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.368932

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 compensation for the whole period of the incapacity. It is for the Tribunal to decide how far an employee’s losses were attributable to action taken by the employer and to arrive at a sum that is just and equitable. The Tribunal may want to consider, for example, whether the illness would have manifested itself in any event. Economic loss would be ‘loss sustained by the complainant in consequence of the dismissal insofar as that loss is attributable to action taken by the employer’, this applies as much to a constructive dismissal as to an ordinary dismissal. The Tribunal should make clear-cut findings on the cause of the illness before any question of a compensatory award could arise.

Lord Coulsfield
[1993] IRLR 517
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Dunnachie v Kingston Upon Hull City Council; Williams v Southampton Institute; Dawson v Stonham Housing Association EAT 8-Apr-2003
EAT Unfair Dismissal – Compensation
In each case, The employee sought additional damages for non-economic loss after an unfair dismissal.
Held: The Act could be compared with the Discrimination Acts . .
Cited – Dignity Funerals Limited v Bruce OHCS 14-Oct-2004
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 . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Employment, Damages, Scotland

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.183851

East Ham Corporation v Bernard Sunley and Sons Ltd: HL 1965

In cases in which the plaintiff is seeking damages for the defective performance of a building contract, which is a contract for labour and materials, the normal measure of his damages is the cost of carrying out remedial work, or re-instatement. Reasonableness is a part of the primary assessment of damages as well as of mitigation of damage.
Lord Cohen said: ‘the learned editors of Hudson’s Building and Engineering Contracts, 8th ed. (1959) say at p.319 that there are in fact three possible bases of assessing damages, namely, (a) the cost of reinstatement; (b) the difference in cost to the builder of the actual work done and work specified; or (c) the diminution in value of the work due to the breach of contract. They go on: ‘There is no doubt that wherever it is reasonable for the employer to insist upon reinstatement the courts will treat the cost of reinstatement as the measure of damage.’ In the present case it could not be disputed that it was reasonable for the appellants to insist upon reinstatement and in these circumstances it necessarily follows that on the question of damage the trial judge arrived at the right conclusion.’
Lord Upjohn stated that in a case of defective building work reinstatement was the normal measure of damages.

Lord Upjohn, Lord Guest, Lord Cohen and Lord Pearson
[1966] 1 AC 406, [1965] 3 All ER 619
England and Wales
Cited by:
Considered – Ruxley Electronics and Construction Ltd v Forsyth HL 29-Jun-1995
Damages on Construction not as Agreed
The appellant had contracted to build a swimming pool for the respondent, but, after agreeing to alter the specification to construct it to a certain depth, in fact built it to the original lesser depth, Damages had been awarded to the house owner . .
Cited – Alfred Mcalpine Construction Limited v Panatown Limited HL 17-Feb-2000
A main contractor who was building not on his own land, would only be free to claim damages from a sub-contractor for defects in the building where the actual owner of the land would not also have had a remedy. Here, the land owner was able to sue . .
Cited – Darlington Borough Council v Wiltshier Northern Ltd and Others CA 29-Jun-1994
The council owned land on which it wanted to build a recreational centre. Construction contracts were entered into not by the council but by a finance company, the building contractors being the respondents Wiltshier Northern Ltd. The finance . .
Cited – Pegler Ltd v Wang (UK) Ltd TCC 25-Feb-2000
Standard Conract – Wide Exclusions, Apply 1977 Act
The claimant had acquired a computer system from the defendant, which had failed. It was admitted that the contract had been broken, and the court set out to decide the issue of damages.
Held: Even though Wang had been ready to amend one or . .
Cited – Darlington Borough Council v Wiltshier Northern Ltd CA 28-Jun-1994
The plaintiff council complained of the work done for it by the defendant builder.
Held: Steyn LJ said: ‘in the case of a building contract, the prima facie rule is cost of cure, i.e., the cost of remedying the defect: East Ham Corporation v. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Construction

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.192627

SCM (United Kingdom) Ltd v W J Whittall and Son Ltd: CA 1970

The defendants’ workmen damaged an electric cable belonging to the electricity board, cutting off several factories, including the plaintiff’s. The defendant sought to have the claim struck out.
Held: The part of the claim arising from physical damage was not struck out, but that for economic loss was. Economic loss ought not to be put on one pair of shoulders, but spread among all the sufferers.
Lord Denning said: ‘I must not be taken, however, as saying that economic loss is always too remote. There are some exceptional cases when it is the immediate consequence of the negligence and is recoverable accordingly. Such is the case when a banker negligently gives a good reference on which a man extends credit, and loses the money. The plaintiff suffers economic loss only, but it is the immediate – almost, I might say, the intended – consequence of the negligent reference and is recoverable accordingly: see Hedley Byrne and Co. Ltd. v. Heller and Partners Ltd. [1964] A.C. 465. Another is when the defendant by his negligence damages a lorry which is carrying the plaintiff’s goods. The goods themselves are not damaged, but the lorry is so badly damaged that the goods have to be unloaded and carried forward in some other vehicle. The goods owner suffers economic loss only, namely, the cost of unloading and carriage, but he can recover it from the defendant because it is immediate and not too remote. It is analogous to physical damage: because the goods themselves had to be unloaded. Such was the illustration given by Lord Roche in Morrison Steamship Co. Ltd. v. Greystoke Castle (Cargo Owners) [1947] A.C. 265. Likewise, when the cargo owners have to pay a general average contribution. It is not too remote and is recoverable.
Seeing these exceptional cases you may well ask: How are we to say when economic loss is too remote or not? Where is the line to be drawn? Lawyers are continually asking that question. But the judges are never defeated by it. We may not be able to draw the line with precision, but we can always say on which side of it any particular case falls.’

Lord Denning
[1971] 1 QB 337, [1970] 3 All ER 245, [1970] 3 WLR 694
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Dutton v Bognor Regis Urban District Council CA 1972
The court considered the liability in negligence of a Council whose inspector had approved a building which later proved defective.
Held: The Council had control of the work and with such control came a responsibility to take care in . .
Cited – D Pride and Partners (A Firm) and Others v Institute for Animal Health and Others QBD 31-Mar-2009
The claimants sought damages after the loss of business when the defendants’ premises were the source of an outbreak of foot and mouth disease. The organism had escaped from their premises via a broken drain.
Held: Much of the damage claimed . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Utilities

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.186894

Gleaner Company Ltd and Another v Abrahams: PC 14 Jul 2003

Punitive Defamation Damages Order Sustained

(Jamaica) The appellants challenged a substantial award of damages for defamation. They had wrongfully accused a government minister of corruption. There was evidence of substantial financial loss. ‘For nearly sixteen years the defendants, with all the prestige and resources at their command, have doggedly resisted the attempts of Mr Abrahams to clear his name. They maintained their allegations far beyond the point when it became obvious that they had no evidence to support them.’ Damages awarded by a jury were to be respected, and in this case the appeal was denied.
Lord Hoffmann said: ‘. . the damages must be sufficient to demonstrate to the public that the plaintiff’s reputation has been vindicated. Particularly if the defendant has not apologised and withdrawn the defamatory allegations, the award must show that they have been publicly proclaimed to have inflicted a serious injury.’
Reference to awards in personal injury cases in defamation cases is controversial and is a matter on which different opinions may be held. Lord Hoffmann identified significant differences between damages for personal injury and damages for defamation, which give rise to the difficulty.

Lord Hoffmann, Lord Hope of Craighead, Lord Hobhouse of Woodborough, Lord Millett, The Rt. Hon. Justice Tipping
[2003] UKPC 55, Times 22-Jul-2003, Gazette 18-Sep-2003, [2004] 1 AC 628, [2003] 3 WLR 1038, [2003] EMLR 3, (2003) 63 WIR 197
Bailii, PC
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Medcalf v Mardell, Weatherill and Another HL 27-Jun-2002
The appellants were barristers against whom wasted costs orders had been made. They appealed. They had made allegations of fraud in pleadings, but without being able to provide evidence to support the allegation. This was itself a breach of the Bar . .
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 – 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 – 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 – Sutcliffe v Pressdram Ltd CA 1991
A 600,000 pound compensatory award was set aside by the Court of Appeal on the grounds that it must have been made on the wrong basis, almost certainly so as to punish Private Eye. The Court of Appeal could not substitute its own award for that of a . .
Cited – Rantzen v Mirror Group Newspapers (1986) Ltd and Others CA 1-Apr-1993
Four articles in the People all covered the same story about Esther Rantzen’s organisation, Childline, suggesting that the plaintiff had protected a teacher who had revealed to Childline abuses of children occurring at a school where he taught, by . .
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 – McCarey v Associated Newspapers Ltd (No 2) CA 1965
References to damages awards in personal injury actions were legitimate in directing a defamation jury on quantum. . .
Cited – Australian Consolidated Press Limited v Uren PC 24-Jul-1967
The Board declined to interfere with the decision of the High Court of Australia not to review its jurisprudence on exemplary damages: ‘[I]n a sphere of law where its policy calls for decision and where its policy in a particular country is . .
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 by:
Cited – George Galloway MP v Telegraph Group Ltd QBD 2-Dec-2004
The claimant MP alleged defamation in articles by the defendant newspaper. They claimed to have found papers in Iraqi government offices after the invasion of Iraq which implicated the claimant. The claimant said the allegations were grossly . .
Cited – Collins Stewart Ltd and Another v The Financial Times Ltd QBD 20-Oct-2004
The claimants sought damages for defamation. The claimed that the article had caused very substantial losses (andpound;230 million) to them by affecting their market capitalisation value. The defendant sought to strike out that part of the claim. . .
Cited – Adelson and Another v Associated Newspapers QBD 19-Feb-2008
Complaint was made that an article was defamatory of the owner of Manchester United. The defendant now argued that the game was not worth the candle. The costs vastly exceeded any possible recovery, and it had openly offered vindication, and that . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Defamation, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.184660

Ahsan v The Labour Party: EAT 29 Jul 2011

ahasan_labourEAT2011

EAT RACIAL DISCRIMINATION – Compensation
Claimant discriminatorily prevented by Labour Party from being selected as a candidate for election to Birmingham City Council in elections in 1998, 1999 and 2000 – Suspended from party membership in March 2002 and, partly in consequence, leaves the party in 2004
Awarded compensation at remedy hearing for loss of allowances that he would have received as a councillor, as follows:
(a) from May 1998 to May 2002, in full;
(b) from May 2002 to May 2004, nothing, on the basis that he had been lawfully suspended;
(c) from June 2004 to May 2008, 25% of the amount of the allowances that he would have received, on an assessment of the chances that he would have been selected and elected in 2004;
(d) from May 2008, nothing, on the basis that no such loss had been proved and that in any event it would be too remote.
HELD:
(1) Allowing the appeal in part, that the Claimant was entitled to lost allowances for the entirety of the period to June 2004 (i.e. including period (b)) because if elected in 2000 he would have served to that date and his suspension as a member of the Labour Party would not have affected his entitlement to allowances as a councillor
(2) Allowing the cross-appeal in part, that the Claimant was not entitled to any compensation in respect of lost allowances from June 2004 since the reason that he had not been selected or elected on that occasion or thereafter was because he had left the party and not because of his unlawful non-selection in 1998-2000 – Essa v Laing Ltd [2004] ICR 746 applied; Beart v Prison Service (no. 2) [2005] ICR 1206 distinguished

Underhill P J
[2011] UKEAT 0211 – 10 – 2907
Bailii
England and Wales

Employment, Discrimination, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.442774

Chapman v Hearse, Baker v Willoughby: HL 26 Nov 1969

The plaintiff, a pedestrian had been struck by the defendant’s car while crossing the road. The plaintiff had negligently failed to see the defendant’s car approaching. The defendant had a clear view of the plaintiff prior to the collision, but was driving at an excessive speed or failing to keep a proper look-out or both. The judge found that the plaintiff was 25% to blame. On appeal, the Court of Appeal increased that apportionment to 50%. The effects of the first tort, which caused injuries to the claimant’s left leg, were obliterated by the second: he was shot in the same leg in an armed robbery, and the leg had to be amputated. It was argued that the Defendant could not be regarded as having caused an injury which would have occurred in any event.
Held: The argument failed. The House restored the trial judge’s assessment of 75/25 in favour of the pedestrian. The plaintiff’s disability could be regarded as having two causes and, where the later injuries became a concurrent cause of the disabilities caused by the injury inflicted by the defendant, they could not reduce the amount of the damages which the defendant had to pay for those disabilities. So the defendants had to pay the same sum by way of damages for the plaintiff’s stiff leg, even though it had actually been amputated. Lord Reid made comparisons between the respective blameworthiness of a cyclist and motorist.
Lord Reid made general observations about apportionment in cases of this kind: ‘The Court of Appeal recognised that the trial judge’s assessment ought not to be varied unless ‘some error in the judge’s approach is clearly discernible.’ But they appear to have thought it impossible to differentiate when both parties had a clear view of each other for 200 yards prior to impact and neither did anything about it. I am unable to agree. There are two elements in an assessment of liability, causation and blameworthiness. I need not consider whether in such circumstances the causative factors must necessarily be equal, because in my view there is not even a presumption to that effect as regards blameworthiness.
A pedestrian has to look to both sides as well as forwards. He is going at perhaps three miles an hour and at that speed he is rarely a danger to anyone else. The motorist has not got to look sideways though he may have to observe over a wide angle ahead: and if he is going at a considerable speed he must not relax his observation, for the consequences may be disastrous . . In my opinion it is quite possible that the motorist may be very much more to blame than the pedestrian.’

Lord Reid
[1970] AC 467, [1969] 3 All ER 1528, [1969] UKHL 8
Bailii
Law Reform (Contributory Negligence) Act 1945
England and Wales
Citing:
Approved – Davies v Swan Motor Co (Swansea) Ltd CA 1949
A plaintiff brought an action for damages for personal injury against the drivers of two cars.
Held: There are two aspects to apportioning responsibility between a plaintiff and defendant in an action for negligence, the respective causative . .

Cited by:
Cited – Eagle v Chambers CA 24-Jul-2003
The claimant was severely injured when run down by the defendant driving his car. She was in Blackpool, and drunk and wandering in the highway. The defendant was himself at or near the drink driving limit. She appealed against a finding that she was . .
Cited – Rahman v Arearose Limited and Another, University College London, NHS Trust CA 15-Jun-2000
The claimant had suffered a vicious physical assault from which the claimant’s employers should have protected him, and an incompetently performed surgical operation. Three psychiatrists agreed that the aetiology of the claimant’s very severe . .
Cited – Fairchild v Glenhaven Funeral Services Ltd and Others HL 20-Jun-2002
The claimants suffered mesothelioma after contact with asbestos while at work. Their employers pointed to several employments which might have given rise to the condition, saying it could not be clear which particular employment gave rise to the . .
Cited – Clenshaw v Tanner and others CA 27-Nov-2002
The claimant was a cyclist. He passed along inside a line of traffic, and collided with a lorry turning left into a petrol station ahead of him, suffering serious injuries. He appealed against a finding that the lorry driver had signalled and that . .
Cited – Bailey v Warre CA 7-Feb-2006
The claimant had been severely injured in a road traffic accident. His claim was compromised and embodied in a court order, but later a question was raised as to whether he had had mental capacity at the time to make the compromise he had.
Cited – 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 – Gray v Thames Trains and Others HL 17-Jun-2009
The claimant suffered severe psychiatric injured in a rail crash caused by the defendant’s negligence. Under this condition of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, the claimant had gone on to kill another person, and he had been detained under section . .
Cited – Halsey v Milton Keynes General NHS Trust etc CA 11-May-2004
The court considered the effect on costs orders of a refusal to take part in alternate dispute resolution procedures. The defendant Trust had refused to take the dispute to a mediation. In neither case had the court ordered or recommended ADR.
Distinguished – Jobling v Associated Dairies HL 1980
The claimant suffered an accident at work which left him with continuing disabling back pain. Before the trial of his claim he was diagnosed as suffering from a disease, in no way connected with the accident, which would in any event have wholly . .
Distinguished – Heil v Rankin CA 13-Jun-2000
Where supervening events might contribute to the personal injury suffered, the proper approach in apportioning compensation in respect of one occasion was in general terms to provide just and sufficient compensation for the injury caused without . .
Cited – Soutzos v Asombang and Others ChD 21-Jun-2011
The claimant had obtained a freezing order against the defendants. His claim having been dismissed, the court now considered if and what damages should be paid under the cross-undertaking he had given.
Held: Setting out and applying the . .
Cited – Jackson v Murray and Another SC 18-Feb-2015
Child not entirely free of responsibility
The claimant child, left a school bus and stepped out from behind it into the path of the respondent’s car. She appealed against a finding of 70% contributory negligence.
Held: Her appeal succeeded (Majority, Lord Hodge and Lord Wilson . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Negligence, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.185854

Heil v Rankin, Rees v Mabco (102) Ltd, Schofield v Saunders and Taylor Ltd and Other cases: CA 23 Mar 2000

The Law Commission had recommended that the general level of damages awarded for pain suffering and loss of amenity in personal injury cases should be raised. The Court now considered several cases on the issue.
Held: The court would do so. Awards above pounds 10,000 should be raised on a sliding scale to a one third proportion in the most severe cases. No change in principle was involved. It was proper for the Court of Appeal to respond to such a report provided it confined its answer to provision of tariffs. The old awards had become out of line with what society as a whole would consider reasonable.

Lord Woolf MR, Beldam, Otton, May LJJ, Nelson J
Times 24-Mar-2000, Gazette 06-Apr-2000, [2000] 2 WLR 1173, [2000] EWCA Civ 84, [2000] 3 All ER 138, [2000] Lloyd’s Rep Med 203, [2000] IRLR 334, [2000] PIQR Q187, [2001] QB 272
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Andrews v Grand and Toy Alberta Ltd 1978
(Supreme Court of Canada) The injured plaintiff sought damages for future loss of earnings and for the cost of future care.
Held: Dickson J said: ‘It is clear that a plaintiff cannot recover for the expense of providing for basic necessities . .
Cited – Wright v British Railways Board HL 1983
An award of interest at a conventional rate includes an element in respect of the ‘real’ rate of return which an investor could expect to receive on a risk-free investment and an element to allow for inflation. Lord Diplock said: ‘that element of . .
Cited – Wells v Wells; Thomas v Brighton Health Authority; etc HL 16-Jul-1998
In each of three cases, the plaintiffs had suffered serious injury. They complained that the court had made a substantial reduction of their damages award for loss of future earnings and the costs of future care.
Held: The appeals succeeded. . .
Cited – Shephard v H West and Son Ltd HL 27-May-1963
The House looked at how personal injury damages shoud be set in cases of severe injury.
Lord Pearce said: ‘[i]f a plaintiff has lost a leg, the court approaches the matter on the basis that he has suffered a serious physical deprivation no . .
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 by:
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 – Rahman v Arearose Limited and Another, University College London, NHS Trust CA 15-Jun-2000
The claimant had suffered a vicious physical assault from which the claimant’s employers should have protected him, and an incompetently performed surgical operation. Three psychiatrists agreed that the aetiology of the claimant’s very severe . .
Cited – George Galloway MP v Telegraph Group Ltd QBD 2-Dec-2004
The claimant MP alleged defamation in articles by the defendant newspaper. They claimed to have found papers in Iraqi government offices after the invasion of Iraq which implicated the claimant. The claimant said the allegations were grossly . .
See Also – Heil v Rankin CA 13-Jun-2000
Where supervening events might contribute to the personal injury suffered, the proper approach in apportioning compensation in respect of one occasion was in general terms to provide just and sufficient compensation for the injury caused without . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Constitutional, Personal Injury, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.135768

Catnic Components Ltd and Another v Hill and Smith Ltd: HL 1982

The plaintiffs had been established as market leaders with their patented construction, had ample production capacity and stocks, but had never granted any licence under their patent. The patent was for a novel type of galvanised steel lintel, which the relevant claim described as including a rear support back plate ‘extending vertically’ from a horizontal plate. The allegedly infringing article included a rear support member which was inclined between 6 degrees and 8 degrees from the vertical. The defendants had not been in business in this field at all, entered the market at the expense of the plaintiffs using an infringing version of the plaintiffs’ patented construction.
Held: The appeal succeeded. The proper damages were on the assumption that the plaintiffs would have made, with their patented lintels, those sales made by the defendants with the infringing lintels save as shown otherwise. An invention involves an inventive step if it is not obvious ‘to a person skilled in the art’ being a person likely to have a practical interest in the subject matter of the invention.
The approach to construction exemplified in Prenn and in Reardon-Smith is to be applied also to the construction of patents claims: ‘A patent specification should be given a purposive construction rather than a purely literal one derived from applying to it the kind of meticulous verbal analysis in which lawyers are too often tempted by their training to indulge.’ and ‘Both parties to this appeal have tended to treat ‘textual infringement’ and infringement of the ‘pith and marrow’ of an invention as if they were separate causes of action, the existence of the former to be determined as a matter of construction only and of the latter upon some broader principle of colourable evasion. There is, in my view, no such dichotomy; there is but a single cause of action and to treat it otherwise . . is liable to lead to confusion.’
Lord Diplock said that it would have been:
‘obvious to a builder familiar with ordinary building operations that the description of a lintel in the form of a weight-bearing box girder of which the back plate was referred to as ‘extending vertically’ from one of the two horizontal plates to join the other, could not have been intended to exclude lintels in which the back plate although not positioned at precisely 90 degree to both horizontal plates was close enough to 90 degree to make no material difference to the way the lintel worked when used in building operations.’ and
‘No plausible reason has been advanced why any rational patentee should want to place so narrow a limitation on his invention. On the contrary, to do so would render his monopoly for practical purposes worthless, since any imitator could avoid it and take all the benefit of the invention by the simple expedient of positioning the back plate a degree or two from the exact vertical.’
Buckley LJ said ‘I do not question the principle that in deciding whether what has been reproduced by an alleged infringer is a substantial part of the work allegedly infringed, one must regard the quality (that is to say the importance) rather than the quantity of the part reproduced (see Ladbroke (Football} Limited v. William Bill (Football J Limited [1964] 1 W.L.R. 273 per Lord Reid at page 276 and per Lord Pearce at page 293); but what is protected is the plaintiffs’ ‘artistic work’ as such, not any information which it may be designed to convey. If it is said that a substantial part of it has been reproduced, whether that part can properly be described as substantial may depend upon how important that part is to the recognition and appreciation of the ‘artistic work’. If an ‘artistic work’ is designed to convey information, the importance of some part of it may fall to be judged by how far it contributes to conveying that information, but not, in my opinion, by how important the information may be which it conveys or helps to convey. What is protected is the skill and labour devoted to making the ‘artistic work’ itself, not the skill and labour devoted to developing some idea or invention communicated or depicted by the ‘artistic work’. The protection afforded by copyright is not, in my judgment, any broader as counsel submitted, where the ‘artistic work1 embodies a novel or inventive idea than it is where it represents a commonplace object or theme.’

Lord Diplock
[1983] FSR 512, [1982] RPC 183
Patents Act 1977 3, Patents Act 1949
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Prenn v Simmonds HL 1971
Backgroun Used to Construe Commercial Contract
Commercial contracts are to be construed in the light of all the background information which could reasonably have been expected to have been available to the parties in order to ascertain what would objectively have been understood to be their . .
Cited – Reardon Smith Line Ltd v Yngvar Hansen-Tangen (The ‘Diana Prosperity’) HL 1976
In construing a contract, three principles can be found. The contextual scene is always relevant. Secondly, what is admissible as a matter of the rules of evidence under this heading is what is arguably relevant, but admissibility is not decisive. . .
Cited – Clark v Adie HL 1877
The court should look to the ‘pith and marrow’ of the invention to see whether a patent infringement had occurred. For a claim be made for a ‘subordinate’ invention, it would have been necessary distinctly to claim it in the patent. . .

Cited by:
Cited – Coflexip Sacoflexip Stena Offshore Limited v Stolt Offshore Limitedstolt Offshore Limited Stolt Offshore A/S CA 13-Mar-2003
In proceedings already heard the defendant had been found liable for patent infringement, and damages remained to be assessed. They claimed for loss of profits and royalties, and for damages through dilution of the market. The claimants said that to . .
Cited – Stena Rederi Aktiebolag and Another v Irish Ferries Ltd CA 6-Feb-2003
A ferry plied its way between Dublin and Holyhead, coming into English territorial waters three or four times a day, and for up to three hours on each occasion. The claimants asserted that the construction of the hull infringed its patent.
Cited – Kirin-Amgen Inc and others v Hoechst Marion Roussel Limited and others etc HL 21-Oct-2004
The claims arose in connection with the validity and alleged infringement of a European Patent on erythropoietin (‘EPO’).
Held: ‘Construction is objective in the sense that it is concerned with what a reasonable person to whom the utterance . .
Explained – Improver Corporation v Remington Consumer Products Ltd ChD 1989
Protocol Tests For Onbviousness Set Out
The invention was based upon the discovery that an arcuate rod with slits, when rotated at high speed, would take the hair off the skin by means of the opening and closing of the slits. The claim was to a rod in the form of an ‘helical spring’ but . .
Cited – PLG Research Ltd and Another v Ardon International Ltd and Others CA 1995
As to Catnic: ‘Lord Diplock was expounding the common law approach to the construction of a patent. This has been replaced by the approach laid down by the Protocol. If the two approaches are the same, reference to Lord Diplock’s formulation is . .
Cited – Assidoman Multipack Ltd v The Mead Corporation 1995
In patents law, the Catnic approach accords with the Protocol. . .
Cited – W L Gore and Associates Gmbh v Geox Spa PatC 7-Oct-2008
The claimants sought a declaration of non-infringement of four patents relating to waterproof fabrics for shoes.
Held: The patents could not be set as invalid for obviousness. . .
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 – PLG Research Ltd and Another v Ardon International Ltd and Others ChD 25-Nov-1994
A patent infingement claim was met by the assertion that the material covered had been disclosed before the patent had been obtained. The court was asked as to the test of whether the information in a claim had been disclosed. Aldous J said: ‘Mr. . .
Cited – Marley v Rawlings and Another SC 22-Jan-2014
A husband and wife had each executed the will which had been prepared for the other, owing to an oversight on the part of their solicitor; the question which arose was whether the will of the husband, who died after his wife, was valid. The parties . .
Cited – Eli Lilly v Actavis UK Ltd and Others SC 12-Jul-2017
The issue raised on this appeal and cross-appeal is whether three products manufactured by Actavis would infringe a patent whose proprietor is Lilly, namely European Patent (UK) No 1 313 508, and its corresponding designations in France, Italy and . .
Cited – Interlego AG v Tyco Industries Inc PC 5-May-1988
How much new material for new copyright
(Hong Kong) Toy building bricks were manufactured by Lego in accordance with engineering drawings made for that purpose. One issue was whether new drawings made since 1972, altering the original drawings in various minor respects but added new . .
Cited – Warner-Lambert Company Llc v Generics (UK) Ltd (T/A Mylan) and Another SC 14-Nov-2018
These proceedings raise, for the first time in the courts of the United Kingdom, the question how the concepts of sufficiency and infringement are to be applied to a patent relating to a specified medical use of a known pharmaceutical compound. Four . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Intellectual Property, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.179765

Standard Chartered Bank v Pakistan National Shipping Corporation; Seaways Maritime Limited; Oakprime International Limited; Arvind Mehra and Sgs United Kingdom Limited: CA 26 Jan 2001

As part of its attempt to mitigate its loss caused by deceit perpetrated in relation to it by the defendants, the claimant bank presided over the sale of a cargo of bitumen in Vietnam. To do this, it sent one of its officers, to Vietnam on two occasions, each for about two months. The bank claimed his salary during those visits, namely US$30,000. The defendants appealed.
Held: The appeal succeeded. Potter LJ cited Tate and Lyle and said: ‘It does not seem to me that either the passage quoted or the circumstances relating to the claim in Tate and Lyle justify the recovery of the proportion of Mr Griffiths’ salary claimed in this case. No doubt it was true, as the judge stated, that, in visiting Vietnam, Mr Griffiths was engaged in an unusual task. However it is not suggested that his trip abroad, as an employee engaged in the business of [the bank] and in respect of whose responsibilities his salary was in any event payable, led to any significant disruption in [the bank’s] business or any loss of profit or increased expenditure on [the bank’s] part . . In certain situations, involving particular types of trading concern, such a claim may be appropriate. In particular, building contractors who, by reason of delay, suffer increased costs attributable to a particular job which costs are irrecovable elsewhere, may claim for a proportion of their fixed overheads (including head office salaries) as part of their claim for consequential loss. However, that is not this case. There is no suggestion that the business of [the bank], or the system of charging upon which its profits depend, were in any way adversely affected by the diversion of Mr Griffiths to Vietnam.’

Potter LJ, Henry LJ and Wall J
[2001] EWCA Civ 55, [2001] CLC 825
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Tate and Lyle Distribution v Greater London Council 1982
The defendants were liable to the claimants for having failed to dredge silt which they had caused to be accumulated when constructing new piers for the Woolwich ferry and which had obstructed the claimants’ use of their barge moorings. The result . .
Cited – Payzu Limited v Saunders CA 1919
The innocent plaintiff buyers had been found to have failed to mitigate their damages because they had not accepted an offer from the defendant sellers (who were in breach of contract) to supply goods on cash terms, the contract having originally . .
Cited – Sotiros Shipping Inc v Sameiet; The Solholt CA 1983
The seller had failed to deliver the vessel he had sold by the delivery date. The buyer cancelled and requested return of his deposit, also claiming damages because the vessel was worth $500,000 more on the delivery date than she had been when the . .

Cited by:
Cited – Aerospace Publishing Ltd and Another v Thames Water Utilities Ltd CA 11-Jan-2007
A substantial private archive of valuable books had been damaged when the defendant’s water mains burst. The court was asked to assess the value.
Held: The water company’s appeal failed save to a small extent. The articles were of substantial . .
Cited – R+V Versicherung Ag v Risk Insurance and Reinsurance Solutions Sa and others ComC 27-Jan-2006
It had held that the defendant insurance intermediaries were liable to the claimants, a German reinsurance company, because of a conspiracy to defraud the claimants on the part of one of the defendants’ employees. The court had to decide issues of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Torts – Other, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.147412

Soutzos v Asombang and Others: ChD 21 Jun 2011

The claimant had obtained a freezing order against the defendants. His claim having been dismissed, the court now considered if and what damages should be paid under the cross-undertaking he had given.
Held: Setting out and applying the principles appropriate to such claims, the court found that the defendants had not established that, but for the injunction they would have been able to arrange the financial facility they had described. No payment of damages was awarded.

Newey J
[2011] EWHC 1582 (Ch)
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Chapman v Hearse, Baker v Willoughby HL 26-Nov-1969
The plaintiff, a pedestrian had been struck by the defendant’s car while crossing the road. The plaintiff had negligently failed to see the defendant’s car approaching. The defendant had a clear view of the plaintiff prior to the collision, but was . .
Cited – Jobling v Associated Dairies HL 1980
The claimant suffered an accident at work which left him with continuing disabling back pain. Before the trial of his claim he was diagnosed as suffering from a disease, in no way connected with the accident, which would in any event have wholly . .
Cited – Heil v Rankin CA 13-Jun-2000
Where supervening events might contribute to the personal injury suffered, the proper approach in apportioning compensation in respect of one occasion was in general terms to provide just and sufficient compensation for the injury caused without . .
See Also – Soutzos v Asombang and Others ChD 23-Apr-2010
The claimant had lent substantial sums to the defendant. The defendant had subsequently been made bankrupt, and now said he was released from the debt. . .
Cited – Lilly Icos Llc and Others v 8Pm Chemists Ltd and Another ChD 31-Jul-2009
The defendants sought assessment of their damages against the claimants under injunctions granted to the claimants and undertakings given.
Held: Arnold J surveyed the applicable legal principles. . .
Cited – Scholefield v Temper 1859
A surety had been released on the strength of a fraud practised by the debtor.
Held: The creditor’s rights against the surety were restored. Not only is a person who has committed the fraud precluded from deriving any benefit under it, but an . .
Cited – Duke of Portland v Topham CA 1864
Commonlii The donee of a power of appointing portions among his younger children appointed a double share to a younger child without previous communication with him. But it appeared from the instructions for the . .
Cited – Morley v Loughnan 1893
Wright J in the context of this claim for undue influence, relied on a passage from an earlier case in which Wilmot CJ had said, ‘Let the hand receiving [a gift] be ever so chaste, yet, if it comes through a polluted channel, the obligation of . .
Cited – Archbolds (Freightage) Ltd v S Spanglett Ltd (Randall, third party) CA 1961
The court considered the effect of illegality on a contract. Devlin LJ said: ‘The effect of illegality on a contract may be threefold. If at the time of making the contract there is an intent to perform it in an unlawful way, the contract, although . .
Cited – Les Laboratoires Servier and Another v Apotex Inc and Others PatC 29-Mar-2011
Arnold J considered what kinds of unlawfulness would engage the ex turpi causa principle.
Held: a relevant illegality was one which was sufficiently serious in all the circumstances of the case, including in particular whether the illegal act . .
Cited – Eddis v Chichester Constable 1969
The court considered an allegation of a concealed fraud.
Held: Goff J referred to the rule ‘that no person however innocent would be allowed to keep what he had received under a title derived through the fraud of another.’ . .
Cited – Hewison v Meridian Shipping Pte, Coflexip Stena Offshore Ltd, Flex Installer Offshore Ltd CA 11-Dec-2002
The claimant was awarded damages for injuries suffered in his work as a seaman. The respondents claimed that he should not receive damages, since he had made false declarations as to his health in order to obtain employment, hiding his epilepsy . .
Cited – Les Laboratoires Servier and Another v Apotex Inc and others ChD 9-Oct-2008
The claimant had alleged that the defendant was producing generic drugs which infringed its rights in a new drug. The patentee had given a cross-undertaking in damages, but the patent was later ruled invalid. The court had to assess the damages to . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.441063

Jaggard v Sawyer and Another: CA 18 Jul 1994

Recovery of damages after Refusal of Injunction

The plaintiff appealed against the award of damages instead of an injunction aftter the County court had found the defendant to have trespassed on his land by a new building making use of a private right of way.
Held: The appeal failed.
A court may substitute damages for the grant of an injunction if an injunction would be oppressive. Referring to Wrotham Park, Sir Thomas Bingham MR said: ‘I cannot, however, accept that Brightman J’s assessment of damages in the Wrotham Park case was based on other than compensatory principles. The defendants had committed a breach of covenant, the effects of which continued. The judge was not willing to order the defendants to undo the continuing effects of that breach. He had therefore to assess the damages necessary to compensate the plaintiffs for this continuing invasion of their right. He paid attention to the profits earned by the defendants, as it seemed to me, not in order to strip the defendants of their unjust gains, but because of the obvious relationship between the profits earned by the defendants and the sum which the defendants could reasonably have been willing to pay to secure a release from the covenant. I am reassured to find that this is the view taken of the Wrotham Park case by Sir Robert Megarry V-C in Tito v Waddell (No.2) [1977] Ch 106, 335.’
CS Millett LJ: ‘It has always been recognised that the practical consequence of withholding injunctive relief is to authorise the continuance of an unlawful state of affairs. If, for example, the defendant threatens to build in such a way that the plaintiff’s light will be obstructed and he is not restrained, then the plaintiff will inevitably be deprived of his legal right. This was the very basis upon which before 1858 the Court of Chancery had made the remedy of injunction available in such cases. After the passing of Lord Cairns’s Act many of the judges warned that the jurisdiction to award damages instead of an injunction should not be exercised as a matter of course so as to legalise the commission of a tort by any defendant who was willing and able to pay compensation.’ Damages awarded under section 50 may relate not only to extant breaches of obligation, but also to future breaches.
He also said: ‘Reported cases are merely illustrations of circumstances in which particular judges have exercised their discretion, in some cases by granting an injunction, and in others by awarding damages instead Since they are all cases on the exercise of a discretion, none of them is a binding authority on how the discretion should be exercised The most that any of them can demonstrate is that in similar circumstances it would not be wrong to exercise the discretion in the same way But it does not follow that it would be wrong to exercise it differently’

Sir Thomas Bingham MR, Millett LJ
Ind Summary 22-Aug-1994, [1995] 1 WLR 269, [1994] EWCA Civ 1, [1995] 13 EG 132, [1995] 2 All ER 189, [1995] 1 EGLR 146, [1994] EGCS 139
Bailii
Supreme Court Act 1981 50, Chancery Amendment Act 1858 5
England and Wales
Citing:
Approved – Wrotham Park Estate Ltd v Parkside Homes Ltd ChD 1974
55 houses had been built by the defendant, knowingly in breach of a restrictive covenant, imposed for the benefit of an estate, and in the face of objections by the claimant.
Held: The restrictive covenant not to develop other than in . .
Cited – Tito v Waddell (No 2); Tito v Attorney General ChD 1977
Equity applies its doctrines to the substance, not the form, of transactions. In respect of the rule against self dealing for trustees ‘But of course equity looks beneath the surface, and applies its doctrines to cases where, although in form a . .
Not the last word – Surrey County Council v Bredero Homes Ltd CA 7-Apr-1993
A local authority had sold surplus land to a developer and obtained a covenant that the developer would develop the land in accordance with an existing planning permission. The sole purpose of the local authority in imposing the covenant was to . .
Cited – Shelfer v City of London Electric Lighting Company, Meux’s Brewery Co v Same CA 1895
The plaintiff sought damages and an injunction for nuisance by noise and vibration which was causing structural injury to a public house.
Held: The court set out the rules for when a court should not grant an injunction for an infringement of . .
Cited – Cowper v Laidler ChD 1903
Buckley J said: ‘The court has affirmed over and over again that the jurisdiction to give damages where it exists is not so to be used as in fact to enable the defendant to purchase from the plaintiff against his will his legal right to the . .
Cited – Isenberg v East India House Estate Co Ltd 1863
The court refused a mandatory injunction to compel the defendant to pull down part of a new building which interfered with the plaintiff’s light and exercised instead the Court of Chancery’s recently-acquired jurisdiction under the 1858 Act to order . .
Not supported – Anchor Brewhouse Developments -v Berkley House (Docklands) Developments 1987
A crane which passes its boom over private land without permission creates an actionable nuisance. Damages could not be awarded so as to remove the plaintiff’s right to bring actions for trespass in the future if the trespass continued: ‘I find some . .
Appeal from – Jaggard v Sawyer CC 1993
(Weymouth County Court) The court refused an injunction to a land owner who complained that a neighbour had erected a building over a right of way. The court awarded damages of andpound;694.44, being a proportionate part of the the sum he might be . .

Cited by:
Cited – Severn Trent Water Ltd v Barnes CA 13-May-2004
The water company appealed an award of damages after it had been found to have laid a water main under the claimant’s land without his knowledge or consent. The court had awarded restitutionary damages.
Held: The judge fell into error in . .
Cited – Midtown Ltd v City of London Real Property Company Ltd ChD 20-Jan-2005
Tenants occupied land next to land which was to be developed after compulsory acquisition. The tenants and the landlords asserted a right of light over the land, and sought an injunction to prevent the development. The developer denied that any . .
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 . .
Cited – Meretz Investments Nv and Another v ACP Ltd and others ChD 30-Jan-2006
The applicant challenged the exercise of a power of sale under a mortgage, saying that the mortgagee’s purposes included purposes not those under the mortgage. The parties had been involved in an attempted development of a penthouse.
Held: The . .
Cited – Regan v Paul Properties DPF No 1 Ltd and others ChD 27-Jul-2006
The claimant sought an injunction claiming that new building works were a nuisance in breaching his rights of light.
Held: The claim for an injunction failed. Whatever may be the position in cases of other wrongful conduct, in the case of an . .
Cited – 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 . .
Cited – Harris v Williams-Wynne ChD 11-Feb-2005
The parties agreed in sale agreement for a plot of land that the buyer would not erect any additional building. He did so, and when he came to try to sell it the original vendor objected. The purchaser’s solicitors registered the agreement for sale. . .
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 . .
Cited – Jacklin and Another v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire CA 16-Feb-2007
The claimants asserted a vehicular right of way over land belonging to the defendant poilce authority. The defendant said that it had been abandoned. The judge found that it had not been and granted an injunction to prevent the defendants . .
Cited – Ludlow Music Inc v Williams and others ChD 2-Oct-2000
The claimant sought damages for copyright infringement in respect of two works which parodied a song to which they owned the rights.
Held: The amount copied, being as much as a quarter of the original work, meant that the claim was . .
Cited – Devenish Nutrition Ltd v Sanofi-Aventis Sa (France) and others CA 14-Oct-2008
The defendant had been involved in price fixing arrangements, and the claimant sought damages for breach of its proprietary rights. The claimant appealed refusal of an award an account of profits for what was akin to a breach of statutory duty.
Cited – Watson and others v Croft Promo-Sport Ltd CA 26-Jan-2009
The claimants were neighbours of the Croft motor racing circuit. They alleged nuisance in the levels of noise emanating from the site. The defendants denied nuisance saying that the interference was deemed reasonable since they operated within the . .
Cited – Fisher v Brooker and Others HL 30-Jul-2009
The claimant sought a share in the royalties from the song ‘A whiter shade of pale’ but had delayed his claim for 38 years. He had contributed the organ solo which had contributed significantly to the song’s success. He now sought a share of future . .
Cited – Jones and Another v Ruth and Another CA 12-Jul-2011
The parties were neighbours. The claimants succeeded in their assertion of trespass and nuisance in building works carried out by the defendant. The claimant appealed against the judge’s failure to award damages for harassment, saying that though . .
Approved – Coventry and Others v Lawrence and Another SC 26-Feb-2014
C operated a motor racing circuit as tenant. The neighbour L objected that the noise emitted by the operations were a nuisance. C replied that the fact of his having planning consent meant that it was not a nuisance.
Held: The neighbour’s . .
Cited – HKRUK II (CHC) Ltd v Heaney ChD 3-Sep-2010
The claimant sought a declaration that its property was free of a suggested right of light in favour of its neighbour . .
Cited – Morris-Garner and Another v One Step (Support) Ltd SC 18-Apr-2018
The Court was asked in what circumstances can damages for breach of contract be assessed by reference to the sum that the claimant could hypothetically have received in return for releasing the defendant from the obligation which he failed to . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Litigation Practice, Damages, Land

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.82468

Aramark Ltd v Graham (Disability Discrimination : Compensation): EAT 3 Jun 2013

aramark_graham

EAT Disability Discrimination : Compensation – Practice and Procedure – Costs – The Claimant was found to have been the victim of disability discrimination and harassment and to have been constructively unfairly dismissed. At a subsequent remedies hearing she was awarded compensation for injury to feelings, and past loss of earnings. She was awarded compensation for future loss on the basis of that she would not find work before her 65th birthday, in 2019; the Employment Tribunal assessed future loss using a 5.5 year multiplier. The ET also awarded her andpound;7,500 costs.
On appeal it was argued that the ET had failed to take into account the risks that the Claimant would have been made redundant if not dismissed or would not have been able to cope with the Respondent’s changed working methods and should have applied a lower multiplier.
Held: that the ET had made no error of principle; they had made findings as to those risks which were not said to be perverse. It was accepted that the ET had to look into the future; it had done so in a manner which did not disclose any error of law. There had also been no error of principle with the order for costs.

Burke QC J
[2013] UKEAT 0164 – 12 – 0306
Bailii
England and Wales

Employment, Discrimination, Damages

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.510167

Haithwaite v Thomson Snell and Passmore (A Firm): QBD 30 Mar 2009

The claimant sought damages from his former solicitors for admitted professional negligence. The court considered the loss suffered in the handling of his claim against a health authority. The solicitors received advice after issuing that the claimant was a patient and therefore required consent to issue proceedings. Having received that consent they were then advised that he was no longer a patient.
Held: The court found that he would have had a 30% chance of establishing negligence against the hospital, and calculated the losses accordingly.

Nicol J
[2009] EWHC 647 (QB), [2009] 15 EG 99, [2009] PNLR 27
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Mount v Baker Austin CA 18-Feb-1998
The Defendant solicitors had allowed the Plaintiff’s claim to be struck out for want of prosecution. The court considered how to calculate the value of the loss of the chance of pursuing the claim: ‘1. The legal burden lies on the plaintiff to prove . .
Cited – Hanif v Middleweeks (a firm) CA 19-Jul-2000
The client was the co-owner of a nightclub which had been destroyed by fire. The insurers had issued proceedings for a declaration of non-liability, on the ground (among others) that the fire had been started deliberately by Mr Hanif’s co-owner. Mr . .
Cited – Dixon v Clement Jones Solicitors (A Firm) CA 8-Jul-2004
The defendant firm had negligently allowed a claim for damages against a firm of accountants to become statute barred. The defendants said the claim was of no or little value, since the claimant would have proceeded anyway.
Held: The court had . .
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 – Sharif and Others v Garrett and Co CA 31-Jul-2001
The applicants sought damages from the defendant solicitors who had failed to prosecute properly a claim for damages. Their building was damaged by fire, but they had not been insured. The action was against the brokers. The court had awarded them . .
Cited – Hatswell v Goldbergs (a firm) CA 2002
The claimant sought damages from his solicitors where his claim for medical negligence was struck out for delay. The High Court declared his claim as of no value.
Held: The underlying claim in medical negligence was made simply impossible by a . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Professional Negligence, Damages

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.326985

Christopher Hill Ltd v Ashington Piggeries Ltd: CA 1969

The buyer suppied a food formula to a food mixer and claimed damages when the food mix injured his mink. The defendant argued that the level of damages sought exceeded that expectations of the parties when the contract was entered into.
Held: The fact that the extent of the loss occasioned by a breach was greater than anticipated by the parties when entering into the contract is not relevant when assessing whether the damages are claimable. The test for remoteness does not require the claimant to show that contract breaker ought to have contemplated as being not unlikely the actual extent of the loss that occurred. The court is entitled to look at: ‘such knowledge and information as (the contract breaker), as reasonable men, experienced in its trade, should have had and should have brought to bear in its contemplation.’
Davies LJ said: ‘the party who has suffered damage does not have to show that the contract breaker ought to have contemplated as being not unlikely, the precise detail of the damage or the precise manner of its happening. It is enough if he should have contemplated damage of that kind is not unlikely.’

Davies LJ
[1969] 3 All ER 1496
Sale of Goods Act 1893 14(1)
England and Wales
Cited by:
Appeal from – Christopher Hill Ltd v Ashington Piggeries Ltd HL 1972
Mink farmers had asked a compounder of animal foods to make up mink food to a supplied formula.
Held: There was reliance as to the suitability of the ingredients only.
Lord Diplock said: ‘Unless the Sale of Goods Act 1893 is to be allowed . .
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 – Shah and Another v HSBC Private Bank (UK) Ltd QBD 26-Jan-2009
The claimants sought damages after delays by the bank in processing transfer requests. The bank said that the delays were made pending reports of suspected criminal activity. The bank’s delay had stigmatised the claimant causing further losses. The . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Contract, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.246739

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. The vessel would not have been ready in any event.
Held: The charter would have been cancelled, and the owners would have been entitled only to nominal damages. The first issue was whether the ‘expected readiness’ clause was a condition of which the owners were in breach, entitling the charterers to terminate the charter contract. This was decided in favour of the charterers and against the owners. The second issue was whether (if the answer to the first issue was wrong) the charterers had repudiated the contract by cancelling three days before the specified deadline.
Held: Lord Denning held that they had not, but Edmund Davies and Megaw LJJ held that they had.
The court then asked as to the damage suffered by the owners, on the assumption that the charterers’ premature cancellation had been a repudiation. Lord Denning upheld the arbitrator’s finding that they had suffered no damage, saying ‘Seeing that the charterers would, beyond doubt, have cancelled, I am clearly of opinion that the shipowners suffered no loss: and would be entitled at most to nominal damages.’ Edmund-Davies LJ agreed: ‘One must look at the contract as a whole, and if it is clear that the innocent party has lost nothing, he should recover no more than nominal damages for the loss of his right to have the whole contract completed.’
Megaw LJ said: ‘In my view, where there is an anticipatory breach of contract, the breach is the repudiation once it has been accepted, and the other party is entitled to recover by way of damages the true value of the contractual rights which he has thereby lost; subject to his duty to mitigate. If the contractual rights which he has lost were capable by the terms of the contract of being rendered either less valuable or valueless in certain events, and if it can be shown that those events were, at the date of acceptance of the repudiation, predestined to happen, then in my view the damages which he can recover are not more than the true value, if any, of the rights which he has lost, having regard to those predestined events.’

Megaw LJ, Lord Denning MR, Edmund Davies LJ
[1971] 1 QB 164, [1970] EWCA Civ 4, [1970] 3 WLR 601, [1970] 2 Lloyd’s Rep 43, [1970] 3 All ER 125
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – 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 . .
Applied – Woodstock Shipping Co v Kyma Compania Naviera SA (‘The Wave’) 1981
There was a time charter for 24 months, 3 months more or less at charterers’ option. The owners repudiated the charter and the charterers accepted their repudiation on 2 August 1979.
Held: Assessing the charterers’ loss, and allowing for their . .
Cited – 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 . .
Approved (Megaw LJ) – SIB International SRL v Metallgesellschaft Corporation (‘The Noel Bay’) CA 1989
The Noel Bay was let on a charterparty to carry oil between ports in Europe, with demurrage provisions. The owners treated the charterer’s failure to nominate a port, as a repudiation. The owners found alternative employment for the ship and sought . .
Approved (Megaw LJ) – North Sea Energy Holdings Nv (Formerly Midland and Scottish Holdings Nv) v Petroleum Authority of Thailand CA 16-Dec-1998
The buyers repudiated an oil purchase agreement and the sellers accepted their repudiation. The sellers could not show that they would have been able to obtain the oil to sell.
Held: They were not entitled to substantial damages. . .
Examined, Megaw LJ discounted – B S and N Limited (BVI) v Micado Shipping Limited (Malta) (‘The Seaflower’) 19-Apr-2000
A time charterparty was dated 20 October 1997 for a period of 11 months, maximum 12 months at charterers’ option. It referred to various major oil company approvals, including that of Mobil, all on the point of expiring, and provided that if, during . .
Cited – Jet2Com Ltd v SC Compania Nationala De Transporturi Aeriene Romane Tarom Sa ComC 15-Mar-2012
The parties had contracted for the defendant to maintain certain of the claimant’s aircraft. Each now asserted breach by the other.
Held: Neither the terms of the contract nor its character made time of the essence for the payments to be made . .
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.

Contract, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.223464

Flora v Wakom (Heathrow) Ltd: CA 28 Jul 2006

The claimant was severely injured and claimed for loss of future earnings and future care. The defendant admitted liability. In the statement of case for damages, the claimant contended that, if the court made an order for periodic payments, it should disapply or modify section 2(8) and provide for the amount of such payments to vary by reference to a wage-related index rather than the retail prices index (RPI). To support that case, the claimant sought to adduce expert evidence. The defendants applied to strike out the relevant parts of the statement of case and to exclude the evidence on the grounds that use could only be made of section 2(9) in exceptional circumstances. Sir Michael Turner had refused the defendant’s applications. They now appealed.
Held: The appeal failed. Section 2(8) identified a default position. Section 2(9) allowed the court to make the orders identified therein not simply in exceptional circumstances but whenever it appeared appropriate and fair to do so.
As to the risk that, if exceptionality was not the test, the courts faced the prospect of trials at which a host of expensive witnesses would be called on each side, Brooke LJ said: ‘We are now dealing with a different statutory provision and, if the experience of the past is any useful guide, it is likely that there will be a number of trials at which the expert evidence on each side can be thoroughly tested. A group of appeals will then be brought to this court to enable it to give definitive guidance in the light of the findings of fact made by a number of trial judges. The armies of experts will then be able to strike their tents and return to the offices or academic groves from which they came.’
The Explanatory Notes accompanying an Act are admissible to illuminate the mischief at which the legislation is aimed

Brooke LJ, Sir Mark Potter Moore-Bick LJ
[2006] EWCA Civ 1103, [2007] 1 WLR 482
Bailii
Damages Act 1996 2(8) 2(9)
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – A v B Hospitals NHS Trust Admn 10-Nov-2006
The claimant baby had suffered catastrophic injuries at birth in the defendant’s hospital. Liability having been admitted, the court now considered whether damages should be paid as a lump sum or by periodical payments.
Held: ‘ the form of . .
Cited – Chief Inspector of Education, Children’s Services and Skills v The Interim Executive Board of Al-Hijrah School CA 13-Oct-2017
Single Sex Schooling failed to prepare for life
The Chief Inspector appealed from a decision that it was discriminatory under the 2010 Act to educate girls and boys in the same school but under a system providing effective complete separation of the sexes.
Held: The action was . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Personal Injury, Litigation Practice

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.243993

Arnup v MW White Ltd: CA 7 May 2008

The claimant sought damages after her husband’s death. The defendant sought to deduct from any damages payable, the payments made from its Employee Benefit Trust.
Held: The payments were to be disregarded. The payments accrued to the claimant not through her late husband’s estate but directly through the trust. The claim was made through the estate. The payments fell within section 4 of the 1976 Act as amended. This was in line with Parliament’s intention in 1982. The employer could have achieved the result he now sought by making payment expressly excluded from section 4 by being a conditional payment on account of its liabilities to the deceased’s estate.

Lord Justice Ward, Lord Justice Dyson and Lady Justice Smith
[2008] EWCA Civ 447, Times 25-Jun-2008
Bailii
Fatal Accidents Act 1976 3 4
England and Wales

Personal Injury, Damages

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.267550

Yorkshire Dale Steamship Co Ltd v Minister of War Transport: HL 1942

Treatment of Merchant as War Vessel

The House considered when a merchant vessel may be treated on the same footing as a war vessel and be deemed to be engaged on a warlike operation.
Held: This depended on the nature of the cargo and the voyage: ‘She was then in the act of proceeding in convoy from Greenock to Narvik with a cargo of petrol for use by His Majesty’s forces in the Norwegian campaign then on foot. The crucial admission was made on behalf of the respondent that at the time of stranding the vessel was engaged in a warlike operation, namely, proceeding from one war base to another war base with military stores for the use of the British forces in the field . . Under certain circumstances, a trading or merchant vessel has been held to be for purposes of the war risk clause engaged in a warlike operation. As illustrative of these circumstances, I may take those of a merchant ship carrying troops, ammunition, guns, tanks, or other military machines or equipment to a theatre of war, or away from a theatre of war . . Such a vessel may be regarded pro hac vice as serving the belligerent purposes of the country and as taking her share in hostilities against the enemy. She is therefore, it is said, to be deemed to be engaged on a warlike operation.’

Lord Wright
[1942] AC 691, [1942] 2 All ER 6
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Smith New Court Securities Ltd v Scrimgeour Vickers HL 21-Nov-1996
The defendant had made misrepresentations, inducing the claimant to enter into share transactions which he would not otherwise have entered into, and which lost money.
Held: A deceitful wrongdoer is properly liable for all actual damage . .
Cited – Fogg and Ledgard v The Secretary of State for Defence, Short Admn 13-Dec-2005
The applicants sought judicial review of a decision of the respondent not to name the wreck of the merchant ship SS STORAA as a protected site under the 1986 Act. It had been a merchant ship forming part of a convoy, and was sunk by enemy action in . .
Cited – The Walumba (Owners) v Australian Coastal Shipping Commission 1965
(High Court of Australia) Instead of rescuing the vessel, she had been despatched to recover, the Walumba tug herself came into peril, and was salved by a pilot boat.
Held: The pilot boat was to be awarded pounds 10,000 for its services. A . .
Cited – Total Transport Corporation v Arcadia Petroleum Ltd (‘the Eurus’) CA 18-Nov-1997
Arcadia chartered the Eurus, and had succeeded in their application for an award in arbitration proceedings against Total. The award had been reversed, and they now appealed against that order. The parties disputed whether the amount was an award of . .
Cited – Petroleo Brasileiro Sa v Ene Kos 1 Ltd (‘The MT Kos’) SC 2-May-2012
The MT Kos had been chartered by the appellants. The respondents failed to make payments, and notice was given to withdraw the vessel. The contract said that such a notice was without prejudice to any claim. At the time, the vessel was laden. The . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Transport, Insurance

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.191190

Hunt v Severs: HL 7 Sep 1994

The tortfeasor, a member of the claimant’s family provided her with voluntary nursing care after the injury. The equivalent cost of that care, was recoverable, but would be held on trust for the carer. The underlying rationale of English Law is to enable the voluntary carer to receive proper recompense for his or her services: ‘Thus in both England and Scotland, the law now ensures that an injured plaintiff may recover the reasonable value of gratuitous services rendered to him by way of voluntary care by a member of his family . . [T]he underlying rationale of the English law . . is to enable the voluntary carer to receive proper recompense for his or her services.’ The policy considerations which underlie the exceptions were ‘well understood’ . . ‘But I find it difficult to see what considerations of public policy can justify a requirement that the tortfeasor himself should compensate the plaintiff twice over for the self-same loss. If the loss in question is a direct pecuniary loss (eg loss of wages), Hussain’s case is clear authority that the defendant employer, as the tortfeasor who makes good the loss either voluntarily or contractually, thereby mitigates his liability in damages pro tanto.’

Lord Bridge of Harwich
Independent 05-May-1994, Times 02-May-1994, Gazette 07-Sep-1994, [1994] 2 AC 350, [1994] UKHL 4, [1994] 2 All ER 385
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Hunt v Severs CA 13-May-1993
The plaintiff was injured by the negligence of the defendant. The defendant provided gratuitous nursing care and other assistance to the plaintiff. They married each other.
Held: Where the Plaintiff was voluntarily cared for by the Tortfeasor, . .
Doubted – Donnelly v Joyce CA 18-May-1973
A six year old injured his leg in a road accident, and needed daily attention. His mother gave up her job to look after him. The claim for damages on behalf of he boy included the mother’s loss of earnings. This was objected to on the grounds that . .
Cited – Parry v Cleaver HL 5-Feb-1969
PI Damages not Reduced for Own Pension
The plaintiff policeman was disabled by the negligence of the defendant and received a disablement pension. Part had been contributed by himself and part by his employer.
Held: The plaintiff’s appeal succeeded. Damages for personal injury were . .

Cited by:
Appealed to – Hunt v Severs CA 13-May-1993
The plaintiff was injured by the negligence of the defendant. The defendant provided gratuitous nursing care and other assistance to the plaintiff. They married each other.
Held: Where the Plaintiff was voluntarily cared for by the Tortfeasor, . .
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 . .
Cited – Pirelli General Plc and others v Gaca CA 26-Mar-2004
The claimant was awarded damages from his employers, who claimed that the benefits received by the claimant from an insurance policy to which the defendants had contributed should be set off against the claim.
Held: McCamley was no longer good . .
Cited – Dimond v Lovell HL 12-May-2000
A claimant sought as part of her damages for the cost of hiring a care whilst her own was off the road after an accident caused by the defendant. She agreed with a hire company to hire a car, but payment was delayed until the claim was settled.
Cited – Dobson and others v Thames Water Utilities Ltd and Another CA 29-Jan-2009
The claimants complained of odours and mosquitoes affecting their properties from the activities of the defendants in the conduct of their adjoining Sewage Treatment plant. The issue was as to the rights of non title holders to damages in nuisance . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Personal Injury, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.81534

HM Land Registry v McGlue: EAT 6 Feb 2013

EAT Sex Discrimination – Inferring discrimination – Injury to feelings – Other losses
Woman on a career break (from which she could return at any time on short notice) was indirectly discriminated against when her employer, which was in need of reductions in headcount and cost, offered generous early retirement schemes to all its staff but then decided without any notice to eliminate from consideration those on a career break who were not due to return before a set date, and then compounded this by telling her she was still be considered for the scheme when she was not, and by wrongly rejecting her grievance. At an appeal in respect of remedy, an award of andpound;12,000 for injury to feelings was upheld (the Claimant though a valued and long serving employee was unhappy at work and had felt bullied), but held there was no sufficient basis for one of andpound;5000 in respect of aggravated damages. The Tribunal was held entitled to award as damages the full payment she would have received if accepted for the scheme, since the evidence was that she would have been if she had not been excluded from consideration by the discriminatory act.

Langstaff P J
[2013] UKEAT 0435 – 11 – 0602
Bailii
England and Wales

Employment, Discrimination, Damages

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.472838

Radcliffe v Eden: 1776

Police Liabie for Damage to Furniture in Riot

The owners of furniture destroyed by rioters who entered a house and damaged it recovered compensation, even though the 1714 Act did not expressly mention furniture.
Lord Mansfield said: ‘To encourage people to resist persons thus riotously assembled, and to reward those, who, by doing their duty, shall have incurred their resentment, the same law has made a further provision, that as the trespassers are to be hanged, the country shall pay the damages; and this, by way of inducement to the inhabitants to be active in suppressing such riots, which it is their duty to do; and which being made their interest too, they are more likely to execute. This is the great principle of the law, that the inhabitants shall be in the nature of sureties for one another. It is a very ancient principle; as old as the decennaries by Alfred . .’

Lord Mansfield
(1776) 2 Cowp 486
Riot Act 1714
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Yarl’s Wood Immigration Ltd and Others v Bedfordshire Police Authority CA 23-Oct-2009
The claimant sought to recover the costs of damage to their centre following a riot, saying that under the 1886 Act, they were liable. It appealed against a ruling that they were unable to claim as a public authority, saying that the 1886 Act was . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Police, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.377515

Pickett v British Rail Engineering: HL 2 Nov 1978

Lost Earnings claim Continues after Death

The claimant, suffering from mesothelioma, had claimed against his employers and won, but his claim for loss of earnings consequent upon his anticipated premature death was not allowed. He began an appeal, but then died. His personal representatives appealed.
Held: The House assumed that, because the claimant had brought a successful claim for his personal injury, a claim by his dependants under the Fatal Accidents Act was precluded, although Lord Salmon emphasised that he expressed no concluded opinion about the correctness of that assumption. Damages could be recovered for loss of earnings in the claimant’s lost years. Only in this way could provision be made for the loss to be suffered by the dependants. Referring to Skelton: ‘The judgments, further, bring out an important ingredient, which I would accept, namely that the amount to be recovered in respect of the earnings in the ‘lost’ years should be that amount after deduction of an estimated sum to represent the victim’s probable living expenses during those years.
There is the additional merit of bringing awards under this head into line with what could be recovered under the Fatal Accidents Acts.’

Lord Wilberforce, Lord Salmon, and Lord Edmund-Davies
[1980] AC 136, [1978] UKHL 4
Bailii
Fatal Accidents Act 1976 1(1)
England and Wales
Citing:
Overruled – Oliver v Ashman CA 1961
The rule that loss of earnings, in the years lost to an injured plaintiff whose life expectancy had been shortened, were not recoverable, was still good law.
Pearce LJ summarised the authorities: ‘The Law Reform Miscellaneous Provisions Act . .
Followed – Skelton v Collins 7-Mar-1966
(High Court of Australia) Damages – Personal Injuries – Loss of earning capacity – Loss of expectation of life – Loss of amenities during reduced life span – Pain and suffering – Plaintiff rendered permanently unconscious by injuries – Basis of . .
Cited – Benham v Gambling HL 1941
The injured person was a child of two and a half. He was unconscious from the moment of the accident until his death, which occurred later on the same day. He had acquired at the time of injury a cause of action for loss of expectation of life.
Cited – Admiralty Commissioners v Steamship Amerika (Owners), The Amerika PC 13-Aug-1917
The Admiralty sought to recover as an item of loss the pensions payable to the widows of sailors killed in an accident to a submarine: . .
Cited – Rose v Ford HL 1937
Damages might be recovered for a loss of expectation of life. A claim for loss of expectation of life survived under the Act of 1934, and was not a claim for damages based on the death of a person and so barred at common law.
Lord Wright . .
Cited – Brunner v Greenslade ChD 1971
Megarry J discussed the ratio decidendi of and approving dicta in Lawrence.
‘The substance of the views of Simonds J was that where there is a head scheme, any sub-purchasers are bound inter se by the covenants of that head scheme even though . .
Cited – Roach v Yates CA 1937
The plaintiff had been gravely injured. His wife and sister-in-law had nursed him and gave up their employment for that purpose.
Held: The plaintiff could recover their lost wages, albeit there was no suggestion of any agreement between the . .
Cited – Chaplin v Hicks CA 1911
A woman who was wrongly deprived of the chance of being one of the winners in a beauty competition was awarded damages for loss of a chance. The court did not attempt to decide on balance of probability the hypothetical past event of what would have . .
Cited – Read v Great Eastern Railway Company QBD 25-Jun-1868
A railway passenger was injured; he sued and was awarded damages. He died later from injury on the accident.
Held: The widow could not bring an action for loss of dependency under section 1 of the 1846 Act. The cause of action was the . .
Cited – Phillips v London and South Western Railway
Co CA 1879
In an action against the railway company for personal injury to a passenger, a physician, making pounds 5,000 a year, and where is an increasing practice, the jury in assessing the damages to their consideration, besides the pain and suffering of . .
Cited – Williams v Mersey Docks and Harbour Board CA 1905
The deceased suffered an injury in December 1902 which would have entitled him to institute proceedings against the harbour board within the special statutory period of six months pursuant to the 1893 Act. No such action was brought by the deceased, . .
Cited – Murray v Shuter CA 1972
The plaintiff had been badly injured and was not expected to live long. When his claim for damages was almost ready for trial, his lawyers requested an adjournment. It was not possible for a live plaintiff to claim damages for his ‘lost years’. They . .
Cited – Harris v Brights Asphalt Contractors Ltd QBD 1953
The plaintiff was not to be prevented from recovering the costs of private medical treatment.
It was argued and decided that (a) damages for the loss of earnings for the ‘lost years’ is nil, and (b) ‘the only relevance of earnings which would . .
Cited – Pope v D Murphy and Son Ltd QBD 1961
Both the injured plaintiff’s earning capacity and his expectation of life had been diminished and in assessing damages for the diminution of his earning capacity his Lordship had regard to the plaintiff’s pre-accident expectation of life.
Cited – Reid v Lanarkshire Traction Co SCS 1934
(Inner House) The shortening of life was accepted as a head of damage: ‘while the doctrine of an award in respect of the shortening of life may have originated in the theory of mental disquiet about the prospect or the possibility of death . . . . .
Cited – Wise v Kaye CA 1-Dec-1961
. .
Cited – Shephard v H West and Son Ltd HL 27-May-1963
The House looked at how personal injury damages shoud be set in cases of severe injury.
Lord Pearce said: ‘[i]f a plaintiff has lost a leg, the court approaches the matter on the basis that he has suffered a serious physical deprivation no . .
Cited – Jefford v Gee CA 4-Mar-1970
The courts of Scotland followed the civil law in the award of interest on damages. The court gave examples of the way in which they apply the ex mora rule when calculating the interest payable in a judgment. If money was wrongfully withheld, then . .
Cited – McCann v Sheppard CA 1973
The injured plaintiff succeeded in his action for damages for personal injury. The defendants appealed the quantum of damage but before the appeal was heard the plaintiff died. The court was now asked to reduce the award because of the death.
Cited – Cookson v Knowles CA 1977
Lord Denning MR said: ‘In Jefford v Gee . . we said that, in personal injury cases, when a lump sum is awarded for pain and suffering and loss of amenities, interest should run ‘ from the date of service of the ‘writ to the date of trial’. At that . .
Cited – Livingstone v Rawyards Coal Co HL 13-Feb-1880
Damages or removal of coal under land
User damages were awarded for the unauthorised removal of coal from beneath the appellant’s land, even though the site was too small for the appellant to have mined the coal himself. The appellant was also awarded damages for the damage done to the . .
Cited – Davies v Powell Duffryn Associated Collieries Limited HL 1941
Damages under the Fatal Accidents Acts are calculated having regard to ‘a balance of gains and losses for the injury sustained by the death.
An appellate court should be slow to interfere with a judge’s assessment of damages. Lord Wright . .

Cited by:
Cited – Independent Assessor v O’Brien, Hickey, Hickey CA 29-Jul-2004
The claimants had been imprisoned for many years before their convictions were quashed. They claimed compensation under the Act. The assessor said that there should be deducted from the award the living expenses they would have incurred if they had . .
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 . .
Applied – Gammell v Wilson; Furness v Massey HL 1982
In each case, the deceased, died as a result of the defendants’ negligence. The parents claimed damages for themselves as dependants under the 1976 Act, and for the estate under the 1934 Act. The claims under the 1976 Act were held to have been . .
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 . .
Cited – Reader and others v Molesworths Bright Clegg Solicitors CA 2-Mar-2007
The claimants were children of the victim of a road traffic accident. The solicitors were conducting a claim on his behalf for damages, but when he died, they negligently discontinued the action.
Held: The claimants’ action as dependants of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Personal Injury

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.190060

Bain v Fothergill: HL 1874

The defendants intended to sell to the plaintiffs their leasehold interests in mining royalties, but were under a covenant not to sell without the consent of the lessors. A condition of the sale provided for ‘ the usual covenant for our protection as standing between you and our lessors’. A deposit was paid, but the lessors refused consent. The plaintiffs sought return of their deposit, their costs and expenses of investigating title, and for loss of bargain.
Held: The case fell within Flureau -v- Thornhill, and damages were limited to the recovery of the deposit and expenses of investigating title. ‘It is recognised on all hands that the purchaser is not to be held entitled to recover any loss on the bargain he may have made, if in effect it should turn out that the vendor is incapable of completing his contract in consequence of his defective title.

Hatherley L
(1874) LR 7 HL 158, 43 LJ Ex 243, 31 LT 387, 39 JP 228, 23 WR 261
England and Wales
Citing:
Approved – Flureau v Thornhill 1746
A person who contracts to purchase land, but where the title is, without collusion, defective cannot claim for his loss of bargain. ‘These contracts are merely upon condition, frequently expressed, but always implied, that the vendor has good title. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Contract, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.183266

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 prisoner also wrongly accused of the same crime, in the percentage deduction made for their own criminal records.
Held: ‘The award of compensation under section 133 does not prevent an applicant pursuing any civil claim which he may have as a result of his wrongful conviction and punishment (although double recovery will be prevented), but nor does the right to compensation in any way depend on the existence or proof of any delictual wrong recognised by the law. Wrongful conviction and punishment may and often are the result of delinquency on the part of public officials or others, but this is not necessarily so. The Secretary of State makes payment out of public funds to victims of miscarriages of justice not because he or his officials are or are treated as being wrongdoers, but because such victims are recognised as having suffered what may (as here) be a great injury at the hands of the state and it is accepted as just that the state, representing the public at large, should make fair recompense. ‘
‘It is in my opinion inapt and understandably offensive to the appellants to regard or treat their imprisonment as a benefit conferred on them by the state. . . But recognition of that principle does not . . . resolve the issue in this appeal. The assessor’s task, in relation to the appellants’ loss of earnings claim, was to assess what they had really lost. That, and that only, was the loss for which they were to be compensated. The assessment has necessarily to be hypothetical, but must be as realistic as possible.’
As to the disparity between the treatment of the defendants, the differences in their records could not be ignored: ‘in any assessment of the non-pecuniary loss suffered by any wrongly-imprisoned claimant: it is of the highest relevance that a claimant would have been in prison in any event or had a very bad criminal reputation independently of the offence of which he was unjustly convicted. ‘
Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, dissenting, said: ‘Section 5 is designed to deal with an injured person’s maintenance while necessarily living in a caring institution for the purposes of treatment. I am by no means satisfied that Parliament would ever have envisaged that it would be extended by analogy to cover a prisoner’s maintenance while unjustifiably detained in a prison for the purposes of punishment. Indeed, at this point the assessor’s approach meets what I consider to be an insuperable objection. In the situation envisaged by Parliament, and indeed in all the situations where the courts have allowed a deduction for basic living costs, by the time the supposed saving occurs the defendant has already injured, but is no longer injuring, the claimant. The wrong is over and done with, even though its effects remain. Parliament provides that any savings which then accrue to the injured person, while he is being maintained at public expense in an institution providing treatment to remove or palliate those effects, are to be set off against any loss of earnings. By contrast, in the appellants’ situation the wrong was not over and done with when they were being maintained at public expense and the supposed savings accrued to them. On the contrary, their enforced but unjustified maintenance in prison at public expense for years on end is the very worst part of the injury which has been done to them and for which they are entitled to compensation. The actual infliction of the continuing wrong and the supposed saving are inextricably linked, just as they would be in the case of a prolonged kidnapping. ‘
Lord Bingham of Cornhill said: ‘It is generally desirable that decision-makers, whether administrative or judicial, should act in a broadly consistent manner. If they do, reasonable hopes will not be disappointed. But the assessor’s task in this case was to assess fair compensation for each of the appellants. He was not entitled to award more or less than, in his considered judgment, they deserved. He was not bound, and in my opinion was not entitled, to follow a previous decision which he considered erroneous and which would yield what he judged to be an excessive award.’

Lord Bingham of Cornhill, Lord Scott of Foscote, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, Lord Carswell, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood
[2007] UKHL 10, [2007] 2 All ER 833, [2007] 2 WLR 544
Bailii
Criminal Justice Act 1988 4 4A 133, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights 14(6), Administration of Justice Act 1982 5
England and Wales
Citing:
At first instance – Regina (on the Application of O’Brien, Hickey, Hickey) v Independent Assessor QBD 16-Apr-2003
The claimants were to be awarded damages for having been wrongly imprisoned for many years. The respondent was to calculate the award. They complained that he had refused to particularise the award to identify and itemise non-pecuniary loss.
Appeal from – Independent Assessor v O’Brien, Hickey, Hickey CA 29-Jul-2004
The claimants had been imprisoned for many years before their convictions were quashed. They claimed compensation under the Act. The assessor said that there should be deducted from the award the living expenses they would have incurred if they had . .
Cited – In re McFarland HL 29-Apr-2004
The claimant was convicted, imprisoned, and then his conviction was overturned. He sought compensation. He had pleaded guilty after being told by counsel to expect an adverse direction from the magistrate, following a meeting in private between . .
Cited – Mullen, Regina (on the Application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department HL 29-Apr-2004
The claimant had been imprisoned, but his conviction was later overturned. He had been a victim of a gross abuse of executive power. The British authorities had acted in breach of international law and had been guilty of ‘a blatant and extremely . .
Cited – Shearman v Folland CA 1950
The injured plaintiff had lived before the accident in hotels to which she paid seven guineas a week for board and lodging. After the accident she spent just over a year in nursing homes at a cost of twelve guineas a week exclusive of medical . .
Cited – British Transport Commission v Gourley HL 1955
It is a universal rule that the plaintiff cannot recover more than he has lost and that realities must be considered rather than technicalities. The damages to be awarded for personal injury including loss of earnings should reflect the fact that . .
Cited – Parry v Cleaver HL 5-Feb-1969
PI Damages not Reduced for Own Pension
The plaintiff policeman was disabled by the negligence of the defendant and received a disablement pension. Part had been contributed by himself and part by his employer.
Held: The plaintiff’s appeal succeeded. Damages for personal injury were . .
Cited – Meah v McCreamer (No 1) QBD 1985
The claimant had suffered serious brain damage as a result of the defendant’s negligence, resulting in a personality change which caused him to commit offences for which he was imprisoned. He sought damages for that imprisonment.
Held: Woolf J . .
Cited – Daish v Wauton CA 1972
The plaintiff, a young child, was seriously injured. In calculating his loss of future earnings, the judge at first instance had made a substantial reduction to reflect the cost of maintaining himself which the child would have incurred if uninjured . .
Cited – Pickett v British Rail Engineering HL 2-Nov-1978
Lost Earnings claim Continues after Death
The claimant, suffering from mesothelioma, had claimed against his employers and won, but his claim for loss of earnings consequent upon his anticipated premature death was not allowed. He began an appeal, but then died. His personal representatives . .
Cited – Lim Poh Choo v Camden and Islington Area Health Authority HL 21-Jun-1979
The plaintiff was catastrophically injured. Her life expectation was not affected, but she would never be able to work at her expected profession as a doctor, and was entitled to recover for loss of earnings. The defendant said that there was in . .
Cited – Lim Poh Choo v Camden and Islington Area Health Authority HL 21-Jun-1979
The plaintiff was catastrophically injured. Her life expectation was not affected, but she would never be able to work at her expected profession as a doctor, and was entitled to recover for loss of earnings. The defendant said that there was in . .
Cited – Dews v National Coal Board HL 1988
The plaintiff miner sought damages for an injury suffered at work.
Held: An employee who had been injured at work could not recover unpaid pension contributions, which had no effect on his pension entitlement, as part of his loss of pay while . .
Cited – Hussain v New Taplow Paper Mills Ltd HL 1988
The plaintiff was injured in an accident at work. His employer was partly responsible. For 13 weeks he received full sick pay in accordance with his contract. He then received half his pre-accident earnings under the permanent health insurance . .
Cited – Hodgson v Trapp HL 10-Nov-1988
The question was whether the attendance and mobility allowances which were payable to the plaintiff pursuant to statute should be deducted from damages she had received for personal injury.
Held: They should be. Damages for negligence are . .
Cited – Toneguzzo-Norvell v Burnaby Hospital 27-Jan-1994
(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 . .
Cited – Associated Provincial Picture Houses Ltd v Wednesbury Corporation CA 10-Nov-1947
Administrative Discretion to be Used Reasonably
The applicant challenged the manner of decision making as to the conditions which had been attached to its licence to open the cinema on Sundays. It had not been allowed to admit children under 15 years of age. The statute provided no appeal . .
Cited – Regina v Tate CACD 2006
The court considered an appeal against sentence based on the disparity between the treatment of the defendants: ‘The fact that the co-defendant Sheppard appears to have been extremely fortunate is not in our judgment a good reason for imposing a . .
Cited – Regina v Fawcett CACD 1983
The test which to be applied when considering questions of disparity in sentencing between defendants is whether ‘right-thinking members of the public, with full knowledge of all the relevant facts and circumstances, learning of this sentence, . .
Cited – Attorney-General v Wilts United Dairies Ltd CA 1921
The Food Controller had been given power under the Defence of the Realm Acts to regulate milk sales. In granting the dairy a licence to buy milk in Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset, the Food Controller required the Dairy to pay 2d. per imperial . .
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 – Shearman v Folland CA 1950
The injured plaintiff had lived before the accident in hotels to which she paid seven guineas a week for board and lodging. After the accident she spent just over a year in nursing homes at a cost of twelve guineas a week exclusive of medical . .
Cited – Watkins v Olafson 1989
(Supreme Court of Canada) The plaintiff sought damages for his injury. He was cared for by the state between the accident and the trial and so had no claim for the cost of care during that period. The Appeal Court (British Columbia) had held that in . .
Cited – Andrews v Grand and Toy Alberta Ltd 1978
(Supreme Court of Canada) The injured plaintiff sought damages for future loss of earnings and for the cost of future care.
Held: Dickson J said: ‘It is clear that a plaintiff cannot recover for the expense of providing for basic necessities . .
Cited – Cooper v Firth Brown Ltd 1963
When calculating losses of earnings, the court must allow for National Insurance contributions which would have had to have been paid by the plaintiff. . .
Cited – Regina v Large CACD 1981
The court considered disparities between sentencing of different defendants in the same case: ‘If there be honour among thieves and armed robbers, let him who has been properly and severely sentenced rejoice in the good fortune of his companion who . .
Cited – Regina v Delaney 1994
The court should be very slow to impose what it regards as anything other than the right sentence simply because it or another court has imposed a ‘wrong’ sentence on a co-defendant: ‘The principle served by this approach is that where right . .
Leave to appeal to CA – Hickey and others v Independent Assessor CA 25-Feb-2004
Application for leave to appeal on measure of award of compensation for long time spent in prison as a result of miscarriage of justice. . .

Cited by:
Cited – Siddall, Regina (on the Application of) v Secretary of State for Justice Admn 16-Mar-2009
The claimant had been imprisoned then released after his conviction for sexual assaults. He appealed against rejection of his claim for compensation. The criterion for compensation was demonstrating that something had ‘gone seriously wrong in the . .
Cited – London Borough of Lewisham and Others), Regina (on The Application of) v Assessment and Qualifications Alliance and Others Admn 13-Feb-2013
Judicial review was sought of the changes to the marking systems for GCSE English in 2012.
Held: The claim failed. Though properly brought, the failure was in the underlying structue of the qualification, and not in the respondent’s attempts . .
Cited – Gallaher Group Ltd and Others, Regina (on The Application of) v The Competition and Markets Authority SC 16-May-2018
No Administrative Duty of Equal Treatment
Extent and consequences of duties of ‘equal treatment’ or ‘fairness’, said to have been owed by the Office of Fair Trading to those subject to investigation under the Competition Act 1998. The respondent had entered negotiations with several parties . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Administrative, Damages, Prisons

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.250028

Transfield Shipping Inc v Mercator Shipping Inc (The Achilleas): HL 9 Jul 2008

The parties contracted to charter the Achileas. The charterer gave notice to terminate the hire, and the owner found a new charterer. Until the termination the charterers sub-chartered. That charter was not completed, delaying the ship for the owners’ new charter which was cancelled. In the meantime hire rates had fallen. The owners claimed damages. The House was asked ‘is the rule that a party may recover losses which were foreseeable (‘not unlikely’) an external rule of law, imposed upon the parties to every contract in default of express provision to the contrary, or is it a prima facie assumption about what the parties may be taken to have intended, no doubt applicable in the great majority of cases but capable of rebuttal in cases in which the context, surrounding circumstances or general understanding in the relevant market shows that a party would not reasonably have been regarded as assuming responsibility for such losses? ‘
Held: The charters were not liable for the owners losses in the absence of a clause making them so. The general understanding in the shipping industry was that damages were not recoverable for loss of a profitable following fixture.

Lord Hoffmann, Lord Hope of Craighead, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, Lord Walker of Gestingthorpe, Baroness Hale of Richmond
[2008] UKHL 48, Times 10-Jul-2008
Bailii, HL
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Hadley v Baxendale Exc 23-Feb-1854
Contract Damages; What follows the Breach Naturaly
The plaintiffs had sent a part of their milling machinery for repair. The defendants contracted to carry it, but delayed in breach of contract. The plaintiffs claimed damages for the earnings lost through the delay. The defendants appealed, saying . .
At first instance – 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 . .
Appeal from – Transfield Shipping Inc of Panama v Mercator Shipping Inc of Monrovia (the ‘Achilleas’) CA 6-Sep-2007
The court considered damages for late redelivery of a time-chartered vessel. . .
Cited – Torvald Klaveness A/S v Arni Maritime Corporation (The Gregos) HL 28-Oct-1994
In a continuing charter when it was clear that the time of the charter will be exceeded, the contract allows an action for an anticipatory breach. Any new redelivery order was to be obtained after after it first became impossible to meet the charter . .
Cited – Czarnikow (C ) Ltd v Koufos; The Heron II HL 17-Oct-1967
The vessel had arrived late at Basrah in breach of the terms of the charterparty. The House was asked as to the measure of damages. The charterers had intended to sell the cargo of sugar promptly upon arrival, and now claimed for the fall in the . .
Cited – Alma Shipping Corpn of Monrovia v Mantovani (The Dione) CA 1974
Lord Denning MR said that, in relation to a charterparty for a stated period such as ‘three months’ or ‘six months’, without any express margin or allowance: ‘the court will imply a reasonable margin or allowance. The reason is because it is not . .
Cited – Liverpool City Council v Irwin HL 31-Mar-1976
The House found it to be an implied term of a tenancy agreement that the lessor was to be responsible for repairing and lighting the common parts of the building of which the premises formed part. In analysing the different types of contract case in . .
Cited – Hyundai Merchant Marine Co Ltd v Gesuri Chartering Co Ltd (The Peonia) CA 1991
If a legitimate last voyage under a charterparty nevertheless proves in the event to exceed the implied margin, the charterer will be bound to pay any increase in the market rate above the charter rate during the period of the excess. . .
Cited – Robinson v Harman 18-Jan-1848
Damages for breach of contract should compensate the victim of the breach for the loss of his contractual bargain. Baron Parke said: ‘The next question is: What damages is the plaintiff entitled to recover? The rule of the common law is, that where . .
Cited – Arta Shipping Co Ltd v Thai Europe Tapioca Service Ltd (The Johnny) 1977
When claiming damages for the loss of a charter, the market rate for a substitute charter ‘must be ascertained by postulating a charter-party which corresponds as closely as possible with the actual charter-party.’ . .
Cited – Satef-Huttenes Albertus SpA v Paloma Tercera Shipping Co SA (The Pegase) 1981
Robert Goff J set out the limits of the kinds of losses for which a reasonable person would consider himself responsible: ‘The test appears to be: have the facts in question come to the defendant’s knowledge in such circumstances that a reasonable . .
Cited – Mulvenna v Royal Bank of Scotland Plc CA 25-Jul-2003
The court considered an an application to strike out a claim for damages for the loss of profits which the claimant said he would have made if the bank had complied with its agreement to provide him with funds for a property development.
Held: . .
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 . .
Cited – Monarch Steamship Co Ltd v Karlshamns Oljefabriker A/B HL 1949
Damages were sought for breach of contract.
Held: After reviewing the authorities on remoteness of damage, the court reaffirmed the broad general rule that a party injured by the other’s breach of contract is entitled to such money . .
Cited – Transworld Oil Ltd v North Bay Shipping Corpn (The Rio Claro) 1987
Staughton J said that for a loss arising from a breach of contract to be recoverable: ‘It must be such as the contract breaker should reasonably have contemplated as not unlikely to result. To that direction must be added the point that the precise . .
Cited – Victoria Laundry (Windsor) Ltd v Newman Industries CA 1949
The plaintiffs claimed for loss of the profits from their laundry business because of late delivery of a boiler.
Held: The Court did not regard ‘loss of profits from the laundry business’ as a single type of loss. They distinguished losses . .
Cited – Banco de Portugal v Waterlow and Sons Ltd HL 28-Apr-1932
Lord Macmillan said: ‘Where the sufferer from a breach of contract finds himself in consequence of that breach placed in position of embarrassment the measures which he may be driven to adopt in order to extricate himself ought not to be weighed in . .
Cited – The ‘Pegase’ 1981
The court considered the measure of damages for breach of contract in the light of the cases in the Heron II and Victoria Laundry: ‘the principle in Hadley v Baxendale is now no longer stated in terms of two rules, but rather in terms of a single . .
Cited – Torvald Klaveness A/S v Arni Maritime Corporation (The Gregos) ChD 1991
The ship was returned late from a charter. The court was asked whether or not the legitimacy of the last voyage fell to be established at the date when the order was given or at the time when the last voyage began.
Held: It was the second: . .
Cited – Torvald Klaveness A/S v Arni Maritime Corporation (The Gregos) CA 4-Jun-1993
The ship was returned by the charterer after the expiry of the time charter. The court was asked as to when the validity of the last order was to be tested.
Held: The legitimacy of the charterer’s final order was to be tested at the date it . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Contract, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.270659

Dobson and Dobson v North Tyneside Health Authority and Newcastle Health Authority: CA 26 Jun 1996

A post mortem had been carried out by the defendants. The claimants, her grandmother and child sought damages after it was discovered that not all body parts had been returned for burial, some being retained instead for medical research. They now appealed an order striking out their claim on the baiss that it disclosed no reasonable cause of damage.
Held: The appeal failed. Next of kin have no right to regain possession of a deceased’s body part which had been removed for autopsy. There was no ownership of a body after death. The autopsy process did not transform a body part into an object capable of ownership. The claim was pleaded in conversion, bailment and wrongful interference with the brain, and the plaintiffs could not establish that they had the right to possession at the time the brain was disposed of. The plaintiff’s desire to discover exactly what had happened to all the body parts was not a sufficient reason for litigation.
Where there is no executor the duty to take possession of and dispose of the body of the deceased falls upon the administrators of the estate, but they may not be able to obtain an injunction for delivery of the body before the grant of letters of administration

Peter Gibson LJ, Butler-Sloss LJ, Peter Gibson LJ
Times 15-Jul-1996, Gazette 29-Aug-1996, [1997] 1 WLR 596, [1996] EWCA Civ 1301, (1997) 33 BMLR 146, [1997] 1 FLR 598, [1997] 8 Med LR 357, [1996] 4 All ER 474, [1997] Fam Law 326, [1997] 2 FCR 651
Bailii
Coroners Rules 1984 (1984 No 552)
England and Wales
Citing:
Considered – Doodeward v Spence 1908
(High Court of Australia) The police seized from an exhibitor the body of a two headed still born baby which had been preserved in a bottle.
Held: An order was made for its return: ‘If, then, there can, under some circumstances, be a continued . .
Cited – Armory v Delamirie KBD 1722
A jeweller to whom a chimney sweep had taken a jewel he had found, took the jewel out of the socket and refused to return it. The chimney sweep sued him in trover. On the measure of damages, the court ruled ‘unless the defendant did produce the . .
Cited – Norwich Pharmacal Co and others v Customs and Excise Commissioners HL 26-Jun-1973
Innocent third Party May still have duty to assist
The plaintiffs sought discovery from the defendants of documents received by them innocently in the exercise of their statutory functions. They sought to identify people who had been importing drugs unlawfully manufactured in breach of their . .
Cited – Williams v Williams 1882
By codicil to his will the deceased directed that his executors should give his body to Miss Williams; and by letter he requested her to cremate his body under a pile of wood, to place the ashes into a specified Wedgwood vase and to claim her . .
Cited – Clarke v London General Omnibus Co Ltd 1906
The parent of an infant child who dies where the parent has the means to do so, has a responsibility to arrange and pay for the burial. . .
Cited – Sharp v Lush 1879
An executor appointed by will is entitled to obtain possession of the body for its proper disposal. . .
Cited – Rees v Hughes 1946
The need to arrange for funerals is a common law obligation ‘in the nature of a public duty’. . .

Cited by:
Cited – AB and others v Leeds Teaching Hospital NHS Trust, Cardiff and Vale NHS Trust QBD 26-Mar-2004
Representative claims were made against the respondents, hospitals, pathologists etc with regard to the removal of organs from deceased children without the informed consent of the parents. They claimed under the tort of wrongful interference.
Cited – Yearworth and others v North Bristol NHS Trust CA 4-Feb-2009
The defendant hospital had custody of sperm samples given by the claimants in the course of fertility treatment. The samples were effectively destroyed when the fridge malfunctioned. Each claimant was undergoing chemotherapy which would prevent them . .
Cited – Buchanan v Milton FD 27-May-1999
The applicant sought to displace, solely for burial purposes, as personal representative a person who was otherwise entitled to a grant.
Held: Hale J said: ‘There is no right of ownership in a dead body. However, there is a duty at common law . .
Cited – Anstey v Mundle and Another ChD 25-Feb-2016
The deceased had been born in Jamaica, but had lived in the UK for many years. The parties, before a grant in the estate of the deceased, disputed whether he should be buried in England or returned to Jamaica for burial.
Held: Having . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Wills and Probate, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.80077

Hussey v Eels: CA 1990

Profits made on development were not deductible

The purchasers of a property for a price of 53,250 pounds had relied on a negligent misrepresentation that the property had not been the subject of subsidence. In fact it had. The cost of the required works was 17,000 pounds, which they could not afford. Two and a half years later, they obtained planning permission to knock the property down and build two new properties: they then sold all the land, with the benefit of the planning permission, to developers for 78,500 pounds and moved out.
Held: They had been under no duty to mitigate by obtaining planning permission, selling and moving. Accordingly the ‘profits’ made on the resale accrued to their own benefit and were not, as a matter of reality, caused by the original negligence. It was not ‘part of a continuous transaction of which the purchase of land and bungalow was the inception’. The Court of Appeal reversed the first instance decision that the profit fell to be deducted from the damages. Although there was a logical distinction between treating benefits as the product of mitigation and treating them as part of the measure of loss, each approach raises the same issues of fact and leads to the same conclusion.
While there was in one sense a causal link between the inducement of the purchase by misrepresentation and the sale of the property two and a half years later, the reality of the situation was that the plaintiffs bought the house to live in, and in fact did live in it for a substantial period. It was only years later that the possibility of selling the land and moving elsewhere was explored and came to fruition, which meant that the transaction was not part of a continuous transaction of which the purchase was the inception.

Mustill LJ
[1990] 2 QB 227, [1990] 1 All ER 449, [1990] 2 WLR 234
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Bacciottini and Another v Gotelee and Goldsmith (A Firm) CA 18-Mar-2016
A property subject to a planning condition was purchased by the appellant under the advice of the respondent, who failed to notify him of the existence of a planning condition. The judge had awarded the claimant pounds 250 being the cost of the . .
Cited – Gard Marine and Energy Ltd and Another v China National Chartering Company Ltd and Another SC 10-May-2017
The dispute followed the grounding of a tanker the Ocean Victory. The ship was working outside of a safe port requirement in the charterparty agreement. The contract required the purchase of insurance against maritime war and protection and . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.561223

Stanton v Collinson: CA 24 Feb 2010

The defendant driver appealed against a refusal to reduce the claimant’s damages for contributory negligence. The claimant sat in the front seat and was severely injured in the accident, but had not been wearing a seat belt.
Held: ‘there is a powerful public interest in there being no [prolonged] enquiry into fine degrees of contributory negligence, so that the vast majority of cases can be settled according to a well-understood formula and those few which entail trial do not mushroom out of control. Froom v Butcher so states, and is binding.’

Ward, Hallett, Hughes LJJ
[2010] EWCA Civ 81, [2010] RTR 284, [2010] CP Rep 27
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Froom v Butcher CA 21-Jul-1975
The court asked what reduction if any should be made to a plaintiff’s damages where injuries were caused not only by the defendant’s negligent driving but also by the failure of the plaintiff to wear a seat belt. It had been submitted that, since . .

Cited by:
Cited – Williams v Williams (The Estate of) CA 30-Apr-2013
A child aged three had been injured as a passenger in her mother’s car when it was hit by another negligently driven vehicle. The mother appealed against a finding that she was 25% contributorily negligent in that the child seat used had been . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Personal Injury, Damages, Negligence, Road Traffic

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.401795

Paff v Speed: 6 Apr 1961

(High Court of Australia) ‘The first consideration is what is the nature of the loss or damage which the plaintiff says he has suffered.’
Damages – Personal injuries – Matters to be considered in reduction of damages – Plaintiff policeman at time of injury – Subsequent compulsory retirement from Police Force – Pension awarded – Evidence adduced by plaintiff of pension rights had he continued in Police Force – Evidence of award of pension admissible – Excessiveness of damages – Consideration of present value of pension – Police Regulation Act, 1899

Dixon C.J.(1), McTiernan(2), Fullagar(3), Menzies(4) and Windeyer(5) JJ.
(1961) 105 CLR 549, [1961] HCA 14, [1961] ALR 614, 35 ALJR 17
Austlii
Australia
Cited by:
Cited – Cantwell v Criminal Injuries Compensation Board HL 5-Jul-2001
When calculating the losses suffered by a victim of crime, the allowance to be made for losses to a retirement pension through having to retire early should have set off against them, the benefits received by way of payments for his ill-health, . .
Cited – Longden v British Coal Corporation HL 13-Mar-1997
The plaintiff was injured whilst at work in one of the defendant’s collieries. The House considered the deductibility from damages awarded for personal injury of a collateral benefit.
Held: The issue of deductibility where the claim is for . .
Cited – Parry v Cleaver HL 5-Feb-1969
PI Damages not Reduced for Own Pension
The plaintiff policeman was disabled by the negligence of the defendant and received a disablement pension. Part had been contributed by himself and part by his employer.
Held: The plaintiff’s appeal succeeded. Damages for personal injury were . .
Cited – Jones v Gleeson 1965
(Australia) When a policeman who had retired retired through injury sought damages for that injury, the pension he received as a result of his retirement was to be ignored entirely: ‘In recent years, however, the relevance or otherwise to the issue . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.219831

Esso Petroleum Company Ltd v Mardon: CA 6 Feb 1976

Statements had been made by employees of Esso in the course of pre-contractual negotiations with Mr Mardon, the prospective tenant of a petrol station. The statements related to the potential throughput of the station. Mr Mardon was persuaded by the statements to enter into the tenancy; but he suffered serious loss when the actual throughput proved to be much lower than had been predicted. Mr Marden did his best but he lost his capital and incurred a large bank overdraft as a result of his trading losses.
Held: Mr. Mardon was entitled to recover damages from Esso, on the basis of either breach of warranty or (on this point affirming the decision of the judge below) negligent misrepresentation. A contractor is not free to carry on with a disastrous contract and then seek to recover any losses on the basis of fraud. A special relationship, giving rise to a duty of care, may arise between the parties negotiating a contract if information is given in connection with the contract.
Lord Denning MR held: ‘A professional man may give advice under a contract for reward; or without a contract, in pursuance of a voluntary assumption of responsibility, gratuitously without reward. In either case he is under one and the same duty to use reasonable care: see Cassidy v. Ministry of Health [1951] 2 K.B. 343, 359-360. In the one case it is by reason of a term implied by law. In the other, it is by reason of a duty imposed by law. For a breach of that duty he is liable in damages: and those damages should be, and are, the same, whether he is sued in contract or in tort.’ and: ‘He is only to be compensated for having been induced to enter into a contract which turned out to be disastrous for him. Whether it be called breach of warranty or negligent misrepresentation, its effect was not to warrant the throughput but only to induce him to enter the contract. So the damages in either case are to be measured by the loss he suffered. Just as in Doyle v Olby he can say: ‘I would not have entered into this contract at all but for your representation. Owing to it, I have lost all the capital I put into it. I also incurred a large overdraft. I have spent four years of my life in wasted endeavour without reward: and it will take sometime to re-establish myself.’ For all such loss he is entitled to recover damages.’
Ormrod and Shaw LJJ agreed that Mr. Mardon was entitled to recover damages either for breach of warranty or for negligent misrepresentation.

Lord Denning MR, Ormrod, Shaw LJJ
[1976] QB 801, [1976] EWCA Civ 4, [1976] 2 All ER 5
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Doyle v Olby (Ironmongers) Ltd CA 31-Jan-1969
The plaintiff had been induced by the fraudulent misrepresentation of the defendant to buy an ironmonger’s business for 4,500 pounds plus stock at a valuation of 5,000 pounds. Shortly after the purchase, he discovered the fraud and started the . .

Cited by:
Cited – AMEC Mining v Scottish Coal Company SCS 6-Aug-2003
The pursuers contracted to remove coal by opencast mining from the defender’s land. They said the contract assumed the removal first of substantial peat depositys from the surface by a third party. They had to do that themselves at substantial cost. . .
Cited – 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 . .
Applied – Archer v Brown 1984
The defendant sold shares in his company to the plaintiff. He had however already sold them elsewhere. The plaintiff sought both rescission and damages. The defendant argued that he could not be entitled to both.
Held: The misrepresentation . .
Cited – Geldof Metaalconstructie Nv v Simon Carves Ltd CA 11-Jun-2010
The parties contracted for the supply and installation of pressure vessels by Geldof (G) for a building constructed by Simon Carves (SC). The contract contained a clause denying the remedy of set-off. G sued for the sale price, and SC now sought an . .
Cited – Downs and Another v Chappell and Another CA 3-Apr-1996
The plaintiffs had suceeded in variously establishing claims in deceit and negligence, but now appealed against the finding that no damages had flowed from the wrongs. They had been sold a business on the basis of incorrect figures.
Held: . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Torts – Other, Damages, Negligence, Contract

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.185449

Yarl’s Wood Immigration Ltd and Others v Bedfordshire Police Authority: CA 23 Oct 2009

The claimant sought to recover the costs of damage to their centre following a riot, saying that under the 1886 Act, they were liable. It appealed against a ruling that they were unable to claim as a public authority, saying that the 1886 Act was not limited in the way suggested.
Held: Though privately operated, the claimants were satisfying a statutory duty. The appeal succeeded, and the claimants could continue with their claims. The law operated within the Centre as much as outside it. The Act imposed strict liability: ‘as is so often the case with strict liability, it is because those who are liable to compensate are also regarded by the law as standing in the shoes of the wrongdoers themselves (as, for instance, in the case of the vicariously liable), in part because their obligation, their strict obligation, is to prevent what has happened happening.’

Rix, Wall, Aikens LJJ
[2009] EWCA Civ 1110, [2010] 2 WLR 1322, [2010] 2 All ER 221
Bailii
Riot (Damages) Act 1886
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Yarl’s Wood Immigration Ltd and others v Bedfordshire Police Authority ComC 30-Sep-2008
The owners of the Yarslwood Immigration centre sought damages under the 1886 Act after a riot at the centre caused substantial damage.
Held: The claim failed: ‘The fact that YWIL and GSL [the appellants] were acting as public authorities . .
See Also – Bedfordshire Police Authority v Constable and others ComC 20-Jun-2008
The authority insured its primary liability for compensation under the 1886 Act through the claimants and the excess of liability through re-insurers. The parties sought clarification from the court of the respective liabilities of the insurance . .
See Also – Bedfordshire Police Authority v Constable CA 12-Feb-2009
The police had responded to a riot at Yarlswood detention centre. They had insurance to cover their liability under the 1886 Act, but the re-insurers said that the insurance did not cover the event, saying that the liability was for statutory . .
Cited – YL v Birmingham City Council and Others HL 20-Jun-2007
The House was asked whether a private care home when providing accommodation and care to a resident under arrangements with a local authority the 1948 Act, is performing ‘functions of a public nature’ for the purposes of section 6(3)(b) of the Human . .
Cited – Glasbrook Brothers Limited v Glamorgan County Council HL 1925
A colliery manager asked for police protection for his colliery during a strike. He wanted police officers to be billeted on the premises. The senior police officer for the area was willing to provide protection by a mobile force, but he refused to . .
Cited – Radcliffe v Eden 1776
Police Liabie for Damage to Furniture in Riot
The owners of furniture destroyed by rioters who entered a house and damaged it recovered compensation, even though the 1714 Act did not expressly mention furniture.
Lord Mansfield said: ‘To encourage people to resist persons thus riotously . .
Cited – Mason v Sainsbury 19-Apr-1782
A claim was made upon insurance after a riot. The court asked asked ‘Who is first liable?’ This was not an issue of chronology but of establishing where the primary responsibility lay to make good the loss. The Act laid the primary responsibility . .
Cited – Glamorgan Coal Co v Glamorgan Joint Standing Committee 1915
Bankes LJ said that the duties of police forces include the preservation of the peace, the protection of the inhabitants, and the safeguarding of property within their area. . .
Cited – Kaufmann Brothers v Liverpool Corporation KBD 1916
It was argued that a claim under the 1886 Act was a claim for ‘alleged neglect or default’ within the meaning of the 1893 Act, so that the claim was time-barred under that Act.
Held: The argument failed. The 1893 Act did not apply.
Lush J . .
Cited – Pitchers v Surrey County Council 1923
In 1919 there was a riot involving Canadian soldiers from a local Camp. They released fellow soldiers in custody and raided the officers’ mess, and damaged and stole the contents of a tailor’s shop and other shops known as ‘Tin Town’ – a group of . .
Cited – Glasbrook Brothers Limited v Glamorgan County Council HL 1925
A colliery manager asked for police protection for his colliery during a strike. He wanted police officers to be billeted on the premises. The senior police officer for the area was willing to provide protection by a mobile force, but he refused to . .
Applied – Pitchers v Surrey County Council CA 2-Jan-1923
The claimant sought payment for damages to his property after imprisoned Canadian troops were released and came into the town causing damage.
Held: Lord Sterndale said: ‘it is said that this camp under the circumstances ceased to be within the . .
Cited – J W Dwyer Ltd v Metropolitan Police District Receiver 1967
The owner of a jewellery shop claimed to recover compensation from the police for damage to his shop in a smash and grab raid. Since there were more than 3 robbers, the police accepted that there had been a riot but defended the claim on the basis . .
Cited – River Wear Commissioners v Adamson HL 1877
It was not necessary for there to be an ambiguity in a statutory provision for a court to be allowed to look at the surrounding circumstances.
As to the Golden Rule of interpretation: ‘It is to be borne in mind that the office of the judge is . .
Cited – Parochial Church Council of the Parish of Aston Cantlow and Wilmcote with Billesley, Warwickshire v Wallbank and another HL 26-Jun-2003
Parish Councils are Hybrid Public Authorities
The owners of glebe land were called upon as lay rectors to contribute to the cost of repairs to the local church. They argued that the claim was unlawful by section 6 of the 1998 Act as an act by a public authority incompatible with a Convention . .
Cited – DH Edmonds Ltd v East Sussex Police Authority CA 6-Jul-1988
The plaintiffs Brighton jewellers sought compensation from the police authority for a raid on their premises by three or four men. Kenneth Jones J at first instance held that the incident did not involve a tumultuous assembly and accordingly the . .
Cited – Moses v Marsland 1901
A ‘public building’ is a building which the public is invited to enter or to which it can demand admission. . .
Cited – Stock v Frank Jones (Tipton) Ltd HL 1978
Where the words of a statute are clear, it is not open to the court to limit, change or disregard that meaning on the ground that the result of the legislation as drafted would be anomalous or absurd.
Lord Simon of Glaisdale said as to an . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Police, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.377240

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 appealed against an order reducing its damages to andpound;1,000.
Held: The appeal by Bocardo failed (Lord Hope DPSC and Lord Clarke JSC dissenting). The statute did not displace the owners rights by implication: ‘ In the context of a statute which is concerned with the right to search for and bore for and extract petroleum existing in its natural condition in strata below ground, the words ‘enter on’ in that subsection are apt to apply to underground workings as well as workings on the surface itself. The words ‘interfere with’ are not restricted, as was suggested, to interfering with the owner’s use and enjoyment of the land for the time being. The owner of the subsurface is entitled to say that his land is being interfered with when it is bored into by someone else. His right to object is inherent in his right of ownership of the land.’ The drilling was a trespass.
Lord Brown said: ‘the compensation – and the only compensation – contemplated by Parliament in enacting the 1934 Act was for ‘any loss of amenity value’ consequent on interference ‘with actual rights that exist’, in particular ‘the surface rights’. For any such loss ‘full compensation in the sense of the full market value’ was to be paid, plus 10% because ‘the owner may not necessarily desire to realise that asset.’ Compensation was to be for interference with ‘any valuable right’. Landowners, however, had no right at all in the oil or ‘in the chances of finding oil under the soil.’ It seems clear that Parliament in 1934 was not contemplating the boring of deep wells diagonally beneath land but that, had they done so, they would not have regarded that as an interference with any actual existing right or as involving any loss of amenity value or at any rate not such an interference as required more than essentially nominal compensation.’ and ‘ by this Act, Parliament in terms (a) vested the property in all petroleum in the Crown, (b) gave the Crown ‘the exclusive right of searching and boring for and getting such petroleum’ (a right that could be licensed to others, as here to Star) and (c) enabled any licencee compulsorily to acquire any necessary ancillary right (as here to access the petroleum through Bocardo’s land). The correct analysis seems to me to be this: that by these provisions Parliament was at one and the same time extinguishing whatever pre-existing key value Bocardo’s land might be thought to have had in the open market and creating a new world in which only the Crown and its licencees had any interest in accessing the oilfield and in which they had been empowered to do so (to turn the key if one wants to persist in the metaphor) compulsorily and thus on terms subject to the Pointe Gourde approach to compensation.’

Lord Hope, Deputy President, Lord Walker, Lord Brown, Lord Collins, Lord Clarke
[2010] UKSC 35, [2010] WLR (D) 204, [2010] NPC 88, [2010] 3 WLR 654, [2011] AC 380, [2010] 31 EG 63, [2010] 3 All ER 975
Bailii, SC, WLRD, Bailii Summary, SC Summary
Petroleum (Production) Act 1934, Mines (Working Facilities and Support) Act 1966 3(2)(d) 8(2), Pipe-lines Act 1962
England and Wales
Citing:
At First Instance – Bocardo Sa v Star Energy UK Onshore Ltd and Another ChD 24-Jul-2008
The defendant had obtained a licence under the Act to extract oil from beneath its land. To do so, it had to drill at a deep level under the claimant’s land. It did so without the claimant’s permission. The claimant sought damages in trespass.
Appeal from – Star Energy UK Onshore Ltd and Another v Bocardo Sa CA 15-Jun-2009
The appellant had taken out a licence to drill for oil on its land. To maximise its return it drilled at a deep level out under the claimant’s land. It now appealed against a finding that this was a trespass, and that it should pay damages on a . .
Applied – Pointe Gourde Quarrying and Transport Co Ltd v Sub-Intendant of Crown Lands PC 29-Jul-1947
Under a wartime agreement in 1941 the UK government agreed to lease to the US Government land in Trinidad on which the US could establish a naval base. To do this the Crown acquired the Pointe Gourde land for its limestone quarry which would be used . .
Cited – Henry Rowbotham, And Others v William Wilson HL 19-Jun-1860
Prima facie, the owner of land is entitled to the surface itself, and all below it, ex jure naturae; those who seek to derogate from that right must do so by virtue of some grant or conveyance. The rights of the grantee of the minerals depend on the . .
Cited – Daniel Rowbotham v William Wilson 30-May-1856
Action for injuririg the plainitiff’s reversion, by removing the minerals without leaving support to the surface, on which were houses more than twenty years old; whereby the houses were injured. On a special case it appeared that, ninety years . .
Cited – Bowser v Maclean 21-Nov-1860
The lord may drive carriages along a tramway under copyholds of the manor, for the purpose of working mines within the manor, but not of working mines beyond its limits, and a bill will lie for an injunction at the suit of a copyholder to restrain . .
Cited – Corbett v Hill 1870
The court considered a conveyance on sale which created an underground flying freehold. Sir William James VC said that the owner of land owns ‘everything up to the sky’. . .
Cited – National Carriers Ltd v Panalpina (Northern) Ltd HL 11-Dec-1980
No Frustration of Lease through loss of access
The tenant’s access to the premises was closed by the local authority because it passed by a derelict and dangerous building. The tenant argued that its tenancy was frustrated.
Held: The lease was not frustrated. The lease had a term of ten . .
Cited – Bury v Pope 1587
The owner of land was held entitled to erect a house against his neighbour’s windows even though they had enjoyed light for over 30 years. ‘And lastly, the earth hath in law a great extent upwards, not only of water as hath been said, but of aire, . .
Cited – Pickering v Rudd KBD 20-Jun-1815
Trespass into Air Space
The plaintiff had erected a board which extended over into his neighbour’s garden. The neighbour cut that down and a tree grown against his wall.
Held: Lord Ellenborough said: ‘I do not think it is a trespass to interfere with the column of . .
Cited – Commissioner for Railways v Valuer-General PC 1974
(New South Wales – Court of Appeal) The parties disputed the value of a property in the centre of Sydney beneath which there had been extensive excavations to a depth of 40 feet or more. The question was how the property was to be valued for rating . .
Cited – Ellis v Loftus Iron Co 1874
The pasturing of cattle must be one of the most ordinary uses of land, and strict liability for damage done by cattle enclosed on one man’s land if they escape thence into the land of another, is one of the most ancient propositions of our law. It . .
Cited – Pountney v Clayton CA 1883
Bowen LJ was asked as to rights of support to land. He said: ‘Prima facie the owner of the land has everything under the sky down to the centre of the earth.’ . .
Cited – Elwes v Brigg Gas Co 1886
. .
Cited – Mitchell v Mosley CA 1914
Where a plot of land sold has the boundaries identified, prima facie, the conveyance will also include all the land within and below the boundaries.
Lord Cozens-Hardy MR said: ‘In my opinion we should be going contrary to perfectly well . .
Cited – Bernstein of Leigh (Baron) v Skyview and General Ltd (Summary) QBD 9-Feb-1977
The plaintiff complained that the defendant had flown over his and neighbouring properties and taken aerial photographs, and said that this was a gross invasion of his privacy, and that the defendant had invaded his airspace to do so. The plaintiff . .
Cited – Kelson v Imperial Tobacco Company 1957
The defendant erected a sign which extended some 8ft into the plaintiff’s property.
Held: The plaintiff was entitled to a mandatory injunction requiring the defendant to remove the sign. The intrusion was a trespass. . .
Cited – Edwards v Minister of Transport 1964
The landowner claimed for injurious affection of the remainder of his land after part was acquired by compulsory purchase.
Held: The claim for injurious affection was confined to the effects of works and uses on the land taken. . .
Cited – Stebbing v Metropolitan Board of Works 1870
In compensation for compulsory purchase (in this case, of graveyards), ‘value’ means value to the owner, not value to the purchaser. The graveyards were therefore of little or no value to the rector.
Cockburn CJ said: ‘When Parliament gives . .
Cited – Raja Vyricherla Narayana Gajapathiraju v Revenue Divisional Officer, Vizagapatam PC 23-Feb-1939
Land adjoining a harbour at Vizagapatam which at that time was malarial was to be valued for compulsory purchase. The land contained a spring of clean water. The only potential purchaser of the special adaptability of the land as a water supply was . .
Cited – Logan v Scottish Water OHCS 1-Nov-2005
. .
Cited – Waters and others v Welsh Development Agency HL 29-Apr-2004
Land was to be compulsorily purchased. A large development required the land to be used to create a nature reserve. The question was how and if at all the value of the overall scheme should be considered when assessing the compensation for this . .
Cited – J A Pye (Oxford) Ltd and Others v Graham and Another HL 4-Jul-2002
The claimants sought ownership by adverse possession of land. Once the paper owner had been found, they indicated a readiness to purchase their interest. The court had found that this letter contradicted an animus possidendi. The claimant had . .
Cited – East End Dwelling Co Ltd v Finsbury Borough Council HL 1952
The house was asked whether a hypothetically rebuilt block of flats would have been subject to the Rent Restriction Acts.
Held: Lord Asquith said: ‘If you are bidden to treat an imaginary state of affairs as real, you must surely, unless . .
Cited – Powell v McFarlane ChD 1977
A squatter had occupied the land and defended a claim for possession. The court discussed the conditions necessary to establish an intention to possess land adversely to the paper owner.
Held: Slade J said: ‘In the absence of evidence to the . .
Cited – Porter and Another v Secretary of State for Transport CA 3-Jun-1996
No issue estoppel on land value arose from a previous Secretary’s finding on Lands Tribunal. . .
Cited – Chapman Lowry and Puttick v Chichester District Council LT 1984
. .
Cited – Batchelor v Kent County Council CA 1989
The Council had compulsorily acquired land for highway improvement. It was within an area scheduled for residential development. Outline permission for development of neighbouring land had been granted but the development could not proceed until the . .
Cited – Batchelor v Kent County Council LT 1-Mar-1987
The tribunal was asked to determine compensation to be paid on the acquisition of two plots of land. The land-owner claimed andpound;9,000,000 and the council offered andpound;5,490. The land-owner claimed the value as ransom as necessary access to . .
Cited – Pell Frischmann Engineering Ltd v Bow Valley Iran Ltd and Others PC 26-Nov-2009
(From the Court of Appeal of Jersey) Lord Walker reviewed the principles in awarding damages under Lord Cairns Act, setting out five general principles established by the authorities. They included: ‘1. Damages (often termed ‘user damage’) are . .
Cited – Pell Frischmann Engineering Ltd v Bow Valley Iran Ltd and Others PC 26-Nov-2009
(From the Court of Appeal of Jersey) Lord Walker reviewed the principles in awarding damages under Lord Cairns Act, setting out five general principles established by the authorities. They included: ‘1. Damages (often termed ‘user damage’) are . .
Cited – Transport for London (London Underground Ltd) v Spirerose Ltd HL 30-Jul-2009
Compulsory Purchase Compensation – Land As it Is
The House considered the basis of calculation of compensation on the compulsory purchase of land without planning permission, but where permission would probably be granted. The appellant challenged the decision which had treated the probability as . .
Cited – Whitwham v Westminster Brymbo Coal and Coke Co CA 24-Jun-1896
Common law damages for the misuse of property involved an award of a sum equivalent to the price or hire that a reasonable person would pay for such use, even if the owner would not himself actually have been using the property. This case involved . .
Cited – South Eastern Railway Co v London County Council 1915
Compulsory purchase – compensation assessment – ‘Increase in value consequent on the execution of the undertaking for or in connection with which the purchase is made must be disregarded.’ . .
Cited – Raza Narayana Gajapatiraju v Revenue Divisional Officer, Vizagapatan (The Indian Case) PC 1939
Land was to be acquired for anti-malarial works relating to a harbour development. Lord Romer rejected the suggestion in a compulsory purchase valuation that it would be possible to ascertain the potential special value of land to a ‘special . .
Cited – Swordheath Properties Ltd v Tabet CA 1979
The amount of damages payable by a trespasser on land is ordinarily the letting value of the premises. Megaw LJ said: ‘It appears to me to be clear, both as a matter of principle and of authority, that in a case of this sort the plaintiff, when he . .
Cited – Inverugie Investments Ltd v Hackett PC 1995
The plaintiff was the lessee of 30 apartments within a hotel complex. The defendants ejected the plaintiff and for some years used the apartments as part of the hotel with an average occupancy rate of not more than 40%.
Held: The defendants . .
Cited – BP Petroleum Developments Ltd v Ryder 1987
Compensation was made on the basis of an increase in value from andpound;40 per annum per acre to andpound;45 for the rights over the additional land sought by the special purchaser, the increase being made ‘for him to be certain that he will . .
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 – Director of Buildings and Lands v Shun Fung Ironworks Ltd PC 20-Feb-1995
Compensation is payable for losses properly anticipating resumption of possession of the land. The principle of equivalence gives rise to the statutory right to interest under section 11(1). The council explained the conceptual foundation of the . .
Cited – Wrotham Park Estate Ltd v Parkside Homes Ltd ChD 1974
55 houses had been built by the defendant, knowingly in breach of a restrictive covenant, imposed for the benefit of an estate, and in the face of objections by the claimant.
Held: The restrictive covenant not to develop other than in . .
Cited – Horsford v Bird and others PC 17-Jan-2006
(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 . .
Cited – Experience Hendrix LLC v PPX Enterprises Inc and Another CA 20-Mar-2003
The claimant had obtained an interim injunction against the defendant for copyright infringement, though it could show no losses. It now sought additionally damages. The defendant argued that it could not have both.
Held: The case arose form . .
Cited – Jaggard v Sawyer CC 1993
(Weymouth County Court) The court refused an injunction to a land owner who complained that a neighbour had erected a building over a right of way. The court awarded damages of andpound;694.44, being a proportionate part of the the sum he might be . .
Cited – Bracewell v Appleby ChD 1975
The defendant wrongly used and asserted a right of way over a private road to a house which he had built.
Held: To restrain the defendant from using the road would render the new house uninhabitable. The court refused an injunction on the . .
Cited – Liverpool and Lancashire Properties Limited and Another v Lunn Poly Ltd and Another CA 15-Mar-2006
Where a tenant successfully obtained relief from forfeiture, and compensatory damages were payable under the 1858 Act in lieu of an injunction, and had assigned the lease for a profit the court could exceptionally use its equitable jurisdiction to . .
Cited – 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 . .
Approved – Mercury Communications Ltd v London and India Dock Investments Ltd 1993
. .
Cited – Mercury Communications Ltd v London and India Dock Investments Ltd 1993
. .
Cited – Stebbing v Metropolitan Board of Works 1870
In compensation for compulsory purchase (in this case, of graveyards), ‘value’ means value to the owner, not value to the purchaser. The graveyards were therefore of little or no value to the rector.
Cockburn CJ said: ‘When Parliament gives . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.421099

Smith v Manchester City Council: CA 10 Jun 1974

Damages – earnings loss for persistent disability

The plaintiff, a part time domestic cleaner slipped and injured herself (a frozen shoulder) when working for the defendant. It was accepted that the cause of the slip was the defendant’s negligence. At the time of the claim she was still employed by the defendant, but she asked for an award of damages for a possible future loss of earning as a result of being disadvantaged in the employment market. .
Held: The court awarded damages for the potential loss to the plaintiff from the plaintiff’s reduced earning capacity, equivalent to the loss of her competitive position in the labour market. Such an award was intended to compensate a plaintiff who is in employment, for a handicap in getting a new job if he lost the current one and for the longer than normal periods out of work between jobs because of his disability.
The damages award of andpound;300 for this element was increased to andpound;1,000.
Scarman LJ said: ‘Loss of future earnings or future earning capacity is usually compounded of two elements. The first is when a victim of an accident finds that he or she can, as a result of the accident, no longer earn his or her pre-accident rate of earnings. In such a case there is an existing reduction in earning capacity which can be calculated as an annual sum. It is then perfectly possible to form a view as to the working life of the plaintiff and, taking the usual contingencies into account, to apply to that annual sum of loss of earnings a figure which is considered to be the appropriate number of years’ purchase in order to reach a capital figure. Fortunately in this case there is no such loss sustained by the plaintiff because, notwithstanding her accident, she has continued with her employment at the same rate of pay and, as long as she is employed by the Manchester Corporation, is likely, if not certain, to continue at the rate of pay appropriate to her pre-accident grade of employment. That element of loss, therefore, does not arise in this case.
The second element in this type of loss is the weakening of the plaintiff’s competitive position in the open labour market: that is to say, should the plaintiff lose her current employment, what are her chances of obtaining comparable employment in the open labour market? The evidence here is plain:- that, in the event (which one hopes will never materialise) of her losing her employment with the Manchester Corporation, she, with a stiff shoulder and a disabled right arm, is going to have to compete in the domestic labour market with women who are physically fully able. This represents a serious weakening of her competitive position in the one market into which she can go to obtain employment. It is for that reason that it is quite wrong to describe this weakness as a ‘possible’ loss of earning capacity: it is an existing loss: she is already weakened to Rat extent, though fortunately she is protected for the time being against suffering any financial damage because she does not, at Present, have to go into the labour market.
It is clearly inappropriate, when assessing this element of loss to attempt to calculate any annual sum or to apply to any annual sum so many years’ purchase. The court has to look at the weakness so to speak ‘in the round’, take note of the various contingencies, and do its best to reach an assessment which will do -justice to the plaintiff. ‘

Edmund Davies, Stamp, Scarman LJJ
(1974) 17 KIR 1, [1974] EWCA Civ 6
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Explained – Moeliker v Reyrolle and Co Ltd CA 1976
The court considered the principles for the award of damages for future loss of earning capacity.
Held: The court distinguished between an award for loss of earnings and compensation for loss of earning capacity. The latter head of damage . .
Cited – Phillips v Holliday and Another CA 6-Jul-2001
The claimant was injured when scaffolding on which he was working collapsed. The defendants appealed the awards for loss of future earnings. The claimant was self-employed working through a limited company controlled by his wife. His past earnings . .
Cited – Woolley v Essex County Council CA 17-May-2006
. .
Cited – Billett v Ministry of Defence CA 23-Jul-2015
Defendant’s appeal against the quantum of damages awarded in a personal injury action. The principal issue is how the court should assess damages for loss of future earning capacity in circumstances where the claimant suffers from a minor . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Personal Injury

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.188135

Raineri v Miles: HL 1980

Damages may be awarded for a delay in completion under an open contract even though time was not of the essence. The failure to complete on the day fixed was a breach. Lord Edmund-Davies said: ‘The fact that time had not been declared to be of the essence does not mean that the express date for completion could be supplanted by the court’s treating it as a mere ‘target’ date and, in effect, enabling the defaulting party to insert into the contractual provision some such words as or within a reasonable time thereafter”. Nevertheless, the innocent party must do all he reasonably can to reduce his losses.
Lord Fraser of Tullybelton explained the decision in United Scientific: ‘The actual decision in the United Scientific Holdings case [1978] AC 904 depended upon treating the fact that strict adherence to the timetable was not of the essence of the contract as equivalent to its not being a condition precedent to enforcing the rent review clause. No doubt that may mean that the law has developed somewhat since the Act of 1873, as indeed Lord Diplock had stressed earlier in his speech, but it did not involve approval for the proposition that failure to adhere to the timetable was not a breach of the contract.’

Lord Edmund-Davies, Lord Fraser of Tullybelton
[1981] AC 1050, [1980] 2 All ER 145
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – United Scientific Holdings v Burnley Borough Council HL 1978
The House was asked whether a failure by a lessor to keep strictly to the timetable laid down in a rent review clause in a lease necessarily deprived the lessor of the benefit of the rent review.
Held: A stipulation as to time in an option . .

Cited by:
Cited – Riverside Housing Association Ltd v White and Another HL 25-Apr-2007
The claimant housing association had raised its rents. The tenants objected that they were unlawful not having complied with the tenancy agreements. They said the clause allowed only one increase in each June of a year, and then only if 28 days . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Land

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.219187

Todd and Others v Adams and Another: CA 18 Apr 2002

The boat owners had failed to comply with the 1975 safety rules, and seamen died. The boat owners relied upon the restriction on damages in the 1995 Act, and the seamen’s families argued that the failure to apply the safety rules removed that limitation.
Held: A breach of the safety rules did not give rise to a separate cause of action for damages against the ship owners. The system for certifying vessels would sit uneasily with any other interpretation, and a criminal remedy was also provided for. The court distinguished between challenges to conclusions of primary fact or inferences from those facts and an evaluation of those facts.
Mance LJ said: ‘With regard to an appeal to this court (which would never have involved a complete rehearing in that sense), the language of ‘review’ may be said to fit most easily into the context of an appeal against the exercise of a discretion, or an appeal where the court of appeal is essentially concerned with the correctness of an exercise of evaluation or judgment-such as a decision by a lower court whether, weighing all relevant factors, a contract of service existed. However, the references in rule 52.11(3)(4) to the power of an appellate court to allow an appeal where the decision below was ‘wrong’ and to ‘draw any inference of fact which it considers justified on the evidence’ indicate that there are other contexts in which the court of appeal must, as previously, make up its own mind as to the correctness or otherwise of a decision, even on matters of fact, by a lower court. Where the correctness of a finding of primary fact or of inference is in issue, it cannot be a matter of simple discretion how an appellant court approaches the matter. Once the appellant has shown a real prospect (justifying permission to appeal) that a finding or inference is wrong, the role of an appellate court is to determine whether or not this is so, giving full weight of course to the advantages enjoyed by any judge of first instance who has heard oral evidence. . In the present case, therefore, I consider that (a) it is for us if necessary to make up our own mind about the correctness or otherwise of any findings of primary fact or inferences from primary fact that the judge made or drew and the claimants challenge, while (b) reminding ourselves that, so far as the appeal raises issues of judgment on unchallenged primary findings and inferences, this court ought not to interfere unless it is satisfied that the judge’s conclusion lay outside the bounds within which reasonable disagreement is possible. In relation to (a) we must, as stated, bear in mind the important and well-recognised reluctance of this court to interfere with a trial judge on any finding of primary fact based on the credibility or reliability of oral evidence. In the present case, however, while there was oral evidence, its content was largely uncontentious.’
Neuberger J stressed that the question whether there was a contract of service on the facts involved the weighing up of a series of factors.

Lord Justice Thorpe, Lord Justice Mance and Mr Justice Neuberger
Times 03-May-2002, Gazette 23-May-2002, [2002] 2 Lloyds Law Rep 293, [2002] 2 All ER (Comm) 1
Merchant Shipping Act 1995 185(1), Fishing (Safety Provisions) Rules 1975 (SI 1975 No 330) 16
England and Wales
Cited by:
Distinguished – Ziemniak v ETPM Deep Sea Ltd CA 7-May-2003
A seaman was injured taking part in a safety drill aboard ship. The defendant had been found not to be negligent, but the claimant alleged breach of statutory duty under the Regulations.
Held: Groves v Wimborne clearly established that . .
Cited – Assicurazioni Generali Spa v Arab Insurance Group (BSC) CA 13-Nov-2002
Rehearing/Review – Little Difference on Appeal
The appellant asked the Court to reverse a decision on the facts reached in the lower court.
Held: The appeal failed (Majority decision). The court’s approach should be the same whether the case was dealt with as a rehearing or as a review. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Transport, Health and Safety, Damages, Litigation Practice

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.170213

Johnson v Unisys Ltd: HL 23 Mar 2001

The claimant contended for a common law remedy covering the same ground as the statutory right available to him under the Employment Rights Act 1996 through the Employment Tribunal system.
Held: The statutory system for compensation for unfair dismissal is a complete system, and was intended to replace any common law action for damages arising from the manner of dismissal. The statutory system allowed a tribunal to award such compensation as it thought just and equitable. It is no longer proper to try to treat contracts of employment as commercial contracts. The statutory system could include damages for matters beyond the purely financial. The statutory system included elements of policy foreign to the common law system. Nevertheless damages might properly be awarded for losses by way of psychiatric damages and consequent losses which arise from the manner of dismissal where that was a breach of the contractual duty of good faith. It would not be appropriate to attempt to achieve the same result by subjecting the employer’s contractual rights to a tortious duty of care.
Lord Hoffmann said: ‘At common law the contract of employment was regarded by the courts as a contract like any other. The parties were free to negotiate whatever terms they liked and no terms would be implied unless they satisfied the strict test of necessity applied to a commercial contract. Freedom of contract meant that the stronger party, usually the employer, was free to impose his terms upon the weaker. But over the last 30 years or so, the nature of the contract of employment has been transformed. It has been recognised that a person’s employment is usually one of the most important things in his or her life. It gives not only a livelihood but an occupation, an identity and a sense of self-esteem. The law has changed to recognise this social reality. Most of the changes have been made by Parliament. The Employment Rights Act 1996 consolidates numerous statutes which have conferred rights upon employees . . ‘

Lord Bingham of Cornhill Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead, Lord Steyn, Lord Hoffmann, Lord Millett
Times 23-Mar-2001, [2001] UKHL 13, [2001] IRLR 279, [2001] 2 All ER 801, [2001] 2 WLR 1076, [2001] ICR 480, [2003] 1 AC 518
House of Lords, Bailii
Employment Rights Act 1996
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Johnson v Unisys Limited CA 4-Dec-1998
The claimant had been dismissed. He said the manner of his dismissal had caused him to suffer a mental breakdown, and claimed for loss of earnings. He asserted a duty on an employer not to dismiss him in such a way as to infringe the duty of trust . .
Cited – Malik v Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI); Mahmud v Bank of Credit and Commerce International HL 12-Jun-1997
Allowance of Stigma Damages
The employees claimed damages, saying that the way in which their employer had behaved during their employment had led to continuing losses, ‘stigma damages’ after the termination.
Held: It is an implied term of any contract of employment that . .
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. . .
Explained – Addis v Gramophone Company Limited HL 26-Jul-1909
Mr Addis was wrongfully and contumeliously dismissed from his post as the defendant’s manager in Calcutta. He sought additional damages for the manner of his dismissal.
Held: It did not matter whether the claim was under wrongful dismissal. . .
Cited – Scally v Southern Health and Social Services Board HL 1991
The plaintiffs were junior doctors employed by the respondents. Their terms had been collectively negotiated, and incorporated the Regulations. During the period of their employment different regulations had given and then taken way their right to . .
Cited – Spring v Guardian Assurance Plc and Others HL 7-Jul-1994
The plaintiff, who worked in financial services, complained of the terms of the reference given by his former employer. Having spoken of his behaviour towards members of the team, it went on: ‘his former superior has further stated he is a man of . .
Cited – West Midland Baptist (Trust) Association (Inc) v Birmingham Corporation HL 1970
The mere fact that an enactment shows that Parliament must have thought that the law was one thing, does not preclude the courts from deciding that the law was in fact something different. The position would be different if the provisions of the . .
Cited – United Bank Ltd v Akhtar 1989
An employer’s express right to transfer an employee may be qualified by the obligation of mutual trust and confidence. . .
Cited – Foaminol Laboratories Ltd v British Artide Plastics Ltd 1941
There is no justification for artificially excising from the damages recoverable for breach of contract that part of the financial loss which might or might not be the subject of a successful claim in defamation. A claim for mere loss of reputation . .
Cited – Malloch v Aberdeen Corporation HL 1971
A common law action for wrongful dismissal can at most yield compensation measured by reference to the salary that should have been paid during the contractual period of notice. Lord Reid said: ‘At common law a master is not bound to hear his . .
Cited – Walker v Northumberland County Council QBD 16-Nov-1994
The plaintiff was a manager within the social services department. He suffered a mental breakdown in 1986, and had four months off work. His employers had refused to provide the increased support he requested. He had returned to work, but again, did . .

Cited by:
Cited – Morrow v Safeway Stores Plc EAT 21-Sep-2000
The complainant appealed a decision that she had not been constructively dismissed. She had been told off in public, causing her great distress. The tribunal had found the employer’s behaviour regrettable but not such as to break the duty of trust . .
Cited – McCabe v Cornwall County Council, The Governing Body of Mounts Bay School CA 23-Dec-2002
The claimant sought damages for the consequences of having been suspended from work as a teacher. He later recovered damages for unfair dismissal, and the court had struck out his claim for damages over and above those already awarded.
Held: . .
Cited – Kenneth Cobley v Forward Technology Industries Plc CA 14-May-2003
The claimant had been chief executive and a director of the respondent for many years, but was dismissed upon it being taken over. His contract of employment as chief executive provided that it was to be coterminous with his appointment as director. . .
Examined – Dunnachie v Kingston Upon Hull City Council; Williams v Southampton Institute; Dawson v Stonham Housing Association EAT 8-Apr-2003
EAT Unfair Dismissal – Compensation
In each case, The employee sought additional damages for non-economic loss after an unfair dismissal.
Held: The Act could be compared with the Discrimination Acts . .
Cited – Eastwood v Magnox Electric plc CA 2002
There was a claim for damages in respect of psychiatric injury said to result from a breach of the implied term of trust and confidence, which was asserted to be recoverable notwithstanding Johnson, on the basis that the acts of the employer . .
Cited – Boardman v Copeland Borough Council CA 13-Jun-2001
The claimant had ‘neither pleaded nor shown any damage to him during the course of his employment which resulted from his employer’s conduct. The only damage which is demonstrated is that which followed from his dismissal and, arguably, the manner . .
Cited – Horkulak v Cantor Fitzgerald International QBD 31-Jul-2003
The claimant sought damages for constructive dismissal. He said that verbal abuse he had suffered from the manager damaged his health and destroyed the relationship of trust and confidence.
Held: The manager was dictatorial and saw it as his . .
Cited – Sally Harper v Virgin Net Limited CA 10-Mar-2004
The employee had been dismissed. Her contractual notice period was longer than the statutory period.
Held: The statutory notice period prevailed in calculating the date of dismissal. The contractual period could not be used to extend the total . .
Cited – Dunnachie v Kingston Upon Hull City Council CA 11-Feb-2004
Compensation for non-economic loss brought about by the manner of an unfair dismissal is, on authority and on principle, recoverable. The award of such compensation by the employment tribunal in the present case was not excessive and was adequately . .
Cited – Dunnachie v Kingston-upon-Hull City Council HL 15-Jul-2004
The claimant sought damages following his dismissal to include a sum to reflect the manner of his dismissal and the distress caused.
Held: The remarks of Lord Hoffmann in Johnson -v- Unysis were obiter. The court could not, under the section, . .
Cited – Eastwood and another v Magnox Electric plc; McCabe v Cornwall County Council and others HL 15-Jul-2004
The first claimants were long standing employees. Mr Eastwood fell out with his manager, who disciplined him using false statements. When Williams refused to provide a false statement he too was disciplined. Each claimed damages for the injury to . .
Cited – Kaur v MG Rover Group Ltd CA 17-Nov-2004
The applicant was employed by the respondent who had a collective agreement with a trade union.
Held: Not all elements of the collective agreement need be intended to be legally enforceable. She complained that the collective agreement would . .
Cited – Reda, Abdul-Jalil v Flag Limited PC 11-Jul-2002
PC (Bermuda) The courts should be reluctant to accept a fetter on the employer’s right to dismiss on notice where there is an express term in the contract empowering the employer to do so.
Lord Millet . .
Cited – Total Network Sl v Revenue and Customs HL 12-Mar-2008
The House was asked whether an action for unlawful means conspiracy was available against a participant in a missing trader intra-community, or carousel, fraud. The company appealed a finding of liability saying that the VAT Act and Regulations . .
Cited – Yearworth and others v North Bristol NHS Trust CA 4-Feb-2009
The defendant hospital had custody of sperm samples given by the claimants in the course of fertility treatment. The samples were effectively destroyed when the fridge malfunctioned. Each claimant was undergoing chemotherapy which would prevent them . .
Cited – Morrow v Safeway Stores Plc EAT 21-Sep-2001
The claimant appealed against dismissal of her claim of unfair constructive dismissal. She complained of having been publicly told off. The court considered whether this amounted to a breach of a fundamental term of her contract entitling her to . .
Cited – GAB Robins (UK) Ltd v Triggs CA 30-Jan-2008
The claimant had been awarded damages for unfair constructive dismissal. The employer appealed an award of damages for the period prior to the acceptance by the employee of the repudiatory breach.
Held: Where a claimant’s losses arose before . .
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 . .
Cited – Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust CA 26-May-2010
The claimant, a consultant doctor, sought damages saying that his employer had failed to follow the contract when disciplining and dismissing him. The GMC had dismissed as unfounded the allegation on which the dismissal was based. He sought damages . .
Cited – Botham v The Ministry of Defence QBD 26-Mar-2010
botham_modQBD10
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. . .
Cited – Gisda Cyf v Barratt SC 13-Oct-2010
The parties disputed the effective date of termination of the claimant’s employment. Was it the date on which the letter notifying her was sent, or was it on the day she received it. She had been dimissed without notice, and the date was the date on . .
Cited – The Child Poverty Action Group v Secretary of State for Work and Pensions SC 8-Dec-2010
The Action Group had obtained a declaration that, where an overpayment of benefits had arisen due to a miscalculation by the officers of the Department, any process of recovering the overpayment must be by the Act, and that the Department could not . .
Cited – Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust SC 14-Dec-2011
The claimant had been employed as consultant surgeon. He had been dismissed in a manner inconsistent with the extress terms of his employment contract. He sought common law damages for the manner of his dismissal. The employer appealed.
Held: . .
Cited – Prudential Plc and Another, Regina (on The Application of) v Special Commissioner of Income Tax and Another SC 23-Jan-2013
The appellants resisted disclosure to the revenue of advice it had received. It claimed legal advice privilege (LAP), though the advice was from its accountants.
Held: (Lords Sumption and Clarke dissenting) LAP applies to all communications . .
Cited – Braganza v BP Shipping Ltd SC 18-Mar-2015
The claimant’s husband had been lost from the defendant’s ship at sea. The defendant had contracted to pay compensation unless the loss was by suicide. They so determined. The court was now asked whether that was a permissible conclusion in the . .
Cited – Sharpe v The Bishop of Worcester CA 30-Apr-2015
Reverend Sharpe applied for the post of Rector of Teme Valley South. The right to present (or nominate) a member of the clergy to this living was vested in Mr and Mrs Miles but a person could not be nominated without the Bishop’s approval, which was . .
Cited – Prudential Assurance Company Ltd v Revenue and Customs SC 25-Jul-2018
PAC sought to recover excess advance corporation tax paid under a UK system contrary to EU law. It was now agreed that some was repayable but now the quantum. Five issues separated the parties.
Issue I: does EU law require the tax credit to be . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Employment, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.82561

Dickinson and Others v Tesco Plc and Others: CA 4 Feb 2013

The court considered the practice on claims for hire of a replacement car on credit terms after a road traffic accident. The defendant resisted paying for the credit where the claimant could have hired without a credit arrangement. The defendants also sought to bring new evidence of dishonesty in the system at issue.
Held: Retrials should held. The fresh evidence as to the true costs and practices required the decisions to be set aside and taken again.

Moore-Bick, Rimer, Aikens LJJ
[2013] EWCA Civ 36
Bailii
Civil Procedure Rules 3.9
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Dimond v Lovell HL 12-May-2000
A claimant sought as part of her damages for the cost of hiring a care whilst her own was off the road after an accident caused by the defendant. She agreed with a hire company to hire a car, but payment was delayed until the claim was settled.
Cited – Owens v Noble CA 18-Mar-2010
In its principal judgment the court referred the case back to the judge to assess whether one or more of the parties had committed a fraud on the court. The court now explained its answer to submissions made on the draft judgment.
Held: It was . .
Cited – Ladd v Marshall CA 29-Nov-1954
Conditions for new evidence on appeal
At the trial, the wife of the appellant’s opponent said she had forgotten certain events. After the trial she began divorce proceedings, and informed the appellant that she now remembered. He sought either to appeal admitting fresh evidence, or for . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.470729

McFaddens (A Firm) v Platford: TCC 30 Jan 2009

The claimant firm of solicitors had been found negligent, and now sought a contribution to the damages awarded from the barrister defendant. They had not managed properly issues as to their clients competence to handle the proceedings.
Held: The standard of care required was that: ‘the barrister must conduct himself in his professional work with the competence (care and skill) of a barrister of ordinary skill who is competent to handle that type of and weight of work and a breach of that duty occurs when the error is one which no reasonably competent member of the profession possessing those skills should have made.’ Counsel’s decision to go ahead despite the issues as to the client’s competence was not negligent since necessarily he had to rely on the solicitors’ closer acquaintance with the client.

Toulmin QC J
[2009] EWHC 126 (TCC)
Bailii
Civil Liability (Contribution Claims) Act 1978 2
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Bolam v Friern Hospital Management Committee QBD 1957
Professional to use Skilled Persons Ordinary Care
Negligence was alleged against a doctor.
Held: McNair J directed the jury: ‘Where some special skill is exercised, the test for negligence is not the test of the man on the Clapham omnibus, because he has not got this special skill. The test . .
Cited – Williams v Thompson Leatherdale (A Firm) and Another QBD 10-Nov-2008
The claimant sought damages from her legal advisers. They had allowed her to settle an ancillary relief application knowing that the case of White v White had been referred to the House of lords, and the settlement proved to have been on . .
Cited – Moy v Pettman Smith (a firm) and another HL 3-Feb-2005
Damages were claimed against a barrister for advice on a settlement given at the door of the court. After substantial litigation, made considerably more difficult by the negligence of the solicitors, the barrister had not advised the claimant at the . .
Cited – Brutus v Cozens HL 19-Jul-1972
The House was asked whether the conduct of the defendant at a tennis match at Wimbledon amounted to using ‘insulting words or behaviour’ whereby a breach of the peace was likely to be occasioned contrary to section 5. He went onto court 2, blew a . .
Cited – W v L CA 1974
For civil patients, it matters a great deal whether the classification of their condition is ‘severe subnormality’ or just ‘subnormality’ or whether it is ‘mental illness’ or ‘psychopathic disorder’. Lawton LJ discussed the construction of the . .
Cited – Arthur JS Hall and Co (A Firm) v Simons; Barratt v Woolf Seddon (A Firm); Harris v Schofield Roberts and Hill (A Firm) HL 20-Jul-2000
Clients sued their solicitors for negligence. The solicitors responded by claiming that, when acting as advocates, they had the same immunities granted to barristers.
Held: The immunity from suit for negligence enjoyed by advocates acting in . .
Cited – Ridehalgh v Horsefield; Allen v Unigate Dairies Ltd CA 26-Jan-1994
Guidance for Wasted Costs Orders
Guidance was given on the circumstances required for the making of wasted costs orders against legal advisers. A judge invited to make an order arising out of an advocate’s conduct of court proceedings must make full allowance for the fact that an . .
Cited – Saif Ali v Sydney Mitchell and Co (a Firm) HL 1978
Extent of Counsel’s Immunity in Negligence
The House considered the extent of a barrister’s immunity from action in negligence, and particularly whether it covered pre-trial acts or omissions in connection with civil proceedings.
Held: A barrister’s immunity from suit extended only to . .
Cited – Locke v Camberwell Health Authority CA 23-May-1991
The court discussed the relative duties of solicitor and counsel. Taylor LJ set out the principles that: 1) In general a solicitor, is entitled to rely upon the advice of counsel properly instructed;
2) For a solicitor, without special . .
Cited – Sidaway v Board of Governors of the Bethlem Royal Hospital and the Maudsley Hospital HL 21-Feb-1985
The plaintiff alleged negligence in the failure by a surgeon to disclose or explain to her the risks inherent in the operation which he had advised.
Held: The appeal failed. A mentally competent patient has an absolute right to refuse to . .
Cited – Kirby v Leather CA 1965
The plaintiff crashed into a van whilst riding his moped and suffered serious brain damage. An inquiry as to a party’s competence to conduct a case had to focus on his capacity to conduct the proceedings. In this case the plaintiff ‘was not capable . .
Cited – In re MB (Medical Treatment) CA 26-Mar-1997
The patient was due to deliver a child. A delivery by cesarean section was necessary, but the mother had a great fear of needles, and despite consenting to the operation, refused the necessary consent to anesthesia in any workable form.
Held: . .
Cited – Practice Note (Family Division: Incapacitated adults) FD 2-Jan-2002
Proceedings which invoked the jurisdiction of the High Court to grant declarations as to the best interests of incapacitated adults were civil proceedings to which the Civil Procedure Rules applied. Although not assigned to any division, having . .
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 – Pritchard Joyce and Hinds v Batcup and Another QBD 17-Jan-2008
The claimant solicitors sought contributions from counsel to the damages they had been obliged to pay to their client in negligence.
Held: Underhill J said: ‘My task is not to seek to decide definitively whether LL were liable in negligence to . .
Cited – Mount v Barker Austin (a Firm) CA 18-Feb-1998
The plaintiff sought damages for professional negligence from his former solicitors in respect of their conduct of a claim on his behalf. He succeeded, but was awarded no damages because the judge had found that his action would be bound to fail. He . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Professional Negligence, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.280259

Addis v Gramophone Company Limited: HL 26 Jul 1909

Mr Addis was wrongfully and contumeliously dismissed from his post as the defendant’s manager in Calcutta. He sought additional damages for the manner of his dismissal.
Held: It did not matter whether the claim was under wrongful dismissal. There was a breach of contract in not allowing the plaintiff to discharge his duties as manager, and the damages were the same, the salary to which the plaintiff was entitled for the six months and the commission he would have earned had he been allowed to continue. The manner of dismissal does not affect these damages. Where a servant is wrongfully dismissed from his employment the damages for the dismissal cannot include compensation for the manner of the dismissal, for his injured feelings, or for the loss he may sustain from the fact that the dismissal of itself makes it more difficult for him to obtain fresh employment.
Lord Loreburn LC said that an employee cannot recover damages for the manner in which the wrongful dismissal took place, for injured feelings or for any loss he may sustain from the fact that his having been dismissed of itself makes it more difficult for him to obtain fresh employment.
Lord Atkinson – An aggrieved party to a contract ‘is to be paid adequate compensation in money for the loss of that which he would have received had his contract been kept, and nothing more.’
Lord Shaw – ‘Suppose that slander or libel accompanied the dismissal, nothing, as I understand, is here decided to the effect that the slander or libel, which is cognisable by law as a good and separate ground of action, suffers either merger or extinction by reason of proceedings in respect of the breach of contract which such slander or libel accompanied.’

Lord Loreburn LC, Lord Atkinson, Lord Gorrell and Lord Shaw of Dunfermline
[1909] AC 488, [1909] UKHL 1, [1909] UKHL 564
Bailii, Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Distinguished – Malik v Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI); Mahmud v Bank of Credit and Commerce International HL 12-Jun-1997
Allowance of Stigma Damages
The employees claimed damages, saying that the way in which their employer had behaved during their employment had led to continuing losses, ‘stigma damages’ after the termination.
Held: It is an implied term of any contract of employment that . .
Explained – Johnson v Unisys Ltd HL 23-Mar-2001
The claimant contended for a common law remedy covering the same ground as the statutory right available to him under the Employment Rights Act 1996 through the Employment Tribunal system.
Held: The statutory system for compensation for unfair . .
Cited – Dunnachie v Kingston Upon Hull City Council; Williams v Southampton Institute; Dawson v Stonham Housing Association EAT 8-Apr-2003
EAT Unfair Dismissal – Compensation
In each case, The employee sought additional damages for non-economic loss after an unfair dismissal.
Held: The Act could be compared with the Discrimination Acts . .
Considered – Ruxley Electronics and Construction Ltd v Forsyth HL 29-Jun-1995
Damages on Construction not as Agreed
The appellant had contracted to build a swimming pool for the respondent, but, after agreeing to alter the specification to construct it to a certain depth, in fact built it to the original lesser depth, Damages had been awarded to the house owner . .
Cited – Hamilton Jones v David and Snape (a Firm) ChD 19-Dec-2003
The claimant was represented by the respondent firm of solicitors in an action for custody of her children. Through their negligence the children had been removed from the country. She sought damages for the distress of losing her children.
Cited – Dunnachie v Kingston Upon Hull City Council CA 11-Feb-2004
Compensation for non-economic loss brought about by the manner of an unfair dismissal is, on authority and on principle, recoverable. The award of such compensation by the employment tribunal in the present case was not excessive and was adequately . .
Cited – Eastwood and another v Magnox Electric plc; McCabe v Cornwall County Council and others HL 15-Jul-2004
The first claimants were long standing employees. Mr Eastwood fell out with his manager, who disciplined him using false statements. When Williams refused to provide a false statement he too was disciplined. Each claimed damages for the injury to . .
Cited – Wiseman v Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd QBD 29-Jun-2006
The claimant said that he was refused permission to board a flight by the defendants representative without paying a bribe, and was publicly humiliated for not doing so.
Held: Whilst the claimant could recover for his own additional expenses, . .
Cited – Johnson v Gore Wood and Co HL 14-Dec-2000
Shareholder May Sue for Additional Personal Losses
A company brought a claim of negligence against its solicitors, and, after that claim was settled, the company’s owner brought a separate claim in respect of the same subject-matter.
Held: It need not be an abuse of the court for a shareholder . .
Cited – Norton Tool Co Ltd v Tewson NIRC 30-Oct-1972
(National Industrial Relations Court) The court was asked to calculate damages on a dismissal, and particularly as to whether the manner of the dismissal should affect the damages.
Held: The common law rules and authorities on wrongful . .
Cited – Grobbelaar v News Group Newspapers Ltd and Another CA 18-Jan-2001
The claimant had been awarded andpound;85,000 damages in defamation after the defendant had wrongly accused him of cheating at football. The newspaper sought to appeal saying that the verdict was perverse and the defence of qualified privilege . .
Cited – GAB Robins (UK) Ltd v Triggs CA 30-Jan-2008
The claimant had been awarded damages for unfair constructive dismissal. The employer appealed an award of damages for the period prior to the acceptance by the employee of the repudiatory breach.
Held: Where a claimant’s losses arose before . .
Cited – Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust CA 26-May-2010
The claimant, a consultant doctor, sought damages saying that his employer had failed to follow the contract when disciplining and dismissing him. The GMC had dismissed as unfounded the allegation on which the dismissal was based. He sought damages . .
Cited – Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust CA 26-May-2010
The claimant, a consultant doctor, sought damages saying that his employer had failed to follow the contract when disciplining and dismissing him. The GMC had dismissed as unfounded the allegation on which the dismissal was based. He sought damages . .
Cited – Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust SC 14-Dec-2011
The claimant had been employed as consultant surgeon. He had been dismissed in a manner inconsistent with the extress terms of his employment contract. He sought common law damages for the manner of his dismissal. The employer appealed.
Held: . .
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.
Employment, Contract, Damages

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.182098

Parkinson v St James and Seacroft University Hospital NHS Trust: CA 11 Apr 2001

A mother had undergone a negligent sterilisation, and in due course she gave birth to a disabled child.
Held: The right to bodily integrity is the first and most important of the interests protected by the law of tort. The cases saying that damages could not be claimed for the expense of bringing up a child should stand, but there was an exception which allowed the award of the additional, but not basic, costs and expenses of bringing up the child so far as they followed from the disability. Hale LJ stressed the importance of bodily integrity, describing the profound physical and psychological changes involved in pregnancy, as well as the continuing responsibilities, legal and practical, of a mother after giving birth, of which, short of adoption, she cannot rid herself.

Hale LJ, Brooke LJ, Sir Martin Nourse
Times 24-Apr-2001, Gazette 01-Jun-2001, [2001] Lloyd’s Rep Med 309, [2001] EWCA Civ 530, [2001] 3 WLR 376, [2002] QB 266, [2001] PNLR 43, [2002] 2 FCR 65, (2001) 61 BMLR 100, [2001] Fam Law 592, [2001] 2 FLR 401, [2001] 3 All ER 97, [2001] PIQR Q12
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Applied – Groom v Selby CA 18-Oct-2001
The defendant negligently failed to discover the claimant’s pregnancy. A severely disabled child was born. The question was as to the responsibility for payment of excess costs of raising a severely disabled child, a claim for economic loss. The . .
Cited – Rees v Darlington Memorial Hospital NHS Trust HL 16-Oct-2003
The claimant was disabled, and sought sterilisation because she feared the additional difficulties she would face as a mother. The sterilisation failed. She sought damages.
Held: The House having considered the issue in MacFarlane only . .
Cited – Niru Battery Manufacturing Company, Bank Sepah Iran v Milestone Trading Limited CA 23-Oct-2003
The claimant had contracted to purchase lead from some of the defendants. There were delays in payment but when funds were made available they should have been repaid. An incorrect bill of lading was presented. The bill certified that the goods had . .
Cited – Binod Sutradhar v Natural Environment Research Council CA 20-Feb-2004
The defendant council had carried out research into a water supply in India in the 1980s. The claimant drank the water, and claimed damages for having consumed arsenic in it.
Held: There is a close link between the tests in law for proximity . .
Cited – Farraj and Another v King’s Healthcare NHS Trust and Another QBD 26-May-2006
The claimants sought damages after the birth of their child with a severe hereditary disease which they said the defendant hospital had failed to diagnose after testing for that disease. The hospital sought a contribution from the company CSL who . .
Cited – Sutradhar v Natural Environment Research Council HL 5-Jul-2006
Preliminary Report of Risk – No Duty of Care
The claimant sought damages after suffering injury after the creation of water supplies which were polluted with arsenic. He said that a report had identified the risks. The defendant said that the report was preliminary only and could not found a . .
Cited – Ashley and Another v Sussex Police CA 27-Jul-2006
The deceased was shot by police officers raiding his flat in 1998. The claimants sought damages for his estate. They had succeeded in claiming damages for false imprisonment, but now appealed dismissal of their claim for damages for assault and . .
Cited – Meadows v Khan QBD 23-Nov-2017
Claim for the additional costs of raising the claimant’s son, A, who suffered from both haemophilia and autism. It is admitted that, but for the defendant’s negligence, A would not have been born because his mother would have discovered during her . .
Cited – A and B, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for Health SC 14-Jun-2017
The court was asked: ‘Was it unlawful for the Secretary of State for Health, the respondent, who had power to make provisions for the functioning of the National Health Service in England, to have failed to make a provision which would have enabled . .
Cited – Human Rights Commission for Judicial Review (Northern Ireland : Abortion) SC 7-Jun-2018
The Commission challenged the compatibility of the NI law relating to banning nearly all abortions with Human Rights Law. It now challenged a decision that it did not have standing to bring the case.
Held: (Lady Hale, Lord Kerr and Lord Wilson . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Professional Negligence, Damages, Torts – Other

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.147512

Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust: SC 14 Dec 2011

The claimant had been employed as consultant surgeon. He had been dismissed in a manner inconsistent with the extress terms of his employment contract. He sought common law damages for the manner of his dismissal. The employer appealed.
Held: (Lady Hale and Lords Kerr and Wilson dissenting) The appeals succeeded. The statutory scheme replaced the system of damages and remedies available at common law save only where the remedy did not in any way cut across the statutory scheme. Both cases fell within the Johnson v Unysis exclusion area.

Lord Phillips, President, Lord Walker, Lady Hale, Lord Mance, Lord Kerr, Lord Dyson, Lord Wilson
[2011] UKSC 58, (2012) 124 BMLR 51, [2012] ICR 201, [2012] Med LR 93, [2012] IRLR 129, [2012] 2 AC 22, [2012] 2 All ER 278, [2012] 2 WLR 55, UKSC 2010/0122
Bailii, Bailii Summary, SC Summary, SC
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Johnson v Unisys Ltd HL 23-Mar-2001
The claimant contended for a common law remedy covering the same ground as the statutory right available to him under the Employment Rights Act 1996 through the Employment Tribunal system.
Held: The statutory system for compensation for unfair . .
At first instance – 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 . .
Appeal from – Edwards v Chesterfield Royal Hospital NHS Foundation Trust CA 26-May-2010
The claimant, a consultant doctor, sought damages saying that his employer had failed to follow the contract when disciplining and dismissing him. The GMC had dismissed as unfounded the allegation on which the dismissal was based. He sought damages . .
At First Instance – Botham v The Ministry of Defence QBD 26-Mar-2010
botham_modQBD10
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. . .
Cited – Addis v Gramophone Company Limited HL 26-Jul-1909
Mr Addis was wrongfully and contumeliously dismissed from his post as the defendant’s manager in Calcutta. He sought additional damages for the manner of his dismissal.
Held: It did not matter whether the claim was under wrongful dismissal. . .
Cited – Gunton v Richmond-upon-Thames London Borough Council CA 1980
The plaintiff college registrar had been the subject of disciplinary proceedings, but the defendant had not followed the contractual procedure. The judge had ordered an inquiry as to damages on the basis that the Plaintiff was entitled to remain in . .
Cited – Nelson v British Broadcasting Corporation (No 2 ) CA 1980
Mr Nelson was employed as a producer but had in fact been engaged in the Caribbean Service of the BBC in terms of the work which he had actually been doing. The contract of employment expressly provided that he should serve wherever and however he . .
Cited – Eastwood and another v Magnox Electric plc; McCabe v Cornwall County Council and others HL 15-Jul-2004
The first claimants were long standing employees. Mr Eastwood fell out with his manager, who disciplined him using false statements. When Williams refused to provide a false statement he too was disciplined. Each claimed damages for the injury to . .
Cited – System Floors (UK) Ltd v Daniel EAT 14-Oct-1981
Browne-Wilkinson J discussed the status of the statement of main terms of employment: ‘It provides very strong prima facie evidence of what were the terms of the contract between the parties but does not constitute a written contract between the . .
Cited – Malik v Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI); Mahmud v Bank of Credit and Commerce International HL 12-Jun-1997
Allowance of Stigma Damages
The employees claimed damages, saying that the way in which their employer had behaved during their employment had led to continuing losses, ‘stigma damages’ after the termination.
Held: It is an implied term of any contract of employment that . .
Cited – Dr Mohammed Saeed v Royal Wolverhampton Hospitals NHS Trust CA 20-Dec-2000
Where disciplinary proceedings were contemplated against an employee who might be subject to alternative contractual and professional complaints procedures, the employer must look to the contract to decide which procedure was to be followed. If the . .
Cited – Skidmore v Dartford and Gravesham NHS Trust HL 22-May-2003
The disciplinary code for doctors employed by the NHS provides different procedures cases involving allegations of ‘professional conduct’ or ‘personal conduct.’ The first would involve a more judicial process, and the second a more informal . .
Cited – King v University Court of the University of St Andrews SCS 30-Jan-2002
The University had employed the pursuer on terms that it was entitled ‘for good cause shown to terminate the appointment of the employee by giving three months’ notice in writing’. He claimed on two bases, first, a breach of the alleged express term . .
Cited – Gogay v Hertfordshire County Council CA 26-Jul-2000
The employee sought damages for breach of the implied term of trust and confidence, even though she remained throughout the employment of the Council against whom she was bringing proceedings.
Held: Her remaining in employment was a factor . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Employment, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.465938

Olayemi v Athena Medical Centre and Another: EAT 18 Jul 2016

Sex Discrimination: Other Losses – 1. The Claimant suffered PTSD in and after 2008 as a result of a campaign of harassment by the Respondent. She had suffered a previous episode of PTSD which had ended in 2003. The Employment Tribunal reduced the whole of the Claimant’s award for losses caused by her PTSD by 12.5% on the basis that her previous PTSD ‘contributed to the causation’ of the latest episode. Appeal on this ground allowed and matter remitted to the same Employment Tribunal. The Employment Tribunal had not explained why it considered the previous episode of PTSD to have been a material cause of the present episode as opposed to merely rendering the Claimant vulnerable or susceptible to a further episode. In any event, the Employment Tribunal had not considered how the loss should be divided: a blanket reduction of 12.5% could not be justified.
2. The Employment Tribunal deducted housing benefit from the loss of earnings award. Appeal on this ground allowed. Housing benefit legislation enabled re-assessment and ‘claw-back’ of housing benefit in the event of an award in respect of loss of earnings from employment; in such circumstances it should not be deducted. Clenshaw v Tanner [2002] EWCA Civ 1848, Savage v Saxena [1998] IRLR 182 EAT considered.
3. The Employment Tribunal had dealt properly with an issue related to cardiologist’s fee. Appeal on this ground dismissed.
4. The Employment Tribunal had correctly included a Simmons v Castle [2013] 1 All ER 334 uplift. Beckford v London Borough of Southwark [2016] IRLR 178 followed. Cross-appeal dismissed.

David Richardson HHJ
[2016] UKEAT 0140 – 15 – 1807
Bailii
England and Wales

Employment, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.567283

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 first seeking authority to publish.
Held: In a case where the usual remedies for breach of contract were insufficient, it was possible to make an order which would remove from the person in breach of contract, the benefits of the breach. In these circumstances, it was appropriate to award a sum equal to the amount of royalties he would receive from his publisher. The law now recognises a restitutionary claim for profits made from a breach of contract in cases of ‘skimped’ performance, and cases where the defendant obtained his profit by doing ‘the very thing’ he contracted not to do, as here.

Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead Lord Goff of Chieveley Lord Browne-Wilkinson Lord Steyn Lord Hobhouse of Wood-borough
Gazette 17-Aug-2000, Times 03-Aug-2000, [2000] UKHL 45, [2000] 4 All ER 385, [2000] 3 WLR 625, [2001] 1 AC 268
House of Lords, Bailii
Official Secrets Act 1911
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Halifax Building Society v Thomas and Another CA 29-Jun-1995
Defrauded Mortgagee cannot take surplus on sale
A Building Society cannot keep any excess proceeds of sale of a house mortgaged to it by fraud. Policy was against unjust enrichment and will not allow a lender to take a profit from a fraudulent borrower.
Peter Gibson LJ said: ‘I remain wholly . .
Cited – Hogg v Kirby 15-Mar-1803
Injunction to restrain publishing a Magazine as a continuation of the Plaintiff’s Magazine in numbers, and as to communications from correspondents, received by the Defendant while publishing for the Plaintiff ; not preventing the publication of an . .
Cited – Lever v Goodwin CA 1887
In trade mark and patent cases the plaintiff was entitled, if he succeeded in getting an injunction, to take either of two forms of relief: he might claim from the defendant either the damage he had sustained from the defendant’s wrongful act or the . .
Cited – Leeds Industrial Co-operative Society Ltd v Slack HL 1924
The plaintiff complained of a threatened interference with ancient lights.
Held: Damages may be awarded in lieu of an injunction even where the injunction sought is a quia timet injunction, but that power imports a further power to give an . .
Cited – Robinson v Harman 18-Jan-1848
Damages for breach of contract should compensate the victim of the breach for the loss of his contractual bargain. Baron Parke said: ‘The next question is: What damages is the plaintiff entitled to recover? The rule of the common law is, that where . .
Cited – Beswick v Beswick HL 29-Jun-1967
The deceased had assigned his coal merchant business to the respondent against a promise to pay andpound;5.00 a week to his widow whilst she lived. The respondent appealed an order requiring him to make the payments, saying that as a consolidating . .
Preferred – Wrotham Park Estate Ltd v Parkside Homes Ltd ChD 1974
55 houses had been built by the defendant, knowingly in breach of a restrictive covenant, imposed for the benefit of an estate, and in the face of objections by the claimant.
Held: The restrictive covenant not to develop other than in . .
Disapproved – Surrey County Council v Bredero Homes Ltd CA 7-Apr-1993
A local authority had sold surplus land to a developer and obtained a covenant that the developer would develop the land in accordance with an existing planning permission. The sole purpose of the local authority in imposing the covenant was to . .
Cited – Reid-Newfoundland Co v Anglo-American Telegraph Co Ltd PC 1912
A railway company agreed not to transmit any commercial messages over a particular telegraph wire except for the benefit and account of the telegraph company.
Held: The railway company was liable to account as a trustee for the profits it . .
Cited – British Motor Trade Association v Gilbert 1951
The Association had attempted to control the price of cars in the context of statutory support. It was after the Second World war and new cars were in short supply. Buyers of new cars had to contract not to sell the car bought for two years without . .
Cited – Attorney General v De Keyser’s Royal Hotel Ltd HL 10-May-1920
A hotel had been requisitioned during the war for defence purposes. The owner claimed compensation. The AG argued that the liability to pay compensation had been displaced by statute giving the Crown the necessary powers.
Held: There is an . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Damages, Contract, Media

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.77983

Wrotham Park Estate Ltd v Parkside Homes Ltd: ChD 1974

55 houses had been built by the defendant, knowingly in breach of a restrictive covenant, imposed for the benefit of an estate, and in the face of objections by the claimant.
Held: The restrictive covenant not to develop other than in accordance with an agreed lay-out plan was valid. It remained, or had not been shown not to remain, capable of being of benefit to the dominant estate, but the court refused injunctions against developers for breach of the injunction (and retained ownership of the roads) and against house-purchasers because it would be an unpardonable waste of much needed houses to pull them down. No damage of a financial nature had been done to the plaintiffs by breach of the lay-out stipulation. The absence of financially measurable loss flowing from a breach of contract was not necessarily fatal to a claimant’s claim for compensation. It would be unjust that the defendants should ‘be left in undisturbed possession of the fruits of their wrongdoing’ merely because the court considered it wasteful to issue an injunction ordering the demolition of the houses. The court awarded damages as a substitute for an injunction. The damages were measured as the amount that might reasonably have been demanded by the plaintiff as payment for relaxing the covenant – five per cent of the developer’s anticipated profit.
Brightman J said: ‘I turn to the consideration of the quantum of damages. I was asked by the parties to assess the damages myself, should the question arise, rather than to direct an inquiry. The basic rule in contract is to measure damages by that sum of money which will put the plaintiff in the same position as he would have been in if the contract had not been broken. From that basis, the defendants argue that the damages are nil or purely nominal, because the value of the Wrotham Park Estate as the plaintiffs concede is not diminished by one farthing in consequence of the construction of a road and the erection of 14 houses on the allotment site. If, therefore, the defendants submit, I refuse an injunction I ought to award no damages in lieu. That would seem, on the face of it, a result of questionable fairness on the facts of this case. Had the offending development been the erection of an advertisement hoarding in defiance of protest and writ, I apprehend (assuming my conclusions on other points to be correct) that the court would not have hesitated to grant a mandatory injunction for its removal. If, for social and economic reasons, the court does not see fit in the exercise of its discretion, to order demolition of the 14 houses, is it just that the plaintiffs should receive no compensation and that the defendants should be left in undisturbed possession of the fruits of their wrongdoing? Common sense would seem to demand a negative answer to this question’.
And ‘In the present case I am faced with the problem what damages ought to be awarded to the plaintiffs in the place of mandatory injunctions which would have restored the plaintiffs’ rights. If the plaintiffs are merely given a nominal sum, or no sum, in substitution for injunctions, it seems to me that justice will manifestly not have been done.
As I have said, the general rule would be to measure damages by reference to that sum which would place the plaintiffs in the same position as if the covenant had not been broken. Parkside and the individual purchasers could have avoided breaking the covenant in two ways. One course would have been not to develop the allotment site. The other course would have been for Parkside to have sought from the plaintiffs a relaxation of the covenant. On the facts of this particular case the plaintiffs, rightly conscious of their obligations towards existing residents, would clearly not have granted any relaxation, but for present purposes I must assume that it could have been induced to do so. In my judgment a just substitute for a mandatory injunction would be such a sum of money as might reasonably have been demanded by the plaintiffs from Parkside as a quid pro quo for relaxing the covenant.’

Brightman J
[1974] 1 WLR 798, [1974] 2 All ER 321
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Whitwham v Westminster Brymbo Coal and Coke Co CA 24-Jun-1896
Common law damages for the misuse of property involved an award of a sum equivalent to the price or hire that a reasonable person would pay for such use, even if the owner would not himself actually have been using the property. This case involved . .
Cited – Shelfer v City of London Electric Lighting Company, Meux’s Brewery Co v Same CA 1895
The plaintiff sought damages and an injunction for nuisance by noise and vibration which was causing structural injury to a public house.
Held: The court set out the rules for when a court should not grant an injunction for an infringement of . .

Cited by:
Cited – Experience Hendrix LLC v PPX Enterprises Inc and Another CA 20-Mar-2003
The claimant had obtained an interim injunction against the defendant for copyright infringement, though it could show no losses. It now sought additionally damages. The defendant argued that it could not have both.
Held: The case arose form . .
Preferred – 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 – 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 . .
Cited – Surrey County Council and Mole District Council v Bredero Homes Ltd ChD 1992
Land was agreed to be sold for development in accordance with an existing planning permission. Instead a later permission was obtained, and more houses were built. The plaintiff had not sought to restrain or prevent the breach, but now sought . .
Considered – Surrey County Council v Bredero Homes Ltd CA 7-Apr-1993
A local authority had sold surplus land to a developer and obtained a covenant that the developer would develop the land in accordance with an existing planning permission. The sole purpose of the local authority in imposing the covenant was to . .
Applied – Tito v Waddell (No 2); Tito v Attorney General ChD 1977
Equity applies its doctrines to the substance, not the form, of transactions. In respect of the rule against self dealing for trustees ‘But of course equity looks beneath the surface, and applies its doctrines to cases where, although in form a . .
Distinguished – Bracewell v Appleby ChD 1975
The defendant wrongly used and asserted a right of way over a private road to a house which he had built.
Held: To restrain the defendant from using the road would render the new house uninhabitable. The court refused an injunction on the . .
Cited – Carr-Saunders v Dick McNeill Associates 1986
The claim was for interference with the plaintiff’s right to light.
Held: There is a need to approach infringements of easements of light with flexibility. The plaintiff’s subjective views as to the loss of light were not to the point. When . .
Cited – Severn Trent Water Ltd v Barnes CA 13-May-2004
The water company appealed an award of damages after it had been found to have laid a water main under the claimant’s land without his knowledge or consent. The court had awarded restitutionary damages.
Held: The judge fell into error in . .
Approved – Jaggard v Sawyer and Another CA 18-Jul-1994
Recovery of damages after Refusal of Injunction
The plaintiff appealed against the award of damages instead of an injunction aftter the County court had found the defendant to have trespassed on his land by a new building making use of a private right of way.
Held: The appeal failed.
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 . .
Cited – Small v Oliver and Saunders (Developments) Ltd ChD 25-May-2006
The claimant said his property had the benefit of covenants in a building scheme so as to allow him to object to the building of an additional house on a neighbouring plot in breach of a covenant to build only one house on the plot. Most but not all . .
Cited – Regan v Paul Properties DPF No 1 Ltd and others ChD 27-Jul-2006
The claimant sought an injunction claiming that new building works were a nuisance in breaching his rights of light.
Held: The claim for an injunction failed. Whatever may be the position in cases of other wrongful conduct, in the case of an . .
Cited – 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 . .
Cited – Tamares (Vincent Square) Ltd. v Fairpoint Properties (Vincent Square) Ltd ChD 8-Feb-2007
The defendant had been found liable for infringing the claimant’s right of light. The court considered the proper measure of damages.
Held: The court should ask what might be the fair result of a hypothetical negiation for the sale of the . .
Cited – Harris v Williams-Wynne ChD 11-Feb-2005
The parties agreed in sale agreement for a plot of land that the buyer would not erect any additional building. He did so, and when he came to try to sell it the original vendor objected. The purchaser’s solicitors registered the agreement for sale. . .
Cited – Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council v Alwiyah Developments CA 1983
There was to be a development of six flats on land subject to a restrictive covenant. The developer began without a modification being sought. The benefit of the covenant was attached to adjoining land owned by the local authority, which they . .
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 . .
Explained – Stoke-on-Trent City Council v W and J Wass Ltd CA 1988
The council had operated open markets on its land under statutory authority. In breach of the statute, the defendant operated a market on a different day, but within the excluded area. This was a nuisance actionable on proof of damage. The council . .
Cited – Devenish Nutrition Ltd v Sanofi-Aventis Sa (France) and others CA 14-Oct-2008
The defendant had been involved in price fixing arrangements, and the claimant sought damages for breach of its proprietary rights. The claimant appealed refusal of an award an account of profits for what was akin to a breach of statutory duty.
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 – Jones and Another v Ruth and Another CA 12-Jul-2011
The parties were neighbours. The claimants succeeded in their assertion of trespass and nuisance in building works carried out by the defendant. The claimant appealed against the judge’s failure to award damages for harassment, saying that though . .
Cited – HKRUK II (CHC) Ltd v Heaney ChD 3-Sep-2010
The claimant sought a declaration that its property was free of a suggested right of light in favour of its neighbour . .
Cited – One Step (Support) Ltd v Morris-Garner and Another QBD 7-Jul-2014
The defendant had sold her interest in the claimant company, undertaking not to compete. The claimant now sought damages alleging a breach.
Held: The defendants had acted in breach of contract by breaching the non-compete covenants (although . .
Cited – Morris-Garner and Another v One Step (Support) Ltd CA 22-Mar-2016
Alleged breach of non-solicitation covenants in the sale of a business providing ‘supported living’ services for children leaving care and vulnerable adults.
Held: The defendant’s appeal was dismissed.
The test was whether an award of . .
Cited – Morris-Garner and Another v One Step (Support) Ltd SC 18-Apr-2018
The Court was asked in what circumstances can damages for breach of contract be assessed by reference to the sum that the claimant could hypothetically have received in return for releasing the defendant from the obligation which he failed to . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Contract, Damages, Land

Leading Case

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.180884

Rennie v Morrison and Another: SCS 8 Aug 2014

Outer House – (i) The pursuer is the guardian of John Rennie, who was seriously injured when he was run down by a car driven by the first defender. The first defender was subsequently convicted of assaulting Mr Rennie. Following a hearing in September 2013 on the pursuer’s motion for summary decree and interim damages, the second defender was found liable to make reparation to the pursuer, and interim damages were awarded. (2014 SLT 111) In March of this year, the pursuer moved the court to allow a proof, restricted to the issue of quantum. The second defender opposed that motion on the ground that it had averred that Mr Rennie had suffered damage as the result partly of his own fault and, separately, that he had provoked the assault. At the hearing on the motion, it was argued on behalf of the pursuer that the second defender’s averments on both of these issues are irrelevant and lacking in specification.
(ii) I have held that each of the second defender’s cases on contributory negligence and provocation is bound to fail, and I have allowed parties a proof of their averments, restricted to the issue of quantum of damages.

Lord Jones
[2014] ScotCS CSOH – 123
Bailii
Scotland

Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.535843

TLT and Others v The Secretary of State for The Home Department and Another: QBD 24 Jun 2016

Damages for Publication of Asylum Applicants Data

The claimants had been part of the family returns process, returning failed asylum seekers to their countries of origin. The defendant collected data about the process and published a spreadsheet which was intended to provide an anonymous summary of the process, but in fact also contained many private details about the claimants.
Held: The court found that the various defendants were living difficult lives and were variously subject to fear stress and shock. Damages were awarded at between 2500 and 6000 pounds.

Mitting J
[2016] EWHC 2217 (QB)
Bailii
Data Protection Act 1998 13
England and Wales
Citing:
Applied – Google Inc v Vidal-Hall and Others CA 27-Mar-2015
Damages for breach of Data Protection
The claimants sought damages alleging that Google had, without their consent, collected personal data about them, which was resold to advertisers. They used the Safari Internet browser on Apple products. The tracking and collation of the claimants’ . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Information, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.570720

Ur-Rehman v Doncaster Jahia Mosque: EAT 10 Aug 2012

EAT UNFAIR DISMISSAL
Compensation (stigma damage)
Summary dismissal
PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE – Appellate jurisdiction/reasons/Burns-Barke
The Appellant who was unfairly dismissed as imam from the Respondent mosque claimed to have suffered the effects of stigma, consisting of difficulty in obtaining further employment as an imam, because he had taken proceedings to establish his rights against the mosque. The evidence to support this was his dismissal, over a year later, from another mosque. The Tribunal declined to find that this was caused by a trustee of the Respondent advising the new employer to part company with the Claimant before he did the same to it. That finding was open to it, and accordingly the further finding that the evidence was insufficient to establish stigma was justified.
A second ground averred a material misunderstanding of evidence which had been given about the amount of holiday taken. On the facts, having considered the Tribunal’s notes, this too was rejected. The evidence before the Employment Tribunal had been vague, unspecific, contradictory and uncertain and the ET was thus justified in concluding it was too uncertain to permit the claim.

Langstaff P J
[2012] UKEAT 0117 – 12 – 1008
Bailii
England and Wales

Employment, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.463684

Manton Hire and Sales Ltd v Ash Manor Cheese Company Ltd: CA 16 May 2013

The court considered a point as to the duty to mitigate damages

Lloyd, Tomlinson, Floyd LJJ
[2013] EWCA Civ 548
Bailii
England and Wales

Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.510180

Neumeister v Austria: ECHR 7 May 1974

The applicant complained, inter alia, of the length of time he had spent in detention while on remand from 24 February to 12 May 1961, that is, two months and sixteen days, and from 12 July 1962 to 16 September 1964, that is two years, two months and four days. The Court had found that there had been a breach of Article 5(3) in that his detention had been continued for longer than a reasonable time. He was later convicted and sentenced by the Court in Austria, and the time spent on remand had been deducted in full from the time to be served. The court now considered the damages whoch might be awarded.
Held: ‘Some losses must have followed from the excessive prolongation of the detention in question but it proves very difficult to isolate and unravel them from those which Neumeister and the Scherzinger company would have had to bear in any event. The Court does not find it necessary on this point to embark on additional proceedings. In effect, the time the applicant had spent in detention on remand was reckoned as part of his sentence and, more especially, he was granted remission of the remainder of his sentence’. However, in spite of the measures already taken in favour of the applicant in Austria, the damage resulting from the breach of Article 5 (3) ‘in itself’ in addition calls for some element of monetary compensation of which it is for the Court to assess the amount in the light of all the circumstances of the case. Here, the finding of a violation was sufficient to afford just satisfaction. The circumstances of the case included (i) that the detention on remand was justified, and (ii) that the period on remand had been deducted in full from the sentence.

Pallierii P
1936/63, [1974] ECHR 1, [1974] ECHR 1, (1979) 1 EHRR 136, 1936/63
Worldlii, Bailii
European Convention on Human Rights
Citing:
See Also – Neumeister v Austria ECHR 6-Jul-1964
The applicant complained of his excessive detention on remand pending trial, suspected of fraud. . .
See Also – Neumeister v Austria ECHR 27-Jun-1968
Hudoc Violation of Art. 5-3; Just satisfaction reserved . .

Cited by:
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.

Human Rights, Prisons, Damages

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.510158

Lewicki v Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council: UTLC 18 Apr 2013

UTLC COMPENSATION – compulsory purchase – dwelling house – settlements and open market sales as comparables – residual valuations – disturbance – compensation awarded pounds 99,794.45
[2013] UKUT 120 (LC)
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 30 October 2021; Ref: scu.509224

Unknown Owner v Shepway District Council: UTLC 22 Apr 2013

UTLC COMPENSATION – Compulsory purchase – unadopted road – untraceable owner – valuation of freehold interest – compensation determined at pounds 1
Rose
[2013] UKUT 190 (LC)
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 30 October 2021; Ref: scu.509226

Allen v Bloomsbury Health Authority: 1993

The plaintiff sought damages after a failed sterilisation. She had been apprehensive during the pregnancy that the child might be handicapped, and in the event the child suffered from temper tantrums, a speech defect and slight dyslexia.
Held: Damages of andpound;2500 was awarded in respect of pain, suffering and loss of amenities, of which general damages for pain suffering and loss of amenities up to the birth were andpound;1250. Nothing was awarded in respect of the fact that the child had these disabilities. andpound;2500 was awarded because it was the sum which the defendants conceded was proper. The court should award all such expenses as might reasonably be incurred for the education and upkeep of the unplanned child, having regard to the condition in life of the child and the reasonable requirements of the child. That would include expensive schools if that was how the child’s siblings had been educated, even though this might result in ‘a very substantial claim’.
Brooke J
[1993] 1 All ER 651, [1992] 3 Med LR 257, (1992) 13 BMLR 47
Cited by:
Applied – Nunnerley and Another v Warrington Health Authority and Another QBD 26-Nov-1999
Where negligent advice lead to the birth of a disabled child who would not otherwise have been conceived, the damages to be awarded could include the costs of educating and otherwise caring for the child beyond the age of eighteen. Such duties did . .
Cited – MacFarlane and Another v Tayside Health Board HL 21-Oct-1999
Child born after vasectomy – Damages Limited
Despite a vasectomy, Mr MacFarlane fathered a child, and he and his wife sought damages for the cost of care and otherwise of the child. He appealed a rejection of his claim.
Held: The doctor undertakes a duty of care in regard to the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 23 October 2021; Ref: scu.180538

Dutton v Bognor Regis Urban District Council: CA 1972

The court considered the liability in negligence of a Council whose inspector had approved a building which later proved defective.
Held: The Council had control of the work and with such control came a responsibility to take care in performing all associated tasks.
Lord Denning MR said: ‘If Mr Tapp’s submissions were right, it would mean that if the inspector negligently passes the house as properly built and it collapses and injures a person, the council are liable : but if the owner discovers the defect in time to repair it – and he does repair it – the council are not liable. That is an impossible distinction. They are liable in either case’.
Lord Denning MR
[1972] 1 All ER 462, [1972] 2 WLR 299, [1972] 1 QB 373, [1972] CLY 2352
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Donoghue (or M’Alister) v Stevenson HL 26-May-1932
Decomposed Snail in Ginger Beer Bottle – Liability
The appellant drank from a bottle of ginger beer manufactured by the defendant. She suffered injury when she found a half decomposed snail in the liquid. The glass was opaque and the snail could not be seen. The drink had been bought for her by a . .
Cited – Dorset Yacht Co Ltd v Home Office HL 6-May-1970
A yacht was damaged by boys who had escaped from the supervision of prison officers in a nearby Borstal institution. The boat owners sued the Home Office alleging negligence by the prison officers.
Held: Any duty of a borstal officer to use . .
Cited – Rondel v Worsley HL 1967
Need for Advocate’s Immunity from Negligence
The appellant had obtained the services of the respondent barrister to defend him on a dock brief, and alleged that the respondent had been negligent in the conduct of his defence.
Held: The House considered the immunity from suit of . .
Cited – Launchbury v Morgans CA 1971
The wife owned the car. The husband who had drunk to excess drove the car with her permission, causing severe injury to the passengers and his own death. She was not present.
Held: From considerations of policy, as the owner of the family car . .
Cited – SCM (United Kingdom) Ltd v W J Whittall and Son Ltd CA 1970
The defendants’ workmen damaged an electric cable belonging to the electricity board, cutting off several factories, including the plaintiff’s. The defendant sought to have the claim struck out.
Held: The part of the claim arising from . .

Cited by:
Cited – Anns and Others v Merton London Borough Council HL 12-May-1977
The plaintiff bought her apartment, but discovered later that the foundations were defective. The local authority had supervised the compliance with Building Regulations whilst it was being built, but had failed to spot the fault. The authority . .
Cited – Murphy v Brentwood District Council HL 26-Jul-1990
Anns v Merton Overruled
The claimant appellant was a house owner. He had bought the house from its builders. Those builders had employed civil engineers to design the foundations. That design was negligent. They had submitted the plans to the defendant Council for approval . .
Cited – Bellefield Computer Services Limited, Unigate Properties Limited; Unigate Dairies Limited; Unigate (Uk) Limited; Unigate Dairies (Western) Limited v E Turner and Sons Limited Admn 28-Jan-2000
The Defendant builders constructed a steel building to be used as, inter alia. a dairy. The original owners sold it to the appellants. A fire spread from the storage area to the rest of the dairy and caused much damage. The Builders, had they . .
Cited – Rees v Darlington Memorial Hospital NHS Trust HL 16-Oct-2003
The claimant was disabled, and sought sterilisation because she feared the additional difficulties she would face as a mother. The sterilisation failed. She sought damages.
Held: The House having considered the issue in MacFarlane only . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 23 October 2021; Ref: scu.180551

John Doyle Construction Limited v Laing Management (Scotland) Limited: SCS 18 Apr 2002

The pursuer made a loss and expense claim in global form in a construction dispute. He was unable to prove that all of his losses stemmed from the default.
Held: A global claim requires proof that each and every element of the loss claimed followed from the breach. Proof that any event not part of the fault caused any part of the loss would defeat the entire claim. However some common sense should be applied, and where individual losses demonstrably flowed from individual acts of default, a rational apportionment might still be possible.
Lord MacFadyen
Times 10-Jul-2002
Scotland
Citing:
Cited – John Holland Construction and Engineering Pty Ltd v Kvaerner R J Brown Pty Ltd 1996
(Supreme Court of Victoria) The defendant applied to strike out substantial parts of a statement of claim on grounds including that the defendant faced allegations that by reason of breaches of contract the plaintiff had suffered loss of damage, . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 23 October 2021; Ref: scu.170357

McFarlane v Tayside Health Board: OHCS 11 Nov 1996

No damages are awardable for the birth of child following the failure of a vasectomy. It is against public policy to treat the birth of a child as a loss.
Times 11-Nov-1996
Scotland
Cited by:
Appeal from – McFarlane v Tayside Health Board IHCS 8-May-1998
Damages were payable where child born after vasectomy of husband and sperm tests gave false confirmation. This even though gift of a child a normal and healthy process and happy outcome. . .
Outer House – MacFarlane and Another v Tayside Health Board HL 21-Oct-1999
Child born after vasectomy – Damages Limited
Despite a vasectomy, Mr MacFarlane fathered a child, and he and his wife sought damages for the cost of care and otherwise of the child. He appealed a rejection of his claim.
Held: The doctor undertakes a duty of care in regard to the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 23 October 2021; Ref: scu.83533

McFarlane v Tayside Health Board: IHCS 8 May 1998

Damages were payable where child born after vasectomy of husband and sperm tests gave false confirmation. This even though gift of a child a normal and healthy process and happy outcome.
Times 08-May-1998
Scotland
Citing:
Appeal from – McFarlane v Tayside Health Board OHCS 11-Nov-1996
No damages are awardable for the birth of child following the failure of a vasectomy. It is against public policy to treat the birth of a child as a loss. . .

Cited by:
Appeal from – MacFarlane and Another v Tayside Health Board HL 21-Oct-1999
Child born after vasectomy – Damages Limited
Despite a vasectomy, Mr MacFarlane fathered a child, and he and his wife sought damages for the cost of care and otherwise of the child. He appealed a rejection of his claim.
Held: The doctor undertakes a duty of care in regard to the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 23 October 2021; Ref: scu.83534

Girvan v Inverness Farmers Dairy and Another: IHCS 1996

The claimant sought damages. One of the heads of claim that were not in dispute was that the pursuer’s injuries had made it impossible for him to continue as a dedicated clay pigeon shot and had as a result lost the very real prospect of winning substantial cash prizes and other valuable trophies and prizes.
Lord McCluskey
1996 SC 135
Scotland
Cited by:
Appeal from – Girvan v Inverness Farmers Dairy and Another HL 13-Nov-1997
(Scotland) A second re-trial in order to obtain a jury assessment of damages more in line with that assessed by judges would be wrong. Lord Clyde: ‘In a system in which damages may be assessed in different cases either by a jury or by a judge it is . .
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: 22 October 2021; Ref: scu.222514

Shepherd Homes Ltd v Enica Remediation Ltd and Another: TCC 26 Jan 2007

[2007] EWHC 70 (TCC)
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 22 October 2021; Ref: scu.248258

Girvan v Inverness Farmers Dairy and Another: HL 13 Nov 1997

(Scotland) A second re-trial in order to obtain a jury assessment of damages more in line with that assessed by judges would be wrong. Lord Clyde: ‘In a system in which damages may be assessed in different cases either by a jury or by a judge it is essential, not only for the profession, but also for the court both in the making of awards and in the consideration of awards which have been made, for there to be available a convenient record of awards by juries as well as by judges.’
The House will always be slow to interfere with a decision of the Court of Session on matters of procedure and the Court of Session is far better placed than the House can ever be to assess what changes could appropriately be made in procedure and practice relating to the conduct of civil jury trials in that court.
Lord Clyde, Lord Browne-Wilkinson, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, Lord Slynn of Hadley, Lord Hope of Craighead
Times 15-Dec-1997, [1997] UKHL 47, 1998 SC (HL) 1, 1998 SLT 21, 1998 SCLR 72
House of Lords, Bailii
Court of Session Act 1988
Scotland
Citing:
Appeal from – Girvan v Inverness Farmers Dairy and Another IHCS 1996
The claimant sought damages. One of the heads of claim that were not in dispute was that the pursuer’s injuries had made it impossible for him to continue as a dedicated clay pigeon shot and had as a result lost the very real prospect of winning . .

Cited by:
Cited – McTear v Imperial Tobacco Ltd OHCS 31-May-2005
The pursuer sought damages after her husband’s death from lung cancer. She said that the defenders were negligent in having continued to sell him cigarettes knowing that they would cause this.
Held: The action failed. The plaintiff had not . .
Cited – Somerville v Scottish Ministers HL 24-Oct-2007
The claimants complained of their segregation while in prison. Several preliminary questions were to be decided: whether damages might be payable for breach of a Convention Right; wheher the act of a prison governor was the act of the executive; . .
Cited – Bowden v Poor Sisters of Nazareth and others and similar HL 21-May-2008
The appellants said they had suffered abuse while resident at children’s homes run by the respondents. The respondents denied the allegations and said that they were also out of time. The claims were brought many years after the events.
Held: . .
Cited – Callery v Gray (1) and (2) HL 27-Jun-2002
Success fees and ATE premiums were recoverable
Objection was made to a claimed uplift of 20% sought by the plaintiff’s solicitors. The defendant’s insurers said that there had been little at risk for them.
Held: The system of conditional fees insurance had been introduced to remedy defects . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 22 October 2021; Ref: scu.158923

Nab, Regina (on The Application of) v Secretary of State for The Home Department: Admn 13 May 2011

The court set the level of damages for false imprisonment by way of wrongful immigration detention for a period of 82 days.
Irwin J
[2011] EWHC 1191 (Admin)
England and Wales

Updated: 22 October 2021; Ref: scu.439666

Daniels v Thompson: 1998

(Court of Appeal of New Zealand) Thomas J said: ‘Compensation recognises the value attaching to the plaintiff’s interest or right which is infringed, but it does not place a value on the fact the interest or right ought not to have been infringed at all’.
Thomas J
[1998] 3 NZLR 22
Cited by:
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 . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 20 October 2021; Ref: scu.267067

Yin v Rapian Bin Suhaili and others (Brunei Darussalam): PC 20 May 1996

Lord Keith of Kinkel, Lord Jauncey of Tullichettle, Lord Nolan, Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead, Lord Steyn
[1996] UKPC 10
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 20 October 2021; Ref: scu.159170

Regina v Secretary of State for Transport Ex Parte Factortame Ltd and Others (No 5): Admn 31 Jul 1997

A breach of EU law by the UK government was not sufficient to justify or allow the award of punitive damages. Liability had been established. The court considered whether exemplary damages could and should be awarded. In that context liability was best understood as a breach of statutory duty.
Lord Justice Hobhouse Mr Justice Collins Mr Justice Moses
Times 11-Sep-1997, [1997] EWHC Admin 755
Bailii
Citing:
Cited – Garden Cottage Foods Ltd v Milk Marketing Board HL 1984
In English law a breach of statutory duty, is actionable as such by a private individual to whom loss or damage is caused by a breach of that duty. Lord Diplock said that it was quite unarguable: ‘that if such a contravention of Article 86 gives . .
Cited – Bourgoin SA v Minister of Agriculture Fisheries and Food CA 1985
The plaintiffs were French producers of turkeys. They alleged that the Minister revoked their licence to import turkeys into this country by a decision that was ultra vires and motivated by a desire to assist British turkey producers, and that this . .

Cited by:
Cited – Phonographic Performance Limited v Department of Trade and Industry HM Attorney General ChD 23-Jul-2004
The claimant represented the interests of copyright holders, and complained that the defendant had failed to implement the Directive properly, leaving them unable properly to collect royalties in the music rental market. The respondent argued that . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 18 October 2021; Ref: scu.137701

Hayes and Another v Dodd: CA 7 Jul 1988

The court considered what damages might be paid for inconvenience and distress.
Purchas LJ, Staughton LJ, Waller LJ
[1988] EWCA Civ 8, [1990] 2 All ER 815
Bailii
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Johnson v Gore Wood and Co HL 14-Dec-2000
Shareholder May Sue for Additional Personal Losses
A company brought a claim of negligence against its solicitors, and, after that claim was settled, the company’s owner brought a separate claim in respect of the same subject-matter.
Held: It need not be an abuse of the court for a shareholder . .
Cited – Watts and Co v Morrow CA 30-Jul-1991
The plaintiff had bought a house on the faith of the defendant’s report that there were only limited defects requiring repair. In fact the defects were much more extensive. The defendant surveyor appealed against an award of damages after his . .
Cited – Watts and Co v Morrow CA 30-Jul-1991
The plaintiff had bought a house on the faith of the defendant’s report that there were only limited defects requiring repair. In fact the defects were much more extensive. The defendant surveyor appealed against an award of damages after his . .
Cited – Downs and Another v Chappell and Another CA 3-Apr-1996
The plaintiffs had suceeded in variously establishing claims in deceit and negligence, but now appealed against the finding that no damages had flowed from the wrongs. They had been sold a business on the basis of incorrect figures.
Held: . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 16 October 2021; Ref: scu.252501

Lips Maritime Corp. v President of India: PC 1988

Lord Brandon of Oakbrook: ‘There is no such thing as a cause of action in damages for late payment of damages. The only remedy which the law affords for delay in paying damages is the discretionary award of interest pursuant to statute.’
Lord Brandon of Oakbrook
[1988] AC 395
Commonwealth
Cited by:
Cited – Johnson v Gore Wood and Co HL 14-Dec-2000
Shareholder May Sue for Additional Personal Losses
A company brought a claim of negligence against its solicitors, and, after that claim was settled, the company’s owner brought a separate claim in respect of the same subject-matter.
Held: It need not be an abuse of the court for a shareholder . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 16 October 2021; Ref: scu.252498

Director of Buildings and Land v Shun Fung Ironworks Limited: PC 1995

The House considered a claim for compensation in the form of loss of profits.
Held: The loss of profits in the shadow period, being the period after the possibility that the claimant’s site might be resumed became known and which had a paralyzing effect on its operations, were awarded.
Lord Nicholls held that such losses might be recovered if they satisfy three conditions, namely, that the losses were causally connected with the resumption; that they were not too remote; and that they were not losses which a reasonable person would have avoided.
Lord Nicholls said: ‘The purpose of these provisions, in Hong Kong and England, is to provide fair compensation for a claimant whose land has been compulsorily taken from him. This is sometimes described as the principle of equivalence. No allowance is to be made because the resumption or acquisition was compulsory; and land is to be valued at the price it might be expected to realise if sold by a willing seller, not an unwilling seller. But subject to these qualifications, a claimant is entitled to be compensated fairly and fully for his loss. Conversely, and built into the concept of fair compensation, is the corollary that a claimant is not entitled to receive more than fair compensation: a person is entitled to compensation for losses fairly attributable to the taking of his land, but not to any greater amount. It is ultimately by this touchstone, with its two facets, that all claims for compensation succeed or fail.’
‘The law expects those who claim compensation to behave reasonably. If a reasonable person in the position of the claimant would have taken steps to reduce the loss, and the claimant failed to do so, he cannot fairly expect to be compensated for the loss or the unreasonable part of it. Likewise if a reasonable person in the position of the claimant would not have incurred, or would not incur, the expenditure being claimed, fairness does not require that the authority should be responsible for such expenditure.’
Lord Nicholls
[1995] 2 AC 111
England and Wales

Updated: 15 October 2021; Ref: scu.250977

James Buchanan and Company Ltd v Babco Forwarding and Shipping (UK) Ltd: CA 2 Dec 1976

A trailer full of whisky had been stolen. Four fifths of its retail value was excise duty. Because it was to have been exported, duty had not been paid. On the theft the owners had had to pay the duty. The owners sued the carriers for the loss, but the court had to decide the value of the cargo.
Held: At common law the carriers would have to pay the full losses, but the 1965 Act imported the European Convention.
Lord Denning discussed the correct approach to interpretation of an international convention.
Lord Denning MR, Roskill LJ, Lawton LJ
[1976] EWCA Civ 9, [1977] QB 208
Bailii
Carriage of Goods by Road Act 1965
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Bulmer (HP) Ltd v Bollinger SA CA 1974
The plaintiff complained that the respondent had described its drink ‘Babycham’ as a champagne perry, which it said was a misuse of the appellation ‘champagne’.
Held: The court considered the effect of European legislation on the law of . .

Cited by:
Appeal from – James Buchanan and Co Ltd v Babco Forwarding and Shipping (UK) Ltd HL 1978
A consignment of whisky was stolen whilst on consignemt from a bonded warehouse under CMR terms for Teheran. In bond, it was worth 7,000 pounds, and on export no excise duty was to be paid. Being stolen in the course of transit, excise duty of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 15 October 2021; Ref: scu.262714

Gilham v MGN Ltd and Another: QBD 12 Aug 2020

The claimant seeks the court’s determination of the amount(s) to be paid to him by way of compensation pursuant to s.3(5) of the Defamation Act 1996, following his acceptance of a qualified offer of amends.
Lewis HHJ
[2020] EWHC 2217 (QB)
Bailii
Defamation Act 1996 3(5)
England and Wales

Updated: 15 October 2021; Ref: scu.653122

Kirby v Harrogate School Board: CA 1896

The Board had power under the 1870 Act to acquire land to build school accommodation. The 1845 Act was to apply ‘with respect to the purchase of land’ for the purposes of the 1870 Act. The Board began to erect a school building on a site which they had acquired by agreement. The plaintiff alleged that it infringed a restrictive covenant attached to his land, and sought an injunction.
Held: The claim failed. The work was authorised by the statute, and the only remedy for the infringement of the private right was a claim for compensation under section 68 of the 1845 Act.
Lindley LJ thought the language of the 1845 statute to be unhappy, but: ‘when regard is had to the object of the section, it would be misreading the Lands Clauses Act if we were to hold that a person injuriously affected by the construction of the works could not have the benefit of section 68 if the company had managed to acquire the land by agreement rather than by the exercise of their compulsory powers. I have not the slightest doubt myself that s. 68 properly applies to all cases of purchase by railway companies under their powers, and to all cases of purchase by school boards under the powers conferred upon them by this Act of 1870.’
Kay LJ would not confine the words of section 68 to works on land which had been acquired compulsorily.
Lindley LJ, Kay LJ, A L Smith LJ
[1896] 1 CH 437
Elementary Education Act 1870, Land Clauses Consolidation Act 1845
England and Wales
Cited by:
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 . .
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: 14 October 2021; Ref: scu.186374

SJC Construction v Sutton London Borough Council: CA 1976

An appeal was mounted against the decision of the Lands Tribunal to allow the variation of a restrictive covenant under 84(1A)(b) only and not under 84(1A)(a). The tribunal had said that the word ‘substantial’ required applicants to show: ‘that the benefit is not of any real importance in either money terms or in having some other advantage’ The application of the word ‘substantial’ was ‘a question of fact and degree having regard to all the circumstances’; and ‘The question I have asked myself in this case is whether the benefits and advantages to the (covenantee) are of so little weight in relation to what is proposed by the appellants that they can regard as having no real importance.’ The answer in this case was ‘No’.
Held: The award was upheld: ‘the modification of this restrictive covenant clearly resulted in the respondents suffering the loss of a practical benefit of substantial value or advantage. For that substantial loss or disadvantage they were entitled to substantial compensation.’
Stephenson LJ
[1974] 28 P and CR 200, (1975) 234 EG 363, [1976] RVR 219
Law of Property Act 1925 84
England and Wales
Cited by:
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 . .
Cited – Shephard and others v Turner and Another CA 23-Jan-2006
The appellants challenged the removal of a restrictive covenant on a neighbour’s house restricting further building on the land to allow further house in the garden. It was in a small close of houses all erected, and the covenant imposed, in 1952. . .
Cited – Batchelor v Kent County Council LT 1-Mar-1987
The tribunal was asked to determine compensation to be paid on the acquisition of two plots of land. The land-owner claimed andpound;9,000,000 and the council offered andpound;5,490. The land-owner claimed the value as ransom as necessary access to . .
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: 14 October 2021; Ref: scu.186377

Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council v Alwiyah Developments: CA 1983

There was to be a development of six flats on land subject to a restrictive covenant. The developer began without a modification being sought. The benefit of the covenant was attached to adjoining land owned by the local authority, which they intended for a development of accommodation for the aged. The tribunal had refused the application under the limited benefit ground (regarding the impact as less than ‘serious’ but ‘of real importance’), but allowed it under the public interest ground.
Held: The measure of compensation payable on the compulsory acquisition of an easement is the diminution in value of the interest affected and not by reference to a reasonable price that could be extracted for the giving up of the right.
Lord Denning MR said: ‘So, we come back to the question: what is the basis or proper basis of compensation? It is simply to make up ‘for [the] loss or disadvantage suffered’ by the borough council. There is no method prescribed by the Act by which it is to be assessed; it is essentially a question of quantum. It is however, to be assessed for loss of amenities, loss of view and so forth, which are things which it is hard to assess in terms of money . . It is similar to compensation for pain and suffering.’ He referred to the Wrotham Park case and said: ‘The President looked at it in much the same way. He took a higher percentage. Instead of 5% he took 50%. He took the realisable development value and split it equally. That was, he said, fair to the parties. It was a method by which he was getting at the loss or disadvantage. I see no error of law in it. The loss or disadvantage is an intangible matter which is incapable of exact calculation in money, and he took a fair and sensible way of assessing it.’
Stephenson LJ held that the proposed way of calculating compensation was not contrary to the Act or to authority. The modification had resulted in the council losing a benefit of ‘substantial value or advantage’ for which they were entitled to ‘substantial compensation’.
Denning MR, Stephenson and Geoffrey Lane LJJ
[1983] 52 PandCR 278
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Wrotham Park Estate Ltd v Parkside Homes Ltd ChD 1974
55 houses had been built by the defendant, knowingly in breach of a restrictive covenant, imposed for the benefit of an estate, and in the face of objections by the claimant.
Held: The restrictive covenant not to develop other than in . .

Cited by:
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 . .
Cited – Midtown Ltd v City of London Real Property Company Ltd ChD 20-Jan-2005
Tenants occupied land next to land which was to be developed after compulsory acquisition. The tenants and the landlords asserted a right of light over the land, and sought an injunction to prevent the development. The developer denied that any . .
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: 14 October 2021; Ref: scu.186378

Aslani v Sobierajska: QBD 28 Jul 2021

Assessment of damages and ancillary relief in a libel claim
[2021] EWHC 2127 (QB)
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 14 October 2021; Ref: scu.666698

Lithgow And Others v The United Kingdom: ECHR 8 Jul 1986

The applicants complained that on the nationalisation of their interests under the 1977 Act, the compensation awarded had been inadequate and did not reflect their true value.
Held: Convention jurisprudence permits a proportionate restriction on access to a court, provided the essential rights that are in contest from a Convention point of view are not thereby rendered nugatory. The court considered the economic policies which underlay the nationalisation of shipbuilding companies. The assessment of compensation in a nationalisation case was particularly complex and called for different considerations from those which applied to the compulsory acquisition of land where legislation applicable across the board was required.
ECHR No violation of P1-1. The phrase ‘subject to the conditions provided for by law’ requires the existence of and compliance with adequately accessible and sufficiently precise domestic legal provisions. As to the need for a reasonable relationship of proportionality between the means employed and the aim sought to be realised, and the requirement that a balance must be struck between the general interest to the community and protection of the individual’s fundamental rights, the taking of property without reasonable compensation would normally constitute a disproportionate interference.
R Ryssdal, President
9006/80, [1986] ECHR 8, (1986) 8 EHRR 329, 9262/81, 9006/80
Worldlii, Bailii, Bailii
European Convention on Human Rights, Aircraft and Shipbuilding Industries Act 1977
Human Rights
Cited by:
Cited – AXA General Insurance Ltd and Others v Lord Advocate and Others SC 12-Oct-2011
Standing to Claim under A1P1 ECHR
The appellants had written employers’ liability insurance policies. They appealed against rejection of their challenge to the 2009 Act which provided that asymptomatic pleural plaques, pleural thickening and asbestosis should constitute actionable . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 14 October 2021; Ref: scu.227222

Lindsay v Wood: FD 18 Oct 2007

Mackay J
[2007] EWHC 3141 (Fam)
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 13 October 2021; Ref: scu.263394

Les Laboratoires Servier and Another v Apotex Inc and Others: CA 12 Feb 2010

Jacob, Sullivan LJJ, Sir David Keene
[2010] EWCA Civ 279
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 10 October 2021; Ref: scu.406519

Allan v Barclay: IHCS 1864

Lord Kinloch said: ‘The grand rule on the subject of damages is, that none can be claimed except such as naturally and directly arise out of the wrong done; and such, therefore, as may reasonably be supposed to have been in the view of the wrongdoer.’
Lord Kinloch
(1864) 2 M 873
Scotland
Cited by:
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 . .
Applied – Cowan v National Coal Board 1958
An employee of the defenders suffered an injury to his eye in the course of his employment. He became nervous and depressed and committed suicide about four months after the accident. His widow and children sought damages from the National Coal . .
Cited – Corr v IBC Vehicles Ltd CA 31-Mar-2006
The deceased had suffered a head injury whilst working for the defendant. In addition to severe physical consequences he suffered post-traumatic stress, became more and more depressed, and then committed suicide six years later. The claimant . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 10 October 2021; Ref: scu.196522

Inchbald v Western Neilgherry Coffee, Tea and Cinchona Plantation Co Ltd: 1864

The damages for breach of contract for prevention of the fulfilment of a condition will take into account the chance that, irrespective of the breach of contract, the condition would not have been fulfilled anyway.
(1864) 17 CBNS 733
England and Wales
Cited by:
Explained – Thompson v Asda MFI Group Plc 1988
The court considered the implication of a term which would prevent an employer selling a subsidiary so that employees of the subsidiary who had rights under the group share option scheme ceased to be employees for the purpose of that agreement. It . .
Cited – Taylor v Rive Droite Music Ltd ChD 6-Jul-2004
The claimant music producer and songwriter had entered into a publishers agreement with the defendant, agreeing to work for it. He now sought to be free to work for another company. The factual background was unclear, and the contract documentation . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 10 October 2021; Ref: scu.211398

Miliangos v George Frank (Textiles) Ltd: HL 1975

The issue was whether an English court was able to award damages in Sterling only.
Held: The House distinguished clearly between the substance of the debtor’s obligations and the effect of English procedural law when a debt in a foreign currency came to be enforced in England. A judgment debt expressed in a foreign currency must be converted into sterling for enforcement purposes on the date when the court authorises enforcement of the judgment. The general rule in tort is that damages should be assessed as at the date of breach.
The House considered whether it was obliged to follow its own previous decisions. Lord Wilberforce: ‘It is true that since 1966 your Lordships have power to depart from a previous decision of your Lordships’ House; although, in view of the limited resources available to decision-making by a court of law, it is a power which your Lordships have exercised with proper restraint. But the statement of Lord Gardiner LC of July 26, 1966 [Practice Statement: (Judicial Precedent) [1966] 1 WLR 395], expressly asserted that it was ‘not intended to affect the operation of the rule of precedent elsewhere than’ in your Lordships’ House; and it is clear law that the Court of Appeal is bound by a decision of your Lordships’ House and (at least on its civil side) by a previous decision of the Court of Appeal itself: Young v Bristol Aeroplane Co. Ltd [1944] KB 718; [1946] AC 163, 160. Any change in this respect would require legislation.’
Lord Wilberforce said: ‘The substance of the debtor’s obligations depends upon the proper law of the contract (here Swiss law); and though English law (lex fori) prevails as regards procedural matters, it must surely be wrong in principle to allow procedure to affect, detrimentally, the substance of the creditor’s rights. [I]f means exist for giving effect to the substance of a foreign obligation, conformably with the rules of private international law, procedure should not unnecessarily stand in the way.’ and ‘[O]bjections based on authority against making an order in specie for the payment or delivery of foreign money, are not, on examination, found to rest on any solid principle or indeed on more than the Court’s discretion.’
Lord Wilberforce, Lord Cross of Chelsea, Lord Edmund-Davies
[1976] AC 443, [1975] 1 WLR 758
England and Wales
Citing:
Not followed – In re United Railways of Havana and Regla Warehouses Ltd; Tomkinson v First Pennsylvania Banking and Trust Co HL 1960
A sum was held to be due from that company in US dollars under a lease and another agreement which were both governed by the law of Pennsylvania.
Held: The sum provable in the liquidation of the company was to be converted at the rates of . .
Appeal from – Miliangos v George Frank (Textiles) Ltd CA 1975
The court looked at what makes a case decided per incuriam: ‘a case is not decided per incuriam because counsel have not cited all the relevant authorities or referred to this or that rule of court or statutory provision.’ (Lord Denning MR) . .
Cited – Clippens Oil Co v Edinburgh and District Water Trustees HL 1907
A wrongdoer must take his victim as he finds him, and be answerable for the consequences which actually flow from his wrongful act.
Lord Collins said: ‘In my opinion the wrongdoer must take his victim talem qualem, and if the position of the . .

Cited by:
Cited – Smith and Another v South Gloucestershire Council CA 31-Jul-2002
The claimants purchased land. The local search did not reveal a planning permission which affected the value of the property by applying an occupancy condition. He claimed compensation. Compensation was eventually agreed to be payable, but the . .
Cited – Lesotho Highlands Development Authority v Impregilo Spa and others CA 31-Jul-2003
The parties went to arbitration to resolve disputes in a construction contract. The award appeared to have been made for payment in currencies different from those set out in the contract. The question was asked as to whether the award of interest . .
Cited – Barings Plc (In Liquidation) and Another, Barings Futures (Singapore) Pte Ltd (In Liquidation) v Coopers and Lybrand (A Firm) and Others, Mattar and 36 Others ChD 17-Oct-2003
BFS was a company incorporated in Singapore which conducted its internal affairs in Singapore Dollars. It was by statute required to render its accounts in that currency. It paid its staff in Singapore Dollars. It sought damages in Singapore . .
Cited – In re Telewest Communications Plc ChD 26-Apr-2004
A scheme of arrangement had been proposed. The creditor complained that in providing for payment in a currency other than that agreed, it had been prejudiced.
Held: The provision in the scheme did purport to alter the claimant’s rights. . .
Cited – Carnegie v Glessen and Others CA 1-Mar-2005
A dispute had been settled by imposition of a charging order against property expressed in a foreign currency. The claimant now said such an order was not possible, and had been made by mistake correctable under the slip rule.
Held: The Master . .
Cited – Lesotho Highlands Development Authority v Impregilo Spa and others HL 30-Jun-2005
The House had to consider whether the arbitrator had acted in excess of his powers under s38, saying the arbitrator had misconstrued the contract. The arbitrator had made his award in different currencies.
Held: The question remained whether . .
Cited – National Westminster Bank plc v Spectrum Plus Limited and others HL 30-Jun-2005
Former HL decision in Siebe Gorman overruled
The company had become insolvent. The bank had a debenture and claimed that its charge over the book debts had become a fixed charge. The preferential creditors said that the charge was a floating charge and that they took priority.
Held: The . .
Cited – James, Regina v; Regina v Karimi CACD 25-Jan-2006
The defendants appealed their convictions for murder, saying that the court had not properly guided the jury on provocation. The court was faced with apparently conflicting decision of the House of Lords (Smith) and the Privy Council (Holley).
Cited – Desnousse v London Borough of Newham and others CA 17-May-2006
The occupier had been granted a temporary licence by the authority under the homelessness provisions whilst it made its assessment. The assessment concluded that she had become homeless intentionally, and therefore terminated the licence and set out . .
Cited – 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 – 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 – William John Henry Johnson v Gore Wood and Co CA 3-Dec-2003
. .
Cited – Alcoa Minerals of Jamaica Inc v Herbert Broderick PC 20-Mar-2000
(Jamaica) Damage had been caused to the claimant’s property, but, because of his lack of funds, he was dependent upon the receipt of the damages to carry out the works of repair necessary. By the time the matter came to trial, inflation meant that . .
Cited – Phillips v Mulcaire SC 24-May-2012
The claimant worked as personal assistant to a well known public relations company. She alleged that the defendant had intercepted telephone message given by and left for her. The court was asked first as to whether the information amounted to . .
Cited – LB Holdings Intermediate 2 Ltd, The Joint Administrators of v Lehman Brothers International (Europe), The Joint Administrators of and Others SC 17-May-2017
In the course of the insolvent administration of the bank, substantial additional sums were received. Parties appealed against some orders made on the application to court for directions as to what was to be done with the surplus.
Held: The . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 10 October 2021; Ref: scu.182981

Heaton and others v AXA Equity and Law Life Assurance Society Plc and Another: CA 19 May 2000

Where a claimant had settled one claim with one of two joint tortfeasors on an issue which also concerned the action against the second, it was a matter for interpretation of that settlement as to whether or not the claimant could continue the action against the remaining defendant. In such an action where the claimant had received full compensation the defendant in the second action could seek a contribution from the defendant in the first.
Times 07-Jun-2000, [2000] EWCA Civ 164, [2000] 3 WLR 1341, [2001] Ch 173, [2001] CP Rep 10, [2000] 4 All ER 673, [2000] CPLR 505
Bailii
Civil Liability (Contributions) Act 1978
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Jameson and Another v Central Electricity Generating Board and others HL 16-Dec-1998
A joint tortfeasor’s concurrent liability was discharged entirely by a full and final settlement and compromise of the claim against the other tortfeasor if in respect of the same harm. A dependency claim made by the claimant’s executors could not . .
Appeal from – Heaton and Others v Axa Equity and Law Life Assurance Society Plc and Axa Equity and Law Unit Trust Managers Limited ChD 27-May-1999
Where a plaintiff settled a claim against one of two defendants, the court would be ready to look carefully at the full details of the settlement to see whether or not the co-defendant was intended also to be released by or under the terms of that . .

Cited by:
Appeal from – Heaton and Others v AXA Equity and Law Life Assurance Society plc and Another HL 25-Apr-2002
The claimant had settled one claim in full and final satisfaction against one party, but then sought further damages from the defendant, for issues related to a second but linked contract. The defendant claimed the benefit of the settlement.
Updated: 10 October 2021; Ref: scu.147197

Evis and Smith v Commission for New Towns: LT 31 Dec 2000

LT COMPENSATION – preliminary issue – disturbance payment – Land Compensation Act 1973 s 37 – business premises acquired by authority with compulsory purchase powers – land later developed by company with lease from authority – entitlement to compensation under Landlord and Tenant Act 1954 s 37 – whether such entitlement precludes compensation under 1973 Act s 37(1)(a) – whether fact that development not carried out by authority precludes compensation under s 37(1)(c) – held compensation under s 37(1)(a) not precluded but no entitlement under s 37(1)(c)
ACQ/125-7/2000
Land Compensation Act 1973 37
England and Wales

Updated: 10 October 2021; Ref: scu.170276

Sovmots Investments Ltd v Secretary of State for the Environment: HL 28 Apr 1977

The section in the 1881 Act does not apply to a quasi-easement because ‘When land is under one ownership one cannot speak in any intelligible sense of rights, or privileges, or easements being exercised over one part for the benefit of another. Whatever the owner does, he does as owner and, until a separation occurs of ownership, or at least of occupation, the condition for the existence of rights, etc., does not exist.’ and ‘He cannot grant or agree to grant land and at the same time deny to his grantee what is at the time of the grant obviously necessary for its reasonable enjoyment.’
Lord Edmund-Davies said as to Wheeldon v Burrows: ‘The basis of such propositions is, as Lord Parker of Waddington stressed in Pwllbach Colliery Co Ltd v Woodman [1915] A.C. 624, 646, that ‘The law will readily imply the grant or reservation of such easements as may be necessary to give effect to the common intention of the parties to a grant of real property . . ‘ But there is no common intention between an acquiring authority and the party whose property is compulsorily taken from him, and the very basis of implied grants of easements is accordingly absent.’
Lord Keith of Kinkel said that both the rule in Wheeldon v Burrows and the provisions of section 62 of the 1925 Act had ‘no place in compulsory purchase’.
Lord Wilberforce rejected the submission that the rule in Wheeldon v Burrows could apply in a case where the conveyance was made pursuant to a compulsory purchase order: ‘To apply this to a case where a public authority is taking from an owner his land without his will is to stand the rule on its head: it means substituting for the intention of a reasonable voluntary grantor the unilateral, opposed, intention of the acquirer’
and ‘section 62 does not fit this case. The reason is that when land is under one ownership one cannot speak in any intelligible sense of rights, or privileges, or easements being exercised over one part for the benefit of another. Whatever the owner does, he does as owner and, until a separation occurs, of ownership or at least of occupation, the condition for the existence of rights, etc., does not exist
Lord Wilberforce, Lord Edmund-Davies, Lord Keith of Kinkel
[1979] AC 144, [1977] UKHL 3, [1977] 2 All ER 385, [1977] 2 WLR 951, [1977] QB 411
Bailii
Conveyancing Act 1881 6, Law of Property Act 1925 62
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Sovmots Investments Ltd v Secretary of State for the Environment 1977
. .
Cited – Wheeldon v Burrows CA 17-Jun-1879
Quasi-Easements granted on sale of part of Estate
S owned a workshop and an adjoining plot of land. The workshop had three windows looking out over the plot. The property was sold in separate lots at auction. The land was sold with no express reservation of any easements, and then similarly the . .
Cited – Bolton v Bolton ChD 10-May-1879
A contract to sell land with the appurtenances does not pass a right to a way to the land sold which the vendor has used over adjoining land of his own.
Where a grantee is entitled to a way of necessity over another tenement belonging to the . .
Cited – Long v Gowlett 1923
Except where a right claimed is continuous and apparent, there must be diversity of ownership or occupation prior to the conveyance for section 62 (1) to apply. . .

Cited by:
Cited – Akumah v London Borough of Hackney HL 3-Mar-2005
The authority set up a parking scheme for an estate of house of which it was the landlord. Those not displaying parking permits were to be clamped. The appellant complained that the regulations had been imposed by council resolution, not be the . .
Cited – Millman v Ellis CA 1996
The defendant had sold part of his land to the claimant. A right of way was granted over a lane. The purchaser asserted that he had the use of a lay-by on the lane which would otherwise be dangerous. The vendor said the plan did not include a right . .
Cited – Kent and Another v Kavanagh and Another CA 2-Mar-2006
The parties owned properties part of a building estate. The properties had been held under leases, but those had been enfranchised. The question was as to how the easements granted by the leases were preserved on enfranchisement. A particular . .
Cited – Sainsbury’s Supermarkets Ltd, Regina (on The Application of) v Wolverhampton City Council and Another SC 12-May-2010
The appellant’s land was to be taken under compulsory purchase by the Council who wished to use it to assist Tesco in the construction of a new supermarket. Tesco promised to help fund restoration of a local listed building. Sainsbury objected an . .
Cited – Campbell and Another v Banks and Others CA 1-Feb-2011
The court considered the creation by section 62 of the 1925 Act automatically of easements when land was divided. The claimants owned land bounded on either side by properties beloinging to the respondents. The properties had once been in common . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 10 October 2021; Ref: scu.223148

Burdis v Livsey: QBD 2001

The several cases claimed the cost of provision by credit hire companies of car hire and repair services to the innocent victims of road accidents. The transactions were ‘res inter alios acta’ – collateral to the commission of the tort.
Gray J
[2003] QB 36, [2001] 1 WLR 1751
Consumer Credit Act 1974 60 61, Consumer Credit (Exempt Agreements) Order 1989, Consumer Credit (Agreements) Regulations 1983
England and Wales
Cited by:
Appeal from – Lagden v O’Connor HL 4-Dec-2003
The parties had been involved in a road traffic accident. The defendant drove into the claimant’s parked car. The claimant was unable to afford to hire a car pending repairs being completed, and arranged to hire a car on credit. He now sought . .
Cited – Bee v Jenson ComC 21-Dec-2006
The defendant objected to paying the plaintiff the costs of a replacement hire car after the accident for which he was liable. He said that the plaintiff was in any event insured to recover that cost, and the insurance company were subrogated to the . .
Cited – Southern Pacific Mortgage Ltd v Heath CA 5-Nov-2009
The court considered the effect of an agreement within the 1974 Act falling into more than one category of agreement. Part was used to be used for the repayment of an existing mortgage (restricted use credit), and part was unrestricted. The question . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 08 October 2021; Ref: scu.188634

Ex parte Llynvi Coal and Iron Co; In re Hide: 1871

The trustee in bankruptcy disclaimed an agreement for a lease under Section 23. The landlord claimed to prove as creditor under the section.
Held: Where one party has repudiated a contract and the other party has accepted that repudiation as terminating the contract and he then exercises his secondary right to claim damages ‘Surely he is to prove for the damage which could be recovered for the breach of the contract.’ ‘I am satisfied that the injury referred to in the sub-section means the legal wrong that is done him. He is deprived of a certain contract, under which he was to recover a certain sum of money, and he is to prove against the estate for that which he would have had a right to recover or to sue for if he had not been deprived of that right by the bankruptcy.’ and ‘A landlord who has made a contract for andpound;500 a year, to be paid to him for the use of the land, is entitled to claim andpound;500 a year, minus what he can get for the land from another tenant.’
Mellish LJ said: ‘It is quite plain that the object of these sections is that the bankrupt should be absolutely relieved from any liability under any contract he has ever entered into. And the bankrupt being so relieved, it is plainly also the intention of the Legislature that the person deprived of the right of action against the bankrupt, and of the benefit of the contract which he made with the bankrupt, should be turned into a creditor in respect of what the Act describes the injury he has received. That, I think, must mean in respect of what he would have been entitled to recover against the bankrupt if the bankrupt had remained solvent. It would be contrary to every principle that in assessing the damages which could have been recovered against the bankrupt if he had not been made bankrupt, and for which proof is made, you are to take into consideration the fact of the bankrupt being insolvent, so that the amount of the proof is to depend upon the extent of his insolvency.’ and ‘In estimating the amount of damages, you are to take into consideration that the landlord regains possession of the property, and if he can get as much rent for the property afterwards as before, then the damages would be nil:if he gets less, it will be the difference.’
Sir G Mellish LJ, James LJ
(1871) LR 7 Ch App 28, [1871] UKLawRpCh 133
Commonlii
Bankruptcy Act 1869 23
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – In Re Park Air Services Plc; Christopher Moran Holdings Ltd v Bairstow and Another HL 4-Feb-1999
The tenant company went into liquidation, the receiver disclaimed the lease, and the landlord claimed compensation under the Act. The question concerned how the compensation was to be calculated.
Held: Where a solvent tenant under an onerous . .
Cited – Park Air Services Plc; Christopher Moran Holdings Limited v Bairstow and Ruddock CA 1-May-1997
If a lease is determined or treated as determined in a winding up or in a bankruptcy, the landlord is entitled to prove in principle for all the rent and other payments which he would have been entitled to recover from the tenant for the residue of . .
Cited – In re Nortel Companies and Others SC 24-Jul-2013
The court was asked as to the interrelationship of the statutory schemes relating to the protection of employees’ pensions and to corporate insolvency.
Held: Liabilities which arose from financial support directions or contribution notices . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 08 October 2021; Ref: scu.197009

Sycamore Bidco Ltd v Breslin and Another: ChD 14 Feb 2013

The court considered whether it was correct to award interest on the sum of damages for the period before as well as after judgment, and if so, from what date and at what rate of interest..
Mann J
[2013] EWHC 174 (Ch)
Bailii
Judgments Act 1838 17, Senior Courts Act 1981 35A
England and Wales
Citing:
Principal judgment – Sycamore Bidco Ltd v Breslin and Another ChD 30-Nov-2012
The court considered a claim in breach of warranty and misrepresentation in a share purchase transaction.
Held: There had been no representation as suggested, and therefore no misrepresentation. There had however been a breach of warranty. . .
See Also – Sycamore Bidco Ltd v Breslin and Another ChD 17-Jan-2013
. .
Cited – General Tire v Firestone Tyre and Rubber Company Limited HL 1975
The object of damages is to compensate for loss or injury. The general rule for ‘economic’ torts is that the measure is that sum of money which will put the injured party in the same position as he would have been in if he had not sustained the . .
Cited – BP Exploration Co (Libya) Ltd v Hunt (No 2) 1979
The contract between the parties relating to an oil concession in Libya had been frustrated by the nationalisation of the field.
Held: The court considered the setting of damages where the plaintiff had delayed in notifying the defendant of . .
Cited – London, Chatham and Dover Railway Co v South Eastern Railway Co HL 1893
The Lord Chancellor was considering the position of a creditor whose debtor refused to exchange accounts as agreed, thus preventing the creditor from quantifying the debt.
Held: The House declined to alter the rule in Page -v- Newman.
Cited by:
See Also – Sycamore Bidco Ltd v Breslin and Another ChD 18-Mar-2013
. .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 October 2021; Ref: scu.470988

Green and Another v Alexander Johnson (A Firm) and Another: ChD 26 May 2004

The judgment related to the assessment of damages for professional negligence by the defendants. The court deprecated the practice of separating off assessments of damages from the principal claim, since this created a risk of confusion. The defendants had advised on applications to extend leases, and had failed to deny that they qualified to be extended, and new leases had to be granted.
Held: The difficulties would have occurred whether or not correct advice had been given, and the court was unable to say the negligence was the cause of the damage. The basis for the credit to be given for the claim was the amount of valuation, not the sums actually received.
The Honourable Mr Justice Peter Smith
[2004] EWHC 1205 (Ch)
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
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 . .
Cited – In re the Oropesa CA 1943
Two steam vessels collided. One’s Master sent fifty of his crew in boats to the other ship and about an hour and a half after the collision decided himself to go to that ship and confer with her Master on measures to be taken. He transferred in . .
Cited – Bell v Peter Browne and Co CA 1990
Mr Bell asked his solicitors to transfer the matrimonial home into his wife’s sole name. He was to receive a one-sixth interest of the gross proceeds on a sale. His interests were to be protected by a trust deed or mortgage. The solicitor drafted . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 October 2021; Ref: scu.197841

Archer v Brown: 1984

The defendant sold shares in his company to the plaintiff. He had however already sold them elsewhere. The plaintiff sought both rescission and damages. The defendant argued that he could not be entitled to both.
Held: The misrepresentation had been fraudulent and both rescission and damages might be available. In this case the loss, the cost of borrowing flowed directly from the fraud perpetrated by the defendant. Aggravated but not exemplary damages might also be awarded. Peter Pain J said: ‘But what seems to put the claim under this head out of court is the fact that exemplary damages are meant to punish and the defendant has been punished. Even if he wins his appeal he will have spent a considerable time in gaol. It is not surprising that there is no authority as to whether this provides a defence, since there is no direct authority as to whether exemplary damages can be given in deceit. I rest my decision on the basic principle that a man should not be punished twice for the same offence. Since he has undoubtedly been punished, I should not enrich the plaintiff by punishing the defendant again.’
Peter Pain J
[1985] QB 401, [1984] 2 All ER 267
Prevention of Fraud (Investments) Act 1958
England and Wales
Citing:
Applied – Doyle v Olby (Ironmongers) Ltd CA 31-Jan-1969
The plaintiff had been induced by the fraudulent misrepresentation of the defendant to buy an ironmonger’s business for 4,500 pounds plus stock at a valuation of 5,000 pounds. Shortly after the purchase, he discovered the fraud and started the . .
Applied – Esso Petroleum Company Ltd v Mardon CA 6-Feb-1976
Statements had been made by employees of Esso in the course of pre-contractual negotiations with Mr Mardon, the prospective tenant of a petrol station. The statements related to the potential throughput of the station. Mr Mardon was persuaded by the . .

Cited by:
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 . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 30 September 2021; Ref: scu.276908

Sidhu and Others v British Airways Plc; Abnett (Known as Sykes) v Same: HL 13 Dec 1996

The claimants had been air passengers who were unlawfully detained in Kuwait, when their plane was captured whilst on the ground on the invasion of Kuwait. They sought damages for that detention.
Held: There are no exceptions to the Warsaw Convention rules. The courts should take a purposive construction of the Act: ‘the answer to the question raised in the present case is to be found in the objects and structure of the Convention. The language used and the subject matter with which it deals demonstrate that what was sought to be achieved was a uniform international code, which could be applied by the courts of all the High Contracting Parties without reference to the rules of their own domestic law.’ If a remedy for the injury is not available under the Convention, it is not available at all.
Lord Hope reached the conclusion that the Convention was intended to be comprehensive and exclusive, allowing for the existence of no liabilities other than those for which it provided. He said: ‘The phrase ‘the cases covered by article 17’ extends therefore to all claims made by the passenger against the carrier arising out of international carriage by air, other than claims for damage to his registered baggage which must be dealt with under article 18 and claims for delay which must be dealt with under article 19. The words ‘however founded’ which appear in article 24(1) and are applied to passenger’s claims by article 24(2) support this approach. The intention seems to be to provide a secure regime, within which the restriction on the carrier’s freedom of contract is to operate. Benefits are given to the passenger in return, but only in clearly defined circumstances to which the limits of liability set out by the Convention are to apply. To permit exceptions, whereby a passenger could sue outwith the Convention for losses sustained in the course of international carriage by air, would distort the whole system, even in cases for which the Convention did not create any liability on the part of the carrier. Thus the purpose is to ensure that, in all questions relating to the carrier’s liability, it is the provisions of the Convention which apply and that the passenger does not have access to any other remedies, whether under the common law or otherwise, which may be available within the particular country where he chooses to raise his action. The carrier does not need to make provision for the risk of being subjected to such remedies, because the whole matter is regulated by the Convention.’ and
‘Here again it seems that a balance has been struck in the interests of uniformity of treatment and of certainty. I see no sign in the generality with which these provisions have been expressed of a recognition that there may be some actions of damages arising from the international carriage of passengers by air which are not subject to these rules. It would be largely destructive of the system which this chapter seems to have been designed to lay down if a passenger were to be able, for example, to maintain a claim of damages for non-bodily injury, for loss of or damage to the personal possessions which he had with him inside the aircraft or for economic loss, outside the conditions and limits set by the Convention while maintaining a claim under the Convention for the bodily injury. . ‘
Otherwise Abnett v British Airways
Lord Browne-Wilkinson, Lord Jauncey of Tullichettle, Lord Mustill, Lord Steyn, Lord Hope of Craighead
Gazette 15-Jan-1997, Times 13-Dec-1996, [1996] UKHL 5, [1997] AC 431, [1997] All ER 193, [1997] 2 WLR 26,
House of Lords, Bailii
Warsaw Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules regarding International Air Transport 1929, Carriage by Air Act 1961
Scotland
Citing:
Appeal from – Abnett v British Airways Plc (Scotland) IHCS 28-Apr-1995
A passenger wrongfully detained in Kuwait, whilst travelling at the time when Iraq invaded Kuwait, only has right to claim damages under Warsaw Convention. . .
Cited – Grein v Imperial Airways Ltd CA 1937
A passenger met his death whilst travelling on a return air ticket between London and Antwerp. Belgium was not a state contracting under the Convention.
Held: Belgium was engaged on ‘international carriage’ within the meaning of the . .
Cited – Fothergill v Monarch Airlines Ltd HL 10-Jul-1980
The plaintiff, on arriving at the airport found that his luggage had been lost. The defendant denied liability saying he had not notified his claim within the requisite period.
Held: Elementary justice requires that the rules by which the . .
Cited – Gatewhite v Iberia Lineas Aereas de Espana SA 1990
In a contract for the carriage of goods by air, the court considered whether the owner of goods who had not been named as the consignor or consignee on the air waybill was entitled to sue the carrier for damages to the goods while in transit.
Cited – T v Secretary of State for the Home Department HL 22-May-1996
The applicant for asylum had been involved in an airport bomb attack killing 10 people. Asylum had been refused on the basis that this was a non-political crime. Though the organisation had political objectives, those were only indirectly associated . .

Cited by:
Cited – Deep Vein Thrombosis and Air Travel Group Litigation HL 8-Dec-2005
The appellants had suffered deep vein thrombosis whilst travelling on long haul air flights. The defendants said that their liability was limited because the injuries were not accidents.
Held: The claimants’ appeal failed. The definition of . .
Cited – Barclay v British Airways Plc CA 18-Dec-2008
The claimant sought damages for personal injury. The airline said that the injury was not the result of an accident within article 17.1. She was walking down the aisle and slipped.
Held: The appeal was dismissed. The meaning of ‘accident’ . .
Cited – Laroche v Spirit of Adventure (UK) Ltd CA 21-Jan-2009
Hot Air balloon was an aircraft: damages limited
The claimant was injured flying in the defendant’s hot air balloon. The defendant said that the journey was covered by the 1967 Regulations and the damages limited accordingly. The claimant appealed against a decision that the balloon was an . .
Cited – Dawson v Thomson Airways Ltd CA 19-Jun-2014
The claimant’s flight had been delayed for six hours. The airline said that the claim having been made outside the two year period applicable under the Montreal convention, no compensation was payable.
Held: The claimant’s appeal failed. ‘We . .
Cited – Stott v Thomas Cook Tour Operators Ltd SC 5-Mar-2014
The Court was asked whether a person may recover damages for discomfort and injury to feelings caused by a breach of the 2007 Regulations, which implement EC Regulation No. 1107/2006. The disabled passenger claimant alleged failure by the defendant . .
Cited – Warner v Scapa Flow Charters (Scotland) SC 17-Oct-2018
This appeal raises a question about the interpretation of article 16 of the Athens Convention relating to the Carriage of Passengers and their Luggage by Sea 1974 (‘the Athens Convention’) and its application to the Scots law of limitation of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 September 2021; Ref: scu.89254

King v Bristow Helicopters Ltd; Morris v KLM Royal Dutch Airlines: HL 28 Feb 2002

Psychiatric Injury under Warsaw Convention

The applicants were passengers who claimed damages for psychiatric injury, after accidents in aircraft.
Held: The Convention created strict liability on air carriers, but explicitly restricted damages to be payable for ‘bodily injury’. That term did not include mental injury, and the awards for such were overturned. The brain as a part of the body was perfectly capable of being injured, and where the injury had a physical manifestation, damages were claimable. There was respectable medical support for the view that, for example, a major depressive disorder was the expression of physical changes in the brain and its hormonal chemistry. Such physical changes were capable of amounting to an injury and, if they did, they were bodily injuries. Also cases of post-traumatic stress disorder which had been shown to have a physical element in changes of the brain had been successful. The rights of a claimant are exclusively defined in the Convention; if the Convention gives no remedy then the alleged wrong will not be satisfied at law. Lord Hope: statutes of the ‘always speaking’ type: should be interpreted in the light of the current scientific evidence . . The proper approach is to make use of the best current medical and scientific knowledge that is available.’
Lord Hope stated the convention ‘was not based on the legal system of any of the contracting states. It was intended to be applicable in a uniform way across legal boundaries’, and ‘the language used should be construed on broad principles leading to a result that is generally acceptable’
Lord Hobhouse of Woodborough stated that the purpose of uniformity required the national court to ‘put to one side its views about its own law and other countries’ laws’ and focus on the question ‘what do the actual words used mean?’
Lord Nicholls of Birkenhead, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, Lord Steyn, Lord Hope of Craighead and Lord Hobhouse of Woodborough
Times 01-Mar-2002, Gazette 28-Mar-2002, [2002] UKHL 7, [2002] 2 AC 628, [2002] 2 WLR 578
House of Lords, Bailii
Warsaw Convention on International Carriage by Air 1929 17, Carriage by Air Act 1961
Scotland
Citing:
Cited – Weaver v Delta Airlines Inc 30-Jun-1999
(United States District Court, D. Montana, Billings Division.) . .
Appeal from – Morris v KLM Royal Dutch Airlines CA 17-May-2001
An unaccompanied female passenger aboard an aircraft was indecently assaulted. She suffered mental, but no physical, injury. She claimed damages against the airline under the Convention.
Held: The assault was a special risk inherent in air . .

Cited by:
Cited – In re Deep Vein Thrombosis and Air Travel Group Litigation QBD 20-Dec-2002
The claimants claimed to have suffered deep vein thrombosis having been sat in cramped conditions for long periods whilst travelling by air. They sought compensation, saying that the failure by the airlines to warn them and take steps to minimise . .
Cited – Glen and Other v Korean Airlines Company Ltd QBD 28-Mar-2003
The claimant sought damages for personal injuries under the Act. The injuries were psychiatric, being suffered when they witnessed a crash from the ground.
Held: Psychiatric injury is a recognised form of personal injury, and no statute . .
Cited – GKN Westland Helicopters Ltd and Another v Korean Air Lines Co Ltd; Press Tech Controls Ltd v Same ComC 19-May-2003
The sum accepted as a payment in, in an air carriage case was capable of being the ‘amount of damages’ awarded under the convention. That it exceeded the amount offered in settlement negotiations meant that the rights to costs under article 22.4 . .
Cited – Regina (Smeaton) v Secretary of State for Health and Others Admn 18-Apr-2002
The claimant challenged the Order as regards the prescription of the morning-after pill, asserting that the pill would cause miscarriages, and that therefore the use would be an offence under the 1861 Act.
Held: ‘SPUC’s case is that any . .
Cited – Regina (Smeaton) v Secretary of State for Health and Others Admn 18-Apr-2002
The claimant challenged the Order as regards the prescription of the morning-after pill, asserting that the pill would cause miscarriages, and that therefore the use would be an offence under the 1861 Act.
Held: ‘SPUC’s case is that any . .
Cited – Deep Vein Thrombosis and Air Travel Group Litigation HL 8-Dec-2005
The appellants had suffered deep vein thrombosis whilst travelling on long haul air flights. The defendants said that their liability was limited because the injuries were not accidents.
Held: The claimants’ appeal failed. The definition of . .
Cited – Barclay v British Airways Plc CA 18-Dec-2008
The claimant sought damages for personal injury. The airline said that the injury was not the result of an accident within article 17.1. She was walking down the aisle and slipped.
Held: The appeal was dismissed. The meaning of ‘accident’ . .
Cited – Gard Marine and Energy Ltd and Another v China National Chartering Company Ltd and Another SC 10-May-2017
The dispute followed the grounding of a tanker the Ocean Victory. The ship was working outside of a safe port requirement in the charterparty agreement. The contract required the purchase of insurance against maritime war and protection and . .
Cited – Mitsui and Co Ltd and Others v Beteiligungsgesellschaft Lpg Tankerflotte Mbh and Co Kg and Another SC 25-Oct-2017
This appeal raises the issue whether the daily vessel-operating expenses of shipowners incurred while they were negotiating to reduce the ransom demands of pirates should be allowed in general average – ie whether those expenses should be shared . .
Cited – Warner v Scapa Flow Charters (Scotland) SC 17-Oct-2018
This appeal raises a question about the interpretation of article 16 of the Athens Convention relating to the Carriage of Passengers and their Luggage by Sea 1974 (‘the Athens Convention’) and its application to the Scots law of limitation of . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 September 2021; Ref: scu.167671

Abnett v British Airways Plc (Scotland): IHCS 28 Apr 1995

A passenger wrongfully detained in Kuwait, whilst travelling at the time when Iraq invaded Kuwait, only has right to claim damages under Warsaw Convention.
Lord Allanbridge, Lord Mayfield and Lord Clyde
Times 22-Jun-1995, 1996 SLT 529
Warsaw Convention for the Unification of Certain Rules regarding International Air Transport 1929
Scotland
Citing:
Distinguished – Gatewhite v Iberia Lineas Aereas de Espana SA 1990
In a contract for the carriage of goods by air, the court considered whether the owner of goods who had not been named as the consignor or consignee on the air waybill was entitled to sue the carrier for damages to the goods while in transit.
Cited by:
Appeal from – Sidhu and Others v British Airways Plc; Abnett (Known as Sykes) v Same HL 13-Dec-1996
The claimants had been air passengers who were unlawfully detained in Kuwait, when their plane was captured whilst on the ground on the invasion of Kuwait. They sought damages for that detention.
Held: There are no exceptions to the Warsaw . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 September 2021; Ref: scu.77611

Bee v Jenson: CA 13 Sep 2007

The claimant hired a car whilst his own, damaged by the defendant, was being repaired. His insurer sought to recover the cost from the other driver. The insurer had first arranged te hire with one company, but then another provided a finacial reward to switch to it. The policy provided that a second insurance company would cover legal expenses and arrange the hire of a replacement vehicle (all as a provision of the original insurance to which the 1974 Act would not apply). The defendant said this arrangement was ineffective in law, since the claimant himself was not liable for the cost of the hire.
Held: The defendant’s argument failed. Mr Bee was entitled to recover the reasonable cost of hire even though, having been fully indemnified, he would hold that sum for the benefit of DAS.
Tuckey LJ, Longmore LJ, Sir Paul Kennedy
[2007] EWCA Civ 923, Times 17-Oct-2008, [2007] 4 All ER 791
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Giles v Thompson, Devlin v Baslington (Conjoined Appeals) HL 1-Jun-1993
Car hire companies who pursued actions in motorists’ names to recover the costs of hiring a replacement vehicle after an accident, from negligent drivers, were not acting in a champertous and unlawful manner. Lord Mustill said: ‘there exists in . .
Cited – Bradburn v Great Western Rail Co CEC 1874
The plaintiff had received a sum of money from a private insurer to compensate him for lost income as a result of an accident caused by the negligence of the defendant.
Held: He was entitled to full damages as well as the payment from the . .
Cited – Dimond v Lovell HL 12-May-2000
A claimant sought as part of her damages for the cost of hiring a care whilst her own was off the road after an accident caused by the defendant. She agreed with a hire company to hire a car, but payment was delayed until the claim was settled.
Cited – Lagden v O’Connor HL 4-Dec-2003
The parties had been involved in a road traffic accident. The defendant drove into the claimant’s parked car. The claimant was unable to afford to hire a car pending repairs being completed, and arranged to hire a car on credit. He now sought . .
Cited – Alexander v Rolls Royce Ltd CA 1996
The claimant was not entitled to damages for loss of enjoyment in the use of his Rolls Royce whilst it was off the road after an accident. . .
Cited – Brown v Davis and Galbraith 1972
The garage, had negotiated with the insurers and entered into a written agreement with them on their printed forms to repair cars of the insured clients. When the insurer failed, they sought to recover payment from the car owners.
Held: The . .
Cited – Adams v London Motor Builders 1921
A plaintiff whose claim was being supported and paid for by a trade union was nevertheless liable to the solicitor instructed by the Union for that solicitor’s costs. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 27 September 2021; Ref: scu.259316

Ghannouchi v Middle East Online Ltd and Another: QBD 23 Jul 2020

Judgment assessing damages for defamation
[2020] EWHC 1992 (QB)
Bailii
England and Wales

Updated: 27 September 2021; Ref: scu.652802