The court was asked whether Lister and Co v Stubbs 45 ChD 1, a decision of the Court of Appeal, was binding on him or whether he could apply the Privy Council’s decision in Attorney General for Hong Kong v Reid
Held: On the facts of the case the judge was able to distinguish Lister and Co v Stubbs but said, if he had been unable to do so, he would have applied Attorney General for Hong Kong v Reid.
Lawrence Collins J said: ‘The House of Lords forcefully reaffirmed the rules of stare decisis in Davis v Johnson [1979] AC 264, but nothing was said about the decisions both in the Court of Appeal (eg Doughty v Turner Manufacturing Co Ltd [1964] 1 QB 518 and Worcester Works Finance Ltd v Cooden Engineering Co Ltd [1972] 1 QB 210) and at first instance which suggest that both a judge of first instance and the Court of Appeal are free to follow decisions of the Privy Council on common law principles which depart, after full argument, from earlier decisions of the Court of Appeal . . The system of precedent would be shown in a most unfavourable light if a litigant in such a case were forced by the doctrine of binding precedent to go to the House of Lords (perhaps through a leap-frog appeal under the Administration of Justice Act 1969, section 12) in order to have the decision of the Privy Council affirmed. That would be particularly so where the decision of the Privy Council is recent, where it was a decision on the English common law, where the Board consisted mainly of serving Law Lords, and where the decision had been made after full argument on the correctness of the earlier decision.’
Judges:
Lawrence Collins J
Citations:
[2004] EWHC 622 (Ch), [2005] Ch 119, [2004] 3 WLR 1106, [2004] WTLR 815, [2005] 4 All ER 73
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
See Also – Solland International Ltd v Daraydan Holdings Ltd TCC 15-Feb-2002
. .
Preferred – The Attorney General of Hong Kong v Reid and Reid And Marc Molloy Co PC 1-Nov-1993
(New Zealand) The Board considered the power to recover property owned by a public official found to have taken bribes.
Held: The bribes received by the policeman were held on trust for his principal, and so they could be traced into . .
Cited by:
Cited – Islamic Republic of Pakistan v Zardari and others ComC 6-Oct-2006
The claimant alleged that the defendants had funded the purchase of various properties by secret and unlawful commissions taken by them whilst in power in Pakistan. They sought to recover the proceeds. They now sought permission to serve proceedings . .
Cited – FHR European Ventures Llp and Others v Cedar Capital Partners Llc SC 16-Jul-2014
Approprietary remedy against Fraudulent Agent
The Court was asked whether a bribe or secret commission received by an agent is held by the agent on trust for his principal, or whether the principal merely has a claim for equitable compensation in a sum equal to the value of the bribe or . .
Cited – Willers v Gubay ChD 15-May-2015
The court was asked whether the tort of malicious prosecution of civil proceedings is known to English law.
Held: The Crawfod Adjusters case should not be followed: ‘If I am not bound by Gregory, then I see no reason for departing from the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Contract, Constitutional
Updated: 16 September 2022; Ref: scu.195041