Habib Bank Ltd v Habib Bank AG Zurich: CA 1981

A combination of defences based on delay was pleaded in a passing off action objecting to the use of a name which the defendants had been using without objection for many years. A permanent injunction was claimed.
Held: Oliver LJ said as to the availability of damages in a case of acquiescence to the breach of a contract: ‘that the test requires a much broader approach which is directed at ascertaining whether, in particular individual circumstances, it would be unconscionable for a party to be permitted to deny that which, knowingly or unknowingly, he has allowed or encouraged another to assume to his detriment.’ The court approved a statement in the court below: ‘Of course, estoppel by conduct has been a field of the law in which there has been considerable expansion over the years and it appears to me that it is essentially the application of a rule by which justice is done where the circumstances of the conduct and behaviour of the party to an action are such that it would be wholly inequitable that he should be entitled to succeed in the proceeding.’ The court favoured a broad approach to the problem of inequitable or unconscionable conduct by long delay, rather than one turning on historical distinctions between the assertion of equitable rights and the enforcement rights by equitable means

Judges:

Oliver LJ

Citations:

[1981] 1 WLR 1265, [1981] 2 All ER 650

Jurisdiction:

England and Wales

Citing:

EndorsedTaylors Fashions Ltd v Liverpool Victoria Trustees Co Ltd ChD 1981
The fundamental principle that equity is concerned to prevent unconscionable conduct permeates all the elements of the doctrine of estoppel. In the light of the more recent cases, the principle ‘requires a very much broader approach which is . .

Cited by:

per incuriamJones v Stones CA 11-May-1999
No defence of acquiescence or estoppel arose from a failure by a land owner to pursue a complaint. Such a defence could only be established by some positive act of encouragement or allowance by him. The heart of the action lay in the allowance of a . .
CitedHarris 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. . .
CitedBrooker and Another v Fisher CA 4-Apr-2008
The claimant had asserted a joint authorship of the song ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’ written in the sixties. The defendant appealed saying that the claim had been brought too late, and that the finding ignored practice in the music industry. The . .
CitedSt Pancras and Humanist Housing Association Ltd v Leonard CA 17-Dec-2008
The claimant sought possession of a garage. The defendant claimed adverse possession.
Held: The defendant’s appeal against an order for possession failed. The defendant had attended a meeting where his behaviour had allowed other parties to . .
CitedBudejovicky Budvar Narodni Podnik v Anheuser-Busch Inc CA 20-Oct-2009
The parties had long disputed the use of the trade marks ‘Bud’ and ‘Budweiser’ for their beers. The claimant now said that the defendants had made an abusive registration under the 1994 Act, by requesting a declaration that the registration by the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Banking, Damages, Equity

Updated: 06 May 2022; Ref: scu.182879