The house discussed the test for relevancy of a pursuer’s averments.
Held: A case should only be dismissed on grounds of relevancy and specification if it would necessarily fail at proof.
The House reversed the decision of the Court of Session that a wife’s allegations of cruelty should be struck out as irrelevant and insufficient. Lord Normand suggested: ‘that it does not do justice to the averments to take up each alleged incident one by one and hold that it is trivial or that it is not hurtful or cruel . . The relationship of marriage is not just the sum of a number of incidents . . ‘
Lord Normand: ‘The true proposition is that an action will not be dismissed as irrelevant unless it must necessarily fail even if all the pursuer’s averments are proved.’
Lord Reid said: ‘If it can be shown that, even if the pursuer succeeds in proving all that he avers, still his case must fail, it appears to me to be highly advantageous that time and money should not be spent on fruitless inquiry into the facts . .’
Lord Normand, Lord Reid
1952 SC (HL) 44
Scotland
Cited by:
Cited – Henderson v 3052775 Nova Scotia Ltd HL 10-May-2006
The liquidator had sought to set aside a transfer of company property as having been made at an undervalue. The defence was that the buyer had assumed some of the company’s debt in addition, and in effect that it was a preference on other creditors. . .
Cited – Flood v The University Court of the University of Glasgow OHCS 8-Jul-2008
The pursuer, a college lecturer claimed damages for stress related injury suffered as a result of overwork. She had communicated with her managers many times about the overload. Other staff had resigned for similar reasons.
Held: The pursuer . .
Cited – Mitchell and Another v Glasgow City Council HL 18-Feb-2009
(Scotland) The pursuers were the widow and daughter of a tenant of the respondent who had been violently killed by his neighbour. They said that the respondent, knowing of the neighbour’s violent behaviours had a duty of care to the deceased and . .
Cited – Owens v Owens SC 25-Jul-2018
W petitioned for divorce alleging that he ‘has behaved in such a way that [she] cannot reasonably be expected to live with [him]’. H defended, and the petition was rejected as inadequate in the behaviour alleged. She said that the section should be . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 09 August 2021; Ref: scu.241642