A lease created in 1950 included a covenant that the premises should not be used for the business of a ‘victualler, vintner, tavern keeper, vendor of malt liquor, restaurant or coffee house keeper’ without the landlord’s consent. Declarations were sought as to the lawfulness of the intended use as a high class sandwich shop.
Held: The words used were precise but of their time. When looked at now the court could only interpret the clause as at the date it was entered into. The intended use would not provide any facility for customers to sit down to drink or eat, and therefore it would not count as a coffee house (as distinct from Mortimer). The term ‘victualler’ had by 1950 acquired a meaning associated with the sale of alcohol. The use would not infringe the covenant.
Judges:
Blackburne J
Citations:
Times 12-May-2005
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Earl of Lonsdale v Attorney-General 1982
The task of interpretation a lease has to be carried out against the background knowledge which would reasonably be available to the contracting parties in the situation in which they were at the time of the execution of the lease, applying the . .
Distinguished – Mortimer Investments Ltd v Mount Eden Land Ltd 26-Mar-1997
The court was asked as to the interpretation of an elderly restrictive user covenant in a lease. The proposed use was by a sub-tenant as a sandwich bar serving ready prepared food, including cooked food, to take away and also to consume on the . .
Cited – Fitz v Iles CA 8-Nov-1892
The plaintiff, George Fitz, was the tenant under a lease in which he covenanted to carry on the business of a coffee house keeper. The lessor, Daniel Iles, covenanted not during the term to let any shop in the same road, over which he had any . .
Cited – Skillion pIc v Keltec Industrial Research Ltd 1992
In the context of a covenant in a lease restricting the tenant’s use of the demised premises, it is the landlord who requires and puts forward the clause, and, the landlord will be treated as the proposer and the clause must therefore be construed . .
Cited by:
Appeal from – Mount Cook Land Ltd v Joint London Holdings Ltd and Another CA 7-Oct-2005
The head lease contained a covenant against use of the premises as ‘victuallers’. The tenant sublet the premises for use as a sandwich shop. The tenant argued that the word ‘victuallers’ was to be construed only to prevent the use as ‘licensed . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Landlord and Tenant
Updated: 24 July 2022; Ref: scu.224868