The County Court had held that the landlords were not entitled to recover possession of a flat of which the defendant was tenant because the premises had not been taken out of the protection of the Rent Restrictions Act by the tenant twice sub-letting furnished the whole of the premises with the landlord’s permission for periods of a year, which periods had expired before the commencement by the landlord of proceedings to recover possession.
Held:
Roche J said: ‘I do not think that the effect of the letting of the whole premises furnished to Mr Moore and Mrs Wilcox (with it is to be noted, the consent of the plaintiffs) was that the premises both became and continued for all time premises to which the Acts of 1920 and 1923 did not apply. In my opinion, at any rate, from the termination of those sub-tenancies Robert Cumming was in possession; his tenancy was a statutory one and the premises were not let furnished.’
Mackinnon J: ‘I do not suppose that Mr Stone (counsel for the landlord) would have sought to argue that Prout -v- Hunter went as far as to apply in a case where the dwelling house had been let furnished during the currency of the original lease, say in 1919 or 1920, but he does seek to say the letting furnished for, I suppose, however short a period after the tenant became a statutory tenant took the house out of the category of a protected house and put it into the category of unprotected house. It is only necessary to consider what startling results that contention would lead to in order to see that that argument must be wrong. For instance, if there be, as well there may be, a person in occupation of a house at Henley on Thames as what is called a statutory tenant, and supposing the owner of that house discovered that the statutory tenant let the premises furnished for Regatta Week in 1922, could he now, by virtue of that use of the house for a week 4 years ago, come to the court and say: give me possession of the premises, because by virtue of that temporary sub-letting so long ago the premises cease to be protected? I am far from saying because you find that some contention under these Acts leads to an extraordinary result that therefore that cannot be the effect of the Act, because the Acts are so worded that extraordinary results of one kind and another do follow; but I think these considerations assist in leading one to the conclusion, with which I agree, that the fact that a house has been let furnished for a period which had expired before proceedings are commenced cannot be relied upon as taking the house out of the protection of the Act in the way in which is suggested.’
Judges:
Roche J and MacKinnon J
Citations:
[1926] 2 KB 417
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Ujima Housing Association v Ansah and Another CA 17-Oct-1997
The tenant had created a sub tenancy, the result of which was that he no longer had any right to enter upon the property unless the sub-tenant surrendered his lease.
Held: The tenant could not be said properly to be in occupation of the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Landlord and Tenant
Updated: 19 May 2022; Ref: scu.220477
