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These cases are from the lawindexpro database. They are now being transferred to the swarb.co.uk website in a better form. As a case is published there, an entry here will link to it. The swarb.co.uk site includes many later cases.  














Estoppel - From: 1970 To: 1979

This page lists 13 cases, and was prepared on 27 May 2018.

 
Kammins Ballrooms Co Limited v Zenith Investments (Torquay) Limited [1971] AC 850; [1971] 1 WLR 1751; [1970] 2 All ER 871
1970
HL
Lord Diplock, Viscount Dilhorne
Estoppel, Landlord and Tenant
The tenant had served his section 26 notice under the 1954 Act, but then began the court proceedings before the minumum two month period had expired. The landlord did not take the point at first, and delivered an answer and negotiated compensation. After the expiry of the maximum period of four months, when it was too late for the tenant to apply, the landlord’s solicitors informed the tenant that it would make a preliminary objection at the hearing that the tenant’s application was invalid. Held: The time limit was procedural or technical, not one of jurisdiction, and as such the landlord could waive the breach. The landlord had done so. The task on which a court of justice is engaged remains one of construction; even where this involves reading into the Act words which are not expressly included in it. The question was treated as a question of statutory construction: was it the intention of Parliament to preclude the parties from agreeing that a notice given by one of them to the other should have effect even though the statutory requirements were not satisfied? "And apart from this distinctive feature of this particular statute, where in any Act which merely regulates the rights and obligations of private parties inter se requirements to be complied with by one of those parties are imposed for the sole benefit of the other party it would be inconsistent with their purpose if the party intended to be benefited were not entitled to dispense with the other party’s compliance in circumstances where it as in his own interest to do so . . Upon the purposive approach to statutory construction this is the reason why in a statute of this character a procedural requirement imposed for the benefit or protection of one party alone is construed as subject to the implied exception that it can be 'waived' by the party for whose benefit it is imposed even though the statute states the requirement in unqualified and unequivocal words. In this context 'waived' means that the party has chosen not to rely upon the non-compliance of the other party with the requirement, or has disentitled himself from relying upon it either by agreeing with the other party not to do so or because he has so conducted himself that it would not be fair to allow him to rely upon the non-compliance."
Waiver is far from a precise term of art. It was used in a wider sense of a deliberate decision by a party not to stand on his strict rights, by not taking a technical point as to the validity of a notice.
Landlord and Tenant Act 1954
1 Citers



 
 Gissing v Gissing; HL 7-Jul-1970 - [1970] 3 WLR 255; [1971] AC 886; [1970] 2 All ER 780; [1970] UKHL 3
 
Schaefer v Schuman [1972] AC 572
1972
PC
Lord Simon of Glaisdale
Estoppel, Wills and Probate, Contract, Commonwealth
(New South Wales - Australia) A promise to leave the property had been performed, and the issue was as to the relevance, if any, and the effect of an earier promise when the value of the devise was sought to be reduced by an order by way of financial provision under the New South Wales Family Provision on Inheritance legislation. The rights of the devisee were properly founded in contract. Held (majority, Lord Simon of Glaisdale dissenting on this as on the major point in the case). The case was indeed properly founded in contract, and, that being so, it was immune from the effect of an order under the family provision legislation.
1 Citers



 
 Woodhouse AC Israel Cocoa Ltd SA v Nigerian Produce Marketing Co Ltd; HL 1972 - [1972] AC 741; [1971] 2 QB 23; [1971] 1 All ER 605; [1971] 2 WLR 272

 
 Yat Tung Investment Co Ltd v Dao Heng Bank Ltd; PC 1975 - [1975] AC 581
 
Alfred C Toepfer v Peter Cremer [1975] 2 Lloyd's Rep 118
1975
CA
Lord Denning MR, Orr LJ, Scarman LJ
Estoppel, Contract
The court was asked as to the effect of a telex sent by the buyers to the sellers, notifying them that if a notice of appropriation was not received by the following day, then the buyers would treat the sellers as being in default, under clause 26 of the GAFTA Form 100. In fact the sellers had one more day before the last day of shipment under the contract. No notice of appropriation was received, so the buyers sent a further telex in which they claimed a "price fixing" by arbitration, nominated their arbitrator and invited the sellers to do likewise. It was argued that these actions of the buyers constituted a repudiation of the contract. Held: The argument failed. On the facts overall, the buyers were not repudiating the contract. The telex giving notice of default was a "misapprehension as to the date of default". He held that the actions of the buyers, taken as a whole, indicated that they were not repudiating the contract but "insisting on it and claiming damages under it."
Scarman LJ pointed out that the arbitrators had not found the action of the buyers to be repudiatory of the contract. He concluded that it was not possible to infer, from the telex, that had the sellers given notice of appropriation on the following day (ie. the last day for shipment), then the buyers would have rejected it. Therefore the telex was not a repudiation.
Lord Denning MR discussed estoppel: "When one person has led another to believe that a particular transaction is valid and correct, he cannot thereafter be allowed to say that it is invalid and incorrect where it would be unfair or unjust to allow him to do so. It is a kind of estoppel. He cannot blow hot and cold according as it suits his book."
The rule that a plaintiff cannot recover for a cause of action which only accrued after the writ was issued, was a rule of practice rather than a rule of law. Moreover, it was a rule of practice which could be departed from whenever the justice of the case required.
1 Citers


 
Mardorf Peach and Co Ltd v Attica Sea Carriers Corporation of Liberi (The Laconia) [1977] AC 850
1977

Lord Wilberforce
Contract, Estoppel
A right of withdrawal had been granted to a shipowner under a time charterparty if the charterer failed to make a punctual monthly payment of hire. Held: If the monthly hire had not been punctually paid, the right of withdrawal remained even after the hire had been paid. The right to withdraw only ceased to exist, if it had been in some way waived, though the shipowner must exercise his right to withdraw the ship ‘within a reasonable time after default. Here, although the bank was an agent of the alleged waiving party, it did not have sufficient authority to waive a right of the principal.
Lord Wilberforce said that: "Although the word 'waiver', like 'estoppel', covers a variety of situations different in their legal nature, and tends to be indiscriminately used by the courts as a means of relieving parties from bargains or the consequences of bargains which are thought to be harsh or deserving of relief, in the present context what is relied on is clear enough. The charterers had failed to make a punctual payment but it was open to the owners to accept a late payment as if it were punctual, with the consequence that they could not thereafter rely on the default as entitling them to withdraw. All that is needed to establish waiver, in this sense, of the committed breach of contract, is evidence, clear and unequivocal, that such acceptance has taken place."
1 Citers


 
Property and Reversionary Investment Corporation v Templar [1977] 1 WLR 1223
1977
CA

Estoppel
A party sought leave to appeal out of time in reliance on an intervening decision of the House of Lords. Held: A change in the understanding of the law would not suffice in the absence of special circumstances.
1 Citers


 
Griffiths v Williams [1978] 2 EGLR 121
1978
CA
Goff LJ
Estoppel, Landlord and Tenant
The claimant had been told she could live in a house for her life. On that assurance she improved the house. Held: She had raised an equity, but how could it be satisfied? The court declined to order the grant of a life interest because it would have created a settlement, under which the claimant would have had the powers of a tenant for life. It suggested a long lease, determinable on her death at a nominal rent. Though the payment of a nominal rent was not contemplated when the representations were made, "perfect equity is seldom possible." The court ordered the grant of a long lease at a rent of £30 per annum, determinable on the death of the tenant. The lease was to be non-assignable, and the other terms of the lease were to be agreed between the parties or, in default of agreement, determined by the county court.
1 Citers


 
Brisbane City Council v Attorney General for Queensland [1979] AC 411; [1978] 3 All ER 30; [1978] 3 WLR 299
1978
PC
Lord Wilberforce
Estoppel
Lord Wilberforce approved Somervell LJ's words in Greenhalgh: "This is the true basis of the doctrine in Henderson v Henderson and it ought only to be applied when the facts are such as to amount to an abuse: otherwise there is a danger of a party being shut out from bringing forward a genuine subject of litigation."
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
The Shackleford [1978] 2 Lloyds Rep 155
2 Jan 1978
CA
Sir David Cairns
Estoppel, Contract
The Notice of Readiness was to discharge at the port of Constanza and was required ‘vessel also having been entered at the Customs House and the laydays will then commence on the next business day, whether in berth or not, whether in port or not, whether in free pratique or not’. The vessel arrived in Constanza Roads, immediately giving NOR on 15 October, which notice was accepted by the receivers on the same day by endorsing ‘accepted’ upon it. Customs entry could not be obtained until the vessel berthed and this did not occur until 26 November. The arbitrator held that the charterers were estopped from denying that they had accepted the NOR and made a finding that the owners and/or Master relied upon the acceptance of the NOR by the receivers in that they made no attempt to procure an earlier berth, such as a bunkering or watering berth, so that Customs entry might be obtained at an earlier date. Sir David Cairns said: “Acceptance of a notice of any kind usually means acceptance of the notice as an effective notice. The experienced arbitrator and the experienced commercial judge interpreted this acceptance without any indication that it had occurred to them that it could have any other meaning. In my judgment they were right to do so.”
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
Western Fish Products Ltd v Penwith District Council and Another [1978] EWCA Civ 6; [1981] 2 All ER 204
22 May 1978
CA

Estoppel, Local Government
Estoppel cannot be used so as to fetter a statutory discretion entrusted to a local authority
1 Citers

[ Bailii ]
 
Newbury District Council v Secretary of State for the Environment [1978] 1 WLR 1241; [1979] 1 All ER 243
14 Jul 1978
CA
Lord Denning MR, Lawton and Browne LJJ
Planning, Estoppel
The Council had, when granting planning permission for the use of certain hangars on an airfield, required that on the end of the use, the hangars should be removed. That decision had been quashed by the repondent's inspector, and again by the Divisional Court. Held: The appeal succeeded.
Lord Denning MR, in the minority on this point, postulated a broad general principle of estoppel or "blowing hot and cold" in planning matters, saying that in 1962 the land owner had two inconsistent courses open to them: " One was to apply for a grant of planning permission; the other was to rely on any existing use rights that might be attached to the site. Once they opted for planning permission - and accepted it without objection - they had made their bed and must lie on it. No doubt they did not know of the past history, but that was only Q because they did not choose to rely on it. They should not be allowed to bring it up again now."
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
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