Links: Home | swarblaw - law discussions

swarb.co.uk - law index


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.  














Nuisance - From: 1985 To: 1989

This page lists 12 cases, and was prepared on 02 April 2018.

 
Thomas v National Union of Mineworkers (South Wales Area) [1986] Ch 20; [1985] 2 All ER 1; [1985] IRLR 157; [1985] ICR 886; [1985] 2 WLR 1081
1985
ChD
Scot J
Vicarious Liability, Torts - Other, Nuisance
Threats made by pickets to those miners who sought to go to work were not an assault because the pickets had no capacity to put into effect their threats of violence whilst they were held back from the vehicles which the working miners were within. The plaintiffs were, however, entitled to enjoy their right to use the highway to go to work without unreasonable harassment and that picketing by 50 to 70 striking miners shouting abuse was a tortious interference with that right. The actions of the striking miners were therefore actionable in nuisance.
1 Citers


 
RHM Bakeries (Scotland) Ltd v Strathclyde Regional Council 1985 SLT 214
1985

Lord Fraser of Tullybelton
Scotland, Negligence, Nuisance
The suggestion that the decision in Rylands v Fletcher had any place in Scots law is "a heresy which ought to be extirpated."
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
RHM Bakeries (Scotland) Ltd v Strathclyde Regional Council [1985] UKHL 9
24 Jan 1985
HL

Nuisance, Scotland, Utilities
The pursuers sought damages after the defender's sewer collapsed flooding their bakery.
Sewerage (Scotland) Act 1968
[ Bailii ]
 
Home Brewery v William Davis and Co (Leicester) Ltd [1987] QB 339; [1987] 2 WLR 117; [1987] 1 All ER 637; Times, 13 August 1986
1986
QBD
Piers Ashworth QC
Nuisance
The defendant, owner of the higher land, filled in a disused clay pit, and squeezed out water from an osier bed with the result that more water flowed onto the neighbouring plaintiff's land causing damage. The plaintiff sought damages and an injunction. Held: The defendant was not liable under Rylands. A defendant land owner is under no obligation to receive water from the neighbour’s land but if the use of his land by him in turning the water away is unreasonable and is resulting to damage to a higher occupier, which the plaintiff is, then a nuisance is created.
Piers Ashworth QC said: "an occupier is under no obligation to prevent water that has come naturally on to his land and has not been artificially retained there or artificially diverted from passing naturally to his neighbour's land", though "the common law rule is that the lower occupier has no ground of complaint and no cause of action against the higher occupier for permitting the natural, unconcentrated flow of water, whether on or under the surface, to pass from the higher to the lower land, but that at the same time the lower occupier is under no obligation to receive it. He may put up barriers, or otherwise pen it back, even though this may cause damage to a higher occupier. However, the lower occupier's right to pen back the water is not absolute."
1 Cites


 
Lloyds Bank plc v Guardian Assurance plc [1986] 35 BLR 34
1986
CA
Sir John Arnold P and Nourse LJ
Nuisance, Construction
The statutory control over building works provided under s.60 is capable of operating quite separately from the private law tort of nuisance.
Control of Pollution Act 1974 60
1 Citers


 
Tetley v Chitty [1986] 1 ALL ER 663
1986


Landlord and Tenant, Nuisance
A local council had granted planning permission to a go-kart club to develop a go-kart track on land owned by the authority, and had granted the club a seven year lease to use it for that express purpose. Held: The council were held liable in nuisance for noise arising from the use of the track. A clause in the lease requiring the tenant not to commit a nuisance did not excuse the Council landlord.
1 Citers



 
 South Carolina Insurance Co v Assurantie Maatschappij de Zeven Provincien NV; HL 1987 - [1987] AC 24; [1986] 3 WLR 398; [1986] 3 A11 ER 487; [1986] 2 Lloyds Rep 317
 
Anchor Brewhouse Developments -v Berkley House (Docklands) Developments (1987) 38 Build LR 82; Times, 03 April 1987
1987

Scott J
Nuisance
A crane which passes its boom over private land without permission creates an actionable nuisance. Damages could not be awarded so as to remove the plaintiff's right to bring actions for trespass in the future if the trespass continued: "I find some difficulty with Bracewell v Appleby mainly because, as it seems to me, the judge regarded the damages he was awarding as a once and for all payment. But it was, as I see it, not within the power of the judge to produce that result. Whether or not an injunction were granted, the defendant's use of the right of way would, after the judgment as well as before, represent trespass unless and until he were granted a right of way. The judge could not by an award of damages put the defendant in the position of a person entitled to an easement of way. So assuming, which is not clear from the case, that there had not been some agreement by the plaintiffs to treat the damages as entitling the defendant to a right of way, the defendant's subsequent use of the private road would have constituted a continuing trespass. A succession of further actions for damages could have been brought. In those circumstances it seems to me very difficult to justify the withholding of the injunction. By withholding the injunction the court was allowing a legal wrong to continue unabated. Nonetheless Mr Moss is entitled to refer to the case as one in which an injunction was refused."
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
Tennant Radiant Heat Ltd v Warrington Development Corporation [1988] 1 EGLR 41; [1988] 11 EG 71
1988

Dillon LJ, Croom-Johnson LJ, Caulfield J
Landlord and Tenant, Nuisance, Damages
A property comprised a large building let on fully repairing leases of 22 units. The many rain outlets were allowed to become blocked, and water accumulated above one unit before that part of the roof collapsed. The landlord appealed a finding that since the roof was not comprised in any of the leases, there was an implied duty on it to repair the roof. Held: There was no necessary implication of business efficacy to allow the implication of the term. The tenant was himself in breach for having failed to clear the outlet above his own property. The landlord was liable in nuisance for failing to clear the other rainwater outlets. The 1945 Act did not apply since the tenant's failure was not tortious. Nevertheless, the tenant was liable as to 10%. "More importantly, however, for present purposes, the archaic and draconian rule of the common law which the 1945 Act was passed to override also has no application to the present case, since that rule had no relevance to a claim in, or in my judgment to a breach of, contract which was not also itself tortious. . . The problem which this court faces, on claim and counterclaim alike, is in my judgment a problem of causation of damage. On the claim, the question is how far the damage to its goods which the lessee has suffered was caused by the corporation's negligence notwithstanding the lessee's own breach of covenant. On the counterclaim, the question is how far the damage to the corporation's building which the corporation has suffered was caused by the lessee's breach of covenant, notwithstanding the corporation's own negligence. The effect is that on each question, apportionment is permissible. This is the same result as the 1945 Act would produce, but it is not reached through the Act, because the obstacle which the 1945 Act was passed to override is not there on either claim or counterclaim in the present case." Croome-Johnson: "If the 1945 Act has no application, what is the position on the two claims? The evidence clearly indicates that the damage to the plaintiff's premises was attributable to two concurrent causes, both operating contemporaneously. One was the defendant's negligence and the other was the plaintiff's breach of covenant . . . If the collapse had been caused by the combined negligence of the defendant and some third party, the plaintiff would have been entitled to recover all its damages from the defendant, leaving it to get contribution from its fellow tortfeasor . . . But that does not apply when the other cause comes from the plaintiff himself . . . A tenant who is in breach of his repairing covenant must pay for all the costs of repair or of the damage to the reversion. But the position is different if the covenantee is the selfsame landlord who has caused nine-tenths of the damage to the roof. . . . It is not possible, therefore, to allow both the claim and counterclaim in full and to set off the two awards of damages. Where one is dealing with two contemporaneous causes, each springing from the breach of a legal duty but operating in unequal proportions, the solution should be to assess the recoverable damages for both on the basis of causation."
Law Reform (Contributory Negligence) Act 1945
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
London Borough of Southwark v Ince (1989) 21 HLR 505
1989
QBD
Savile J
Housing, Nuisance
Savile J: "I am not persuaded that because there is now the Control of Pollution Act and there was previously the Noise Abatement Act that therefore lends any support to the construction [that the Public Health Act 1936 did not apply to premises whose standard of noise insulation was such as make the premises prejudicial to health). Under s 92 (l)(a) the question is not whether the noise itself is a statutory nuisance but whether the premises are in such a state as to be prejudicial to health. "
Public Health Act 1936
1 Citers



 
 Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council v Bujok; CA 1989 - (1989) 88 LGR 521
 
Regina v Inner London Crown Court ex parte Bentham [1989] 1 WLR 408
1989
QBD
Mann LJ
Nuisance, Legal Aid
The defendant sought legal aid to defend an action to abate a statutory nuisance under the 1936 Act. Held: Such an action was criminal in nature. The action had been brought under section 99, but the imposition of a penalty under s94 was a criminal sentence. "On analysis, the position seem to be that proceedings are initiated by information under section 99, and that the information is then dealt with under section 94(2). It appears plain that the proceedinbgs under section 94(2) are criminal in character. The offence is the wrongdoing which leads to whatever order is in fact made; in this case, putting it generally, allowing premises to be in such a state as to be prejudicial to health."
Public Health Act 1936 9492) - Legal Aid Act 1974 28(5)
1 Cites

1 Citers


 
Copyright 2014 David Swarbrick, 10 Halifax Road, Brighouse, West Yorkshire HD6 2AG.