swarb.co.uk - law index
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Utilities - From: 1970 To: 1979
This page lists 5 cases, and was prepared on 02 April 2018.
SCM (United Kingdom) Ltd v W J Whittall and Son Ltd [1971] 1 QB 337; [1970] 3 All ER 245; [1970] 3 WLR 694
1970
CA
Lord Denning
Damages, Utilities
The defendants' workmen damaged an electric cable belonging to the electricity board, cutting off several factories, including the plaintiff's. The defendant sought to have the claim struck out. Held: The part of the claim arising from physical damage was not struck out, but that for economic loss was. Economic loss ought not to be put on one pair of shoulders, but spread among all the sufferers.
Lord Denning said: "I must not be taken, however, as saying that economic loss is always too remote. There are some exceptional cases when it is the immediate consequence of the negligence and is recoverable accordingly. Such is the case when a banker negligently gives a good reference on which a man extends credit, and loses the money. The plaintiff suffers economic loss only, but it is the immediate - almost, I might say, the intended - consequence of the negligent reference and is recoverable accordingly: see Hedley Byrne & Co. Ltd. v. Heller & Partners Ltd. [1964] A.C. 465. Another is when the defendant by his negligence damages a lorry which is carrying the plaintiff's goods. The goods themselves are not damaged, but the lorry is so badly damaged that the goods have to be unloaded and carried forward in some other vehicle. The goods owner suffers economic loss only, namely, the cost of unloading and carriage, but he can recover it from the defendant because it is immediate and not too remote. It is analogous to physical damage: because the goods themselves had to be unloaded. Such was the illustration given by Lord Roche in Morrison Steamship Co. Ltd. v. Greystoke Castle (Cargo Owners) [1947] A.C. 265. Likewise, when the cargo owners have to pay a general average contribution. It is not too remote and is recoverable.
Seeing these exceptional cases you may well ask: How are we to say when economic loss is too remote or not? Where is the line to be drawn? Lawyers are continually asking that question. But the judges are never defeated by it. We may not be able to draw the line with precision, but we can always say on which side of it any particular case falls."
1 Citers
Paul v Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications; 1973 - [1973] RTR 245
Wills Trustees v Cairngorm Canoeing and Sailing School; HL 1976 - [1976] SC (HL) 30
Beech Properties v GE Wallis and Sons Ltd [1977] EG 735
1977
Walton J
Utilities
The court was asked whether a vendor of property had satisfied an obligation to provide the purchaser with the right to run foul and surface water from the land sold to a public sewer. The vendor contended that this obligation was satisfied by the right of the purchaser to connect a 12 inch diameter pipe to a 9 inch diameter public sewer at a particular location, pursuant to section 34 of the 1936 Act. Held. The condition was not satisfied, since there remained too much uncertainty.
Walton J said: "However, it does appear to me that, wide as the words of subsection (1) may be, and for the moment ignoring the opening qualification, they do not confer upon an individual the right to connect his sewer to the water authority's sewer at any point which he may choose. In most cases, of course, the matter will be quite academic. There will be the water authority's sewer, going along the road; a new house is built in the road; and quite obviously and clearly the owner will expect to have a right to drain into that sewer, and it would be very difficult, assuming that there are no problems under the proviso to subsection (1), to imagine a set of circumstances where the water authority would be entitled to say that he must not connect to that sewer but to some other sewer. Even so, if the new house was built at a crossroads and there were available sewers in both roads, I can see no reason why the owner should be entitled to drain into the sewer of his choice if the water authority required him to drain into the other, which might, for example, well be a relief sewer expressly provided for the district because the other sewer was approaching capacity. Similarly, I see no reason why the owner is entitled to connect at point X rather than an adjacent point Y, if the water authority requires him to connect at Y."
Public Health Act 1936 34
1 Citers
United States v Ramsey [1977] USSC 97; 431 US 606; 97 SCt 1972; 52 LEd2d 617
6 Jun 1977
Utilities, Police, Immigration
United States Supreme Court - Title 19 U.S.C. ss 482 and implementing postal regulations authorize customs officials to inspect incoming international mail when they have a "reasonable cause to suspect" that the mail contains illegally imported merchandise, although the regulations prohibit the reading of correspondence absent a search warrant. Acting pursuant to the statute and regulations, a customs inspector, based on the facts that certain incoming letter-sized airmail envelopes were from Thailand, a known source of narcotics, and were bulky and much heavier than a normal airmail letter, opened the envelopes for inspection at the General Post Office in New York City, considered a "border" for border-search purposes, and ultimately the envelopes were found to contain heroin. Respondents were subsequently indicted for and convicted of narcotics offenses, the District Court having denied their motion to suppress the heroin. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the border-search exception to the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement applicable to persons, baggage, and mailed packages did not apply to the opening of international mail, and that the Constitution requires that before such mail is opened a showing of probable cause must be made and a warrant obtained. Held:
1. Under the circumstances, the customs inspector had "reasonable cause to suspect" that there was merchandise or contraband in the envelopes, and therefore the search was plainly authorized by the statute. Pp. 611-616.
2. The Fourth Amendment does not interdict the actions taken by the inspector in opening and searching the envelopes. Pp. 616-625.
(a) Border searches without probable cause and without a warrant are nonetheless "reasonable" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Pp. 616-619.
(b) The inclusion of international mail within the border-search exception does not represent any "extension" of that exception. The exception is grounded in the recognized right of the sovereign to control, subject to substantive limitations imposed by the Constitution, who and what may enter the country, and no different constitutional standards should apply simply because the envelopes were mailed, not carried the critical fact being that the envelopes cross the border and enter the country, not that they are brought in by one mode of transportation rather than another. It is their entry into the country from without it that makes a resulting search "reasonable." Pp. 619-621.
(c) The border-search exception is not based on the doctrine of "exigent circumstances," but is a longstanding, historically recognized exception to the Fourth Amendment's general principle that a warrant be obtained. Pp. 621-622.
(d) The opening of international mail under the guidelines of the statute only when the customs official has reason to believe the mail contains other than correspondence, while the reading of any correspondence inside the envelopes is forbidden by the regulations, does not impermissibly chill the exercise of free speech under the First Amendment, and any "chill" that might exist under such circumstances is not only "minimal" but is also wholly subjective. Pp. 623-624.
1 Citers
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