A landlord is not liable in damages to his lessee under a covenant for quiet enjoyment in respect of a nuisance caused by another of his lessees, even if he knows the lessee is causing the nuisance and takes no steps to prevent it. To be liable for nuisances committed by his tenant, it is not enough for them to be aware of the nuisance and take no steps to prevent it, he must either participate directly in the commission of the nuisance, or must be taken to have authorised it by letting the property.
Lord Cozens-Hardy MR said: ‘It is quite a novel doctrine to me that permission by a lessee to use demised premises for a purpose which may or may not involve or create a nuisance is a wrong act on the part of the landlord, and that the landlord can be rendered liable merely because a person does carry on that business in such a manner as to create a nuisance. It would be different, of course, if it were let for a purpose which necessarily involved a nuisance, but this letting did not necessarily involve a nuisance. That is quite plain from the plaintiff’s own evidence. He says there was no ground for complaint until the Dents came into possession.’
Judges:
Lord Cozens-Hardy MR
Citations:
[1916] 2 KB 308
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Southwark London Borough Council v Mills/Tanner; Baxter v Camden London Borough Council HL 21-Oct-1999
Tenants of council flats with ineffective sound insulation argued that the landlord council was in breach of the covenant for quiet enjoyment in their tenancy agreements.
Held: A landlord’s duty to allow quiet enjoyment does not extend to a . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Nuisance, Landlord and Tenant
Updated: 07 October 2022; Ref: scu.442752