Tag: Limitation

Prudential Assurance Company Ltd v Waterloo Real Estate Inc: ChD 13 May 1998

The owner of a party wall who had allowed a neighbour exclusive use of it without objection for a period over twelve years, could lose his interest in the wall by the adverse possession of that neighbour.

Times 13-May-1998
England and Wales
Cited by:
Appeal From – Prudential Assurance Company Limited v Waterloo Real Estate Inc CA 22-Jan-1999
Where title to land was to be established by adverse possession, the claim had to be unequivocal only in the sense that the intention to possess was clear to the world. It was unnecessary for the dispossessed party to know of the title he lost. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Limitation

Updated: 05 December 2021; Ref: scu.85071

Mayor and Burgesses of London Borough of Hounslow v Anne Minchinton: CA 19 Mar 1997

The defendant asserted title to a strip of land by adverse possession. The judge had held that the occupation by the claimant had been insufficient to establish possession.
Held: The use of the land as a garden for compost heaps and similar was a sufficient trespass to allow an action, and was therefore sufficient to found a claim for adverse possession. Having acquired a title by adverse possession, the claimant does not lose it by going out of possession, unless the original owner retakes possession. Enclosure is strong evidence of possession.

Lord Justice Butler-Sloss, Lord Justice Millett, Lord Justice Thorpe
[1997] EWCA Civ 1277, (1997) 74 P and CR 221
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Pulleyn v Hall Aggregates (Thames Valley) Ltd 1993
. .
Cited – Buckinghamshire County Council v Moran CA 13-Feb-1989
The parties’ respective properties were separated by a fence or hedge and the true owner had no access to the disputed land. In 1967 the Defendants’ predecessors in title began to maintain the land by mowing the grass and trimming the hedges and . .
Cited – Leigh v Jack CA 11-Dec-1879
The plaintiff’s predecessor in title (Mr Leigh) had laid out part of his estate as proposed streets to be known as Grundy Street and Napier Place. He conveyed to the defendant certain land described as being ‘bounded by’ Grundy Street and Napier . .
Cited – Buckinghamshire County Council v Moran CA 13-Feb-1989
The parties’ respective properties were separated by a fence or hedge and the true owner had no access to the disputed land. In 1967 the Defendants’ predecessors in title began to maintain the land by mowing the grass and trimming the hedges and . .
Cited – Gray v Wykeham Martin and Goode 17-Jan-1977
. .
Cited – Kynoch Limited v Rowlands 1912
The parties owned adjoining agricultural land divided by a dry ditch. The Plaintiffs built an enclosing wall on their own side of the ditch, cutting themselves off from access to the ditch.
Held: The true boundary between the properties lay . .

Cited by:
Cited – Tower Hamlets v Barrett and Another CA 19-Jul-2005
The defendant tenants appealed an order for them to surrender possession of land which they claimed had been acquired by adverse possession. The buildings, including one which shared a party wall with the building owned by the defendants had been . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Limitation

Updated: 05 December 2021; Ref: scu.141673

UBAF Ltd v European American Banking Corporation: CA 1984

The defendant invited the plaintiff to take part in a syndicated loan. The defendant’s assistant secretary signed a letter to the plaintiff making representations, now claimed to be fraudulent. The defendant succeeded at first instance arguing that the signature was not that of the bank, and that even if it was, the action would be statute barred.
Held: The court refused to strike out the claim. A company itself made a representation, if it produced a document which was signed by an authorised officer or agent acting within the scope of his actual authority. This applied to bind the defendant bank. The nature of a syndicated loan was a fiduciary arrangement, and the obligations on a lead bank were continuing for limitation purposes, time did not run, and the obligation was not time barred. The issue would be settled at trial when it was established when the defendant could be said to have come to know of the alleged deceit.

Ackner LJ
[1984] QB 713, [1984] 1 WLR 508, [1984] CLY 1579
England and Wales
Citing:
Explained – Swift v Jewsbury and Goddard 1874
. .
Explained – Hirst v West Riding Banking Co CA 1901
The representation on which the claim made was was in a letter signed by the branch manager of the defendant bank and the court evidently assumed that this could not be equated with the bank’s own signature.
Held: The action against the bank . .
Considered – Forster v Outred and Co CA 1981
A mother signed a mortgage deed charging her property to H as security for a loan to her son. She claimed the solicitor had been negligent in his advice. The solicitor replied that the claim was out of time. The loss accrued not when demand for . .

Cited by:
Cited – Nykredit Mortgage Bank Plc v Edward Erdman Group Ltd (No 2) HL 27-Nov-1997
A surveyor’s negligent valuation had led to the plaintiff obtaining what turned out to be inadequate security for his loan. A cause of action against a valuer for his negligent valuation arises when a relevant and measurable loss is first recorded. . .
Cited – Pegasus Management Holdings Sca and Another v Ernst and Young (A Firm) and Another ChD 11-Nov-2008
The claimants alleged professional negligence in advice given by the defendant on a share purchase, saying that it should have been structured to reduce Capital Gains Tax. The defendants denied negligence and said the claim was statute barred.
Banking, Limitation, Torts – Other, Company

Updated: 29 November 2021; Ref: scu.181338

Alves v Attorney General of The Virgin Islands (British Virgin Islands): PC 18 Dec 2017

From the Court of Appeal of the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court (British Virgin Islands)

Lord Neuberger

Lord Kerr

Lord Carnwath

Lord Hughes

Lord Hodge
[2017] UKPC 42
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Stubbings v Webb and Another HL 10-Feb-1993
Sexual Assault is not an Act of Negligence
In claims for damages for child abuse at a children’s home made out of the six year time limit time were effectively time barred, with no discretion for the court to extend that limit. The damage occurred at the time when the child left the home. A . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Personal Injury, Limitation

Updated: 22 November 2021; Ref: scu.601883

Archbishop Bowen and Another v JL: CA 21 Feb 2017

The defendants appealed against finding that they were responsible for the assaults by a priest on the claimant.

Lewison, Burnett LJJ, Sir Ernest Ryder SP T
[2017] EWCA Civ 82
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Stubbings v Webb and Another HL 10-Feb-1993
Sexual Assault is not an Act of Negligence
In claims for damages for child abuse at a children’s home made out of the six year time limit time were effectively time barred, with no discretion for the court to extend that limit. The damage occurred at the time when the child left the home. A . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Torts – Other, Limitation

Updated: 22 November 2021; Ref: scu.575330

In re Diplock’s estate: CA 1948

After considering a situation in which trust money had been applied in making alterations to the property of an innocent third party but had not added to the value of the property,
Held: The origin of the equitable rules of tracing were described: ‘the metaphysical approach of equity coupled with and encouraged by the far-reaching remedy of a declaration of charge that enabled equity to identify money in a mixed fund.’ and
‘In the absence of authority to the contrary, our conclusion is that as regards the Diplock money used in these cases it cannot be traced in any true sense; and, further, that even if this were not so, the only remedy available to equity, viz., that of a declaration of charge, would not produce an equitable result and is inapplicable accordingly’
and ‘In the case of adaptation of property of the volunteer by means of trust money, it by no means necessarily follows that the money can be said to be present in the adapted property. The beneficial owner of the trust money seeks to follow and recover that money and claims to use the machinery of a charge on the adapted property in order to enable him to do so. But in the first place the money may not be capable of being followed. In every true sense the money may have disappeared. …. The result may add not one penny to the value of the house. Indeed the alteration may well lower the value of the house. …. Can it be said that in such cases the trust money can be traced and extracted from the altered asset? Clearly not for the money will have disappeared leaving no monetary trace behind. ….’
As regards limitation, the 12 year period for enforcing a will trust runs from the date of the death, even though a personal representative is not bound to distribute within a year from death.

Lord Greene MR
[1948] Ch 465
England and Wales
Citing:
Explained – Sinclair v Brougham HL 1914
An insolvent building society had, outside its powers, run a banking business. The House considered the competing claims of the unadvanced shareholders of the building society’s intra vires business, members of the society who had not been granted . .

Cited by:
Cited – Aluminium Industrie Vaassen B V v Romalpa Aluminium Ltd ChD 11-Feb-1975
The plaintiffs sold aluminium to the defendant and by a clause in the contract retained their title in the materials sold until payment was received. The purchaser went into insolvent receivership, and the seller sought recovery of the equipment and . .
Cited – Foskett v McKeown and Others CA 27-Jun-1997
Various people had paid money with the promise of acquiring an interest in land in Portugal. The scheme was fraudulent. The funds had been used to purchase a life/investment policy. The policy was held in trust for the fraudster’s mother but he had . .
Cited – Foskett v McKeown and Others HL 18-May-2000
A property developer using monies which he held on trust to carry out a development instead had mixed those monies with his own in his bank account, and subsequently used those mixed monies to pay premiums on a life assurance policy on his own life, . .
Cited – Green and others v Gaul and Another; In re Loftus deceased ChD 18-Mar-2005
The claimants began an action in January 2003 to seek to set aside the appointment of an administrator from December 1991, and to have set aside transfers of property made within the estate.
Held: The limitation period against a personal . .
Appeal from – Ministry of Health v Simpson; In re Diplock dec HL 1950
The will of Cable Diplock purported to make a gift to charity, and was distributed accordingly. The house however found the gift to be invalid.
Held: A personal remedy existed for the recovery of amounts wrongly paid in the distribution of an . .
Cited – Gomez and others v Vives CA 3-Oct-2008
The claimant appealed a finding that the court did not have jurisdiction over income payable to a trust governed by English law under which the claimant was beneficiary.
Held: The appeal failed in part. Because Article 5 is in derogation from . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Equity, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 11 November 2021; Ref: scu.182265

Cartledge v E Jopling and Sons Ltd: HL 1963

The plaintiffs were steel dressers who, in the course of their employment, had inhaled quantities of noxious dust which had caused them to suffer from pneumoconiosis. They issued proceedings on 1 October 1956 but were unable to show any breach of duty by their employers which contributed to their condition after 1 October 1950. The defendants pleaded that the claims were barred by the six year limitation period under section 2 of the 1939 Act.
Held: Lord Reid made it clear that he would have wished to hold ‘that a cause of action ought not to be held to accrue until either the injured person has discovered the injury or it would be possible for him to discover it if he took such steps as were reasonable in the circumstances’. But the House unanimously held that the 1939 Act and established authority precluded it from so holding. Where a defendant sought to rely upon some damage as setting the limitation clock running, the damage referred to must be ‘real’ as distinct from minimal. The common law ought never to produce a wholly unreasonable result.
Lord Pearce said: ‘It is for a judge or jury to decide whether a man has suffered any actionable harm and in borderline cases it is a question of degree.
It is a question of fact in each case whether a man has suffered material damage by any physical changes in his body. Evidence that those changes are not felt by him and may never be felt tells in favour of the damage coming within the principle of de minimis non curat lex. On the other hand evidence that in unusual exertion or at the onslaught of disease he may suffer from his hidden impairment tells in favour of the damage being substantial.’ and ‘The cause of action accrued when it reached a stage, whether known or unknown, at which a judge could properly give damages for the harm that had been done.’
Lord Reid: ‘If this were a matter governed by the common law I would hold that a cause of action ought not to be held to accrue until either the injured person has discovered the injury or it would be possible for him to discover it if he took such steps as were reasonable in the circumstances. The common law ought never to produce a wholly unreasonable result . . But the present question depends on statute, the Limitation Act, 1939, and section 26 of that Act appears to me to make it impossible to reach the result which I have indicated.’

Lord Reid, Lord Evershed MR, Lord Pearce
[1963] AC 758, [1963] 1 All ER 341
Limitation Act 1939 2
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Cartledge v E Jopling and Sons Ltd CA 1962
The court gave guidance on when an injury passes from being de minimis to being sufficiently significant to found a cause of action: ‘there is from the beginning some injury occurring from day to day, as each of the minute particles which enter the . .

Cited by:
Cited – Hatton v Messrs Chafes (A Firm) CA 13-Mar-2003
The defendant firm appealed against a refusal to strike out the claimant’s claim for professional negligence, asserting that the judge should have considered the limitation issue in the light of Khan v Falvey.
Held: By the time that the . .
Cited – Lagden v O’Connor HL 4-Dec-2003
The parties had been involved in a road traffic accident. The defendant drove into the claimant’s parked car. The claimant was unable to afford to hire a car pending repairs being completed, and arranged to hire a car on credit. He now sought . .
Cited – McDonnell v Congregation of Christian Brothers Trustees (Formerly Irish Christian Brothers) and others HL 4-Dec-2003
In 2000, the claimant sought damages for sexual abuse from before 1951. The issue was as to whether the limitation law which applied was that as at the date of the incidents, or that which applied as at the date when he would be deemed uner the . .
Cited – The Law Society v Sephton and Co and others CA 13-Dec-2004
The Society appealed dismissal for limitation of its claim against the defendant firm of accountants arising from alleged fraud in approval of a solicitor’s accounts.
Held: The liability did not arise until the Society decided to make . .
Cited – Rothwell v Chemical and Insulating Co Ltd and Another CA 26-Jan-2006
Each claimant sought damages after being exposed to asbestos dust. The defendants resisted saying that the injury alleged, the development of pleural plaques, was yet insufficient as damage to found a claim.
Held: (Smith LJ dissenting) The . .
Cited – Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council v Municipal Mutual Insurance Ltd CA 6-Feb-2006
The deceased had come into contact with asbestos when working on building sites for more than one contractor. The claimant here sought contribution from the defendants for the damages it had paid to his estate. The issue was as to liability on . .
Cited – Haward and others v Fawcetts HL 1-Mar-2006
The claimant sought damages from his accountants, claiming negligence. The accountants pleaded limitation. They had advised him in connection with an investment in a company which investment went wrong.
Held: It was argued that the limitation . .
Cited – A v Hoare; H v Suffolk County Council, Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs intervening; X and Y v London Borough of Wandsworth CA 12-Apr-2006
Each claimant sought damages for a criminal assault for which the defendant was said to be responsible. Each claim was to be out of the six year limitation period. In the first claim, the proposed defendant had since won a substantial sum from the . .
Mentioned – Law Society v Sephton and Co (a Firm) and Others HL 10-May-2006
A firm of solicitors had a member involved in a substantial fraud. The defendant firm of accountants certified the firm’s accounts. There were later many calls upon the compensation fund operated by the claimants, who sought recovery in turn from . .
Cited – Horton v Sadler and Another HL 14-Jun-2006
The claimant had been injured in a road traffic accident for which the defendant was responsible in negligence. The defendant was not insured, and so a claim was to be made against the MIB. The plaintiff issued proceedings just before the expiry of . .
Cited – Johnston v NEI International Combustion Ltd; Rothwell v Chemical and Insulating Co Ltd; similar HL 17-Oct-2007
The claimant sought damages for the development of neural plaques, having been exposed to asbestos while working for the defendant. The presence of such plaques were symptomless, and would not themselves cause other asbestos related disease, but . .
Cited – Axa General Insurance Ltd and Others v Lord Advocate and Others SCS 8-Jan-2010
axaReSCS201
The claimant sought to challenge the validity of the 2009 Act by judicial review. The Act would make their insured and themselves liable to very substantial unanticipated claims for damages for pleural plaques which would not previousl or otherwise . .
Cited – Dryden and Others v Johnson Matthey Plc SC 21-Mar-2018
Sensitisation to salt can be personal injury
The claimants, had developed platinum salt sensitisation due to the defendant employer’s breach of health and safety regulations and common law duty, claimed a cause of action for personal injury. Platinum salt sensitisation is, in itself, an . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Limitation, Personal Injury

Leading Case

Updated: 11 November 2021; Ref: scu.179759

Dalton v Henry Angus and Co: HL 14 Jun 1881

The court explained the doctrine of lost modern grant. Where there has been more than 20 years’ uninterrupted enjoyment of an easement, and that enjoyment has the necessary qualities to fulfil the requirements of prescription, then unless, for some reason the existence of such a grant is impossible, the law will adopt a legal fiction that such a grant was made, in spite of any direct evidence that no such grant was in fact made. ‘. . the whole law of prescription and the whole law which governs the presumption or inference of a grant or covenant rest upon acquiescence. The courts and the judges have had recourse to various expedients for quieting the possession of persons in the exercise of rights which have not been resisted by the persons against whom they are exercised, but in all cases it appears to me that acquiescence and nothing else is the principle upon which these expedients rest.’
Lord Blackburn, delivering the principal speech on this point, regarded the interposition of an independent contractor as irrelevant, because of the nature of the duty: ‘Ever since Quarman v Burnett (1840) 6 M and W 499, [1840] EngR 182, it has been considered settled law that one employing another is not liable for his collateral negligence unless the relation of master and servant existed between them. So that a person employing a contractor to do work is not liable for the negligence of that contractor or his servants. On the other hand, a person causing something to be done, the doing of which casts on him a duty, cannot escape from the responsibility attaching on him of seeing that duty performed by delegating it to a contractor. He may bargain with the contractor that he shall perform the duty and stipulate for an indemnity from him if it is not performed, but he cannot thereby relieve himself from liability to those injured by the failure to perform it: Hole v Sittingbourne Railway Co (1861) 6 H and N 488, [1861] EngR 170; Pickard v Smith 10 CB (NS) 470, [1861] EngR 71, Tarry v Ashton (1876) 1 QBD 314.’
Fry J (asked to give his opinion to the house said: ‘But leaving such technical questions aside, I prefer to observe that, in my opinion, the whole law of prescription and the whole law which governs the presumption or inference of a grant or covenant rest upon acquiescence. The Courts and the Judges have had recourse to various expedients for quieting the possession of persons in the exercise of rights which have not been resisted by the persons against whom they are exercised, but in all cases it appears to me that acquiescence and nothing else is the principle upon which these expedients rest.’

Lord Selborne LC, Lord Blackburn, Fry J (advising)
(1881) 6 App Cas 740, [1881] UKHL 1
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
At first instance – Dalton v Henry Angus and Co 1877
Fry J said: ‘ . .I cannot imagine any case of acquiescence in which there is not shown to be in the servient owner: 1, a knowledge of the acts done; 2, a power in him to stop the acts or to sue in respect of them; and 3, an abstinence on his part . .
Appeal from – Dalton v Henry Angus and Co CA 1878
. .

Cited by:
Cited – Regina v City of Sunderland ex parte Beresford HL 13-Nov-2003
Land had been used as a park for many years. The council land owner refused to register it as a common, saying that by maintaining the park it had indicated that the use was by consent and licence, and that prescription did not apply.
Held: . .
Explained – Tehidy Minerals Ltd v Norman CA 1971
The fact that land had been requisitioned by the Ministry of Agriculture between 1941 and 1960 and the 20-odd years’ user relied on as having created the rights had preceded 1941 was a bar to a prescriptive claim to grazing rights under the . .
Cited – Bakewell Management Limited v Brandwood and others HL 1-Apr-2004
Houses were built next to a common. Over many years the owners had driven over the common. The landowners appealed a decision that they could not acquire a right of way by prescription over the common because such use had been unlawful as a criminal . .
Cited – Hunter and Others v Canary Wharf Ltd HL 25-Apr-1997
The claimant, in a representative action complained that the works involved in the erection of the Canary Wharf tower constituted a nuisance in that the works created substantial clouds of dust and the building blocked her TV signals, so as to limit . .
Cited – Lawrence and Another v Fen Tigers Ltd and Others QBD 4-Mar-2011
The claimants had complained that motor-cycle and other racing activities on neighbouring lands were a noise nuisance, but the court also considered that agents of the defendants had sought to intimidate the claimants into not pursuing their action. . .
Cited – Woodland v Essex County Council SC 23-Oct-2013
The claimant had been seriously injured in an accident during a swimming lesson. She sought to claim against the local authority, and now appealed against a finding that it was not responsible, having contracted out the provision of swimming . .
Cited – Winterburn and Another v Bennett and Another CA 25-May-2016
The court was asked as to the steps which an owner of land must take to prevent others, who were using the land without permission, acquiring rights over the land. The claimants here had ignored clear signs placed on the land which asserted the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 11 November 2021; Ref: scu.187796

Beaman v ARTS Ltd: CA 1949

The italian plaintiff had left Egland in 1935 leaving certain valuables with the defendants for safe keeping. During the war, the property was released to the authorities as alien property, who, informed by the defemdant that they were of no value, gave them to the Salvation Army. The plaintiff returned in 1946, and after discovering the history, began proceedings for conversion, saying that the action was not defeated by limitation for fraud.
Held: The actions of the defendants were not fraudulent as such sop that section 26(a) of the 1939 Act did not operate. However, the defendants had made no attempt to obtain the plaintiff’s instructions, before disposing of the property as a matter of their own convenience, and in breach of the duty of confidence accepted. Their failure to inform the plaintoff of what they had done did amount to a reckless ‘concealment by fraud’ with section 26(b), and the action could proceed.

Lord Greene
[1949] 1 KB 550, [1949] 1 All ER 465, 65 TLR 389, 93 Sol Jo 236
Limitation Act 1939 26(a) 26(b)
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – The Bulli Coal Mining Company v Patrick Hill Osbourne and Another PC 1899
(New South Wales) . .

Cited by:
Cited – Cave v Robinson Jarvis and Rolf (a Firm) HL 25-Apr-2002
An action for negligence against a solicitor was defended by saying that the claim was out of time. The claimant responded that the solicitor had not told him of the circumstances which would lead to the claim, and that deliberate concealment should . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Torts – Other, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 11 November 2021; Ref: scu.194819

Tito v Wadell (No 2): ChD 1977

The liability to account for profits on breach of the self-dealing rule and the fair-dealing rule does not arise from a breach of duty at all. In his judgment such liability is the consequence of an equitable disability rather than of a breach of duty, such as a breach of trust by a trustee or, it appears, a breach of an analogous duty, such as the fiduciary obligations of a company director to his company. The claim for an account of profits is a claim for unjust enrichment, which may succeed, even in the absence of the commission of any wrong, such as a breach of trust or of fiduciary duty or the misuse or misapplication of any of the assets of the beneficiary of the duty. the fair-dealing rule was not confined to trustees, but ‘to many others, such as agents, solicitors and company directors’. It would be anomalous if the limitation applied to trustees, but not to others subject to the same rule. ‘A possible line of escape from the anomaly would be to treat agents, solicitors and the rest as constructive trustees for this purpose, so that all would be subject to the six years period: but I should be reluctant to resort to such artificiality unless driven to it.’

Sir Robert Megarry VC
[1977] 1 Ch 107
Limitation Act 1939 19(2)
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – DEG-Deutsche Investitions und Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH v Koshy and Other (No 3); Gwembe Valley Development Co Ltd (in receivership) v Same (No 3) CA 28-Jul-2003
The company sought to recover damages from a director who had acted dishonestly, by concealing a financial interest in a different company which had made loans to the claimant company. He replied that the claim was out of time. At first instance the . .
Cited – Bhullar and Another v McArdle CA 10-Apr-2001
The defendant had registered a caution against the claimant’s land at the Land Registry. The claimant sought its removal and now appealed an order for rectification of the register against him. The parties had reached oral agreements as to the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Company, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 10 November 2021; Ref: scu.187427

Parker and Another v SJ Berwin and Co and Another: QBD 17 Dec 2008

The claimants sought damages from their former solicitors. They set out to purchase a football club, expending substantial sums for the purpose, relying on the defendants’ promised provision of service in finding and arranging the funding. They said that the defendants made no progress, the opportunity was lost, and their money wasted. After a dilatory action, the claimants sought permission to amend their particulars out of time to add several new claims.
Held: Some amendments were allowed since they arose from the same facts, and others were rejected as having no prospect of success. However, it was not open to the Claimants to ‘rely on the CCC Films principle in the present case. There is no presumption that their wasted expenditure is recoverable in full. To recover any of that expenditure they must establish that there was a real and substantial chance of the expenditure being recovered, as would be usual in cases of this nature, and as they themselves initially acknowledged and pleaded.’

Hamblen J
[2008] EWHC 3017 (QB)
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Cobbold v London Borough of Greenwich CA 9-Aug-1999
The tenant had sought an order against the council landlord for failure to repair her dwelling. The defendant appealed refusal of leave to amend the pleadings in anticipation of the trial, now due to start on the following day.
Held: Leave was . .
Cited – Finlan v Winfield ChD 2007
Blackburne J said that when considering an application to amend particulars of claim outside the limitation period: ‘the court should not confine itself to a comparison of the new cause of action with the existing cause of action at the highest . .
Cited – Smith v Henniker-Major and Co CA 22-Jul-2002
The claimant appealed the strike-out of his claim for professional negligence against the respondent solicitors. He claimed that the solicitors had acted in breach of their duty, and he then called a company meeting. Only he attended. He mistakenly . .
Cited – Swain v Hillman CA 21-Oct-1999
Strike out – Realistic Not Fanciful Chance Needed
The proper test for whether an action should be struck out under the new Rules was whether it had a realistic as opposed to a fanciful prospect of success. There was no justification for further attempts to explain the meaning of what are clear . .
Cited – Independents’ Advantage Insurance Company Ltd v Cook and Another CA 24-Jul-2003
‘The power of the court to strike out a statement of case under CPR 3.4(2)(a) – and the related power to give summary judgment under CPR 24.2 – has an important place in the disposal of claims in accordance with the Civil Procedural Rules. The . .
Not applied – CCC Films (London) Ltd v Impact Quadrant Films Ltd 1984
The claimants purchased a licence to promote three films, but the defendant lost the film prints and CCC could not therefore promote them. After their claim for loss of profit failed in the absence of evidence, they claimed for the expenditure they . .
Cited – Allied Maples Group Ltd v Simmons and Simmons CA 12-May-1995
Lost chance claim – not mere speculative claim
Solicitors failed to advise the plaintiffs sufficiently in a property transaction. A warranty against liability for a former tenant’s obligations under leases had not been obtained. The trial judge held that, on a balance of probabilities, there was . .
Cited – Law Society of England and Wales and others v Shah and others ChD 30-Nov-2007
Solicitor firms had been made bankrupt leaving a shortfall after thefts from client accounts of over 12 million pounds. The thief had diappeared, and the other partners were now discharged form bankruptcy. The Law Society accepted that it could not . .
Cited – Cullinane v British ‘Rema’ Manufacturing Co Ltd CA 1954
The court considered the possibility of a claim in breach of contract for damages for both capital loss and loss of profit.
Lord Evershed MR said: ‘It seems to me, as a matter of principle, that the full claim of damages in the form in which . .
Cited – Anglia Television v Oliver Reed CA 1971
The television company had agreed with the actor defendant for him to appear in a production. He breached the contract. The company sought both loss of profits and for the expense incurred. The issue before the Court of Appeal was whether such . .
Cited – South Australia Asset Management Corporation v York Montague Ltd etc HL 24-Jun-1996
Limits of Damages for Negligent Valuations
Damages for negligent valuations are limited to the foreseeable consequences of advice, and do not include losses arising from a general fall in values. Valuation is seldom an exact science, and within a band of figures valuers may differ without . .
Cited – L Albert and Son v Armstrong Rubber Co 1949
(United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit) A purchaser of machines designed to recondition rubber sought damages for breach of contract, namely, the cost of the foundation on which the machines were placed. However, the purchaser did not prove . .
Cited – Filobake Ltd v Rondo Ltd and Another CA 11-May-2005
Unsuitability of baking equipment installation. A claimant in a breach of contract claim has a choice whether to claim loss of profits or wasted expenditure. . .
Cited – Galoo Ltd and Others v Bright Grahame Murray CA 21-Dec-1993
It is for the Court to decide whether the breach of duty was the cause of a loss or simply the occasion for it by the application of common sense. A breach of contract, to found recovery, must be shown to have been ‘an ‘effective’ or ‘dominant’ . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Professional Negligence, Litigation Practice, Limitation

Updated: 10 November 2021; Ref: scu.278861

Linfood Cash and Carry v Thomson: EAT 1989

One employee had informed his employer that a fellow employee had stolen two books of credit notes. He refused to allow his identity to be disclosed for fear of reprisals. The Tribunal had held that the dismissal was unfair because although the employers had a genuine belief in the employee’s guilt they had no reasonable ground for that belief and had not carried out as much investigation into the matter as was reasonable in all the circumstances; and in particular considered that in the absence of any corroborative evidence, a most stringent enquiry should have been made by management to ascertain that the informant was not actuated by improper motives.
Held: The employer’s appeal was dismissed. Wood P said that when assessing credibility: ‘the tribunal must not substitute their own view for the view of the employer, and thus they should be putting to themselves the question – could this employer acting reasonably and fairly in these circumstances properly accept the facts and opinions which it did? The evidence given is that given during the disciplinary procedures and not that which is given before the Tribunal. If a Tribunal is to say that this employer could not reasonably have accepted a witness as truthful, it seems to us that this decision must be based on logical and substantial grounds – good reasons.’
The court set out a checklist to be used in assessing the reliability of an anonymous informant witness. ‘We have been told by both sides that there seems to be no decision of this court giving guidance upon appropriate procedures for an employer to adopt where informants are involved. It is obvious that from whichever side of industry one looks it is important that dishonesty and lack of trust should, where possible, be eliminated, but a careful balance must be maintained between the desirability to protect informants who are genuinely in fear, and providing a fair hearing of issues for employees who are accused of misconduct. We are told that there is no clear guidance to be found from ACAS publications, and the lay members of this court have given me the benefit of their wide experience.
Every case must depend upon its own facts, and circumstances may vary widely – indeed with further experience other aspects may demonstrate themselves – but we hope that the following comments may prove to be of assistance:

    1. The information given by the informant should be reduced into writing in one or more statements. Initially these statements should be taken without regard to the fact that in those cases where anonymity is to be preserved, it may subsequently prove to be necessary to omit or erase certain parts of the statements before submission to others – in order to prevent identification.
    2. In taking statements the following seem important:
    (a) date, time and place of each or any observation or incident;
    (b) the opportunity and ability to observe clearly and with accuracy;
    (c) the circumstantial evidence such as knowledge of a system, or the reason for the presence of the informer and why certain small details are memorable;
    (d) whether the informant has suffered at the hands of the accused or has any other reason to fabricate, whether from personal grudge or any other reason or principle.

3. Further investigation can then take place either to confirm or undermine the information given. Corroboration is clearly desirable.
4. Tactful inquiries may well be thought suitable and advisable into the character and background of the informant or any other information which may tend to add or detract from the value of the information.
5. If the informant is prepared to attend a disciplinary hearing, no problem with arise, but if, as in the present case, the employer is satisfied that the fear is genuine then a decision will need to be made whether or not to continue with the disciplinary process.
6. If it is to continue, then it seems to us desirable that at each stage of those procedures the member of management responsible for that hearing should himself interview the informant and satisfy himself that weight is to be given to the information.
7. The written statement of the informant – if necessary with omissions to avoid identification – should be made available to the employee and his representatives.
8. If the employee or his representative raises any particular and relevant issue which should be put to the informant, then it may be desirable to adjourn for the chairman to make further inquiries of that informant.
9. Although it is always desirable for notes to be taken during disciplinary procedures, it seems to us to be particularly important that full and careful notes should be taken in these cases.
10. Although not peculiar to cases where informants have been the cause for the initiation of an investigation, it seems to us important that if evidence from an investigating officer is to be taken at a hearing it should, where possible, be prepared in a written form.
‘This case also appears to highlight the problems facing a Tribunal when considering credibility. As Mr O’Hara confirmed to us, the tribunal must not substitute their own view for the view of the employer, and thus they should be putting to themselves the question – could this employer acting reasonably and fairly in these circumstances properly accept the facts and opinions which it did? The evidence is that given during the disciplinary procedures and not that which is given before the Tribunal.
If a Tribunal is to say that this employer could not reasonably have accepted a witness as truthful, it seems to us that that decision must be based upon logical and substantial grounds – good reasons. Instances might be – that the witness was a bare faced liar, who must have given that impression to the employer at the relevant time; that the witness was clearly biased – provided that such a bias should have been clear at the relevant time; that documents available at the relevant time clearly showed the witness to be inaccurate and that such documentary evidence was ignored by the employer.
However, there could be other less obvious situations where mere vagueness and uncertainty would not be sufficient, and it should never be forgotten that cross-examination by experienced advocates may produce a picture not made evident during the disciplinary procedures. For the Tribunal merely to prefer one witness to another might well not be sufficient as this could be to substitute their own view. The employers have the peculiar advantage over the Tribunal of having an intimate knowledge of the geography, the nature and workings of the business and the various members of the staff.’

Wood P
[1989] IRLR 235, [1989] ICR 518
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – British Home Stores Ltd v Burchell EAT 1978
B had been dismissed for allegedly being involved with a number of other employees in acts of dishonesty relating to staff purchases. She had denied the abuse. The tribunal had found the dismissal unfair in the methods used to decide to dismiss her. . .

Cited by:
Mentioned – Hussain v Elonex Plc CA 17-Mar-1999
The claimant appealed against a finding that he had not been unfairly dismissed. He said that the procedure adopted had been unfair, since he had not had opportunity to see the statements provided to his employer by independent witnesses of the . .
Mentioned – Regina (S) v Brent London Borough Council and Others Regina (T) v Brent and Others Regina (P) v Oxfordshire County Council’s Exclusion Appeals Panel and Another CA 17-May-2002
Three pupils appealed their exclusion from school for violent or threatening behaviour.
Held: The statute imposed clear obligations on the appeal panel to act independently, and to consider both the individual circumstances of the child and . .
Cited – West Coast Trains Ltd v Murphy EAT 4-Apr-2006
EAT The claimant, a service manager employed on the respondents’ trains, was dismissed on conduct grounds for having sworn at and been threatening towards a customer. She claimed she had been unfairly dismissed . .
Cited – Ramsey, Hamblet and Treweeke v Walker Snack Foods Ltd, D McDonnell EAT 13-Feb-2004
Three employees appealed decisions that they had not been unfairly dismissed. The employer had suspected them of involvement in a scam involving the diversion of prize-winning crisp packets. Informants had insisted on remaining anonymous. The . .
Cited – Asda Stores Ltd v Thompson and others EAT 11-Oct-2001
. .
Cited – 2 Care v Ababio EAT 20-Oct-1999
. .
Cited – TNT Express UK Ltd v McConnell EAT 25-Nov-1994
. .
Cited – Boys and Girls Welfare Society v McDonald EAT 18-Oct-1995
. .
Cited – Signs and Labels Ltd v Wallace EAT 22-Jan-1996
. .
Cited – Ainsworth and others v Whitbread Plc EAT 17-Dec-1997
. .
Cited – Louies v Coventry Hood and Seating Co EAT 1990
An employer’s dismissal procedure need not be prima facie unfair if the employee was not permitted to know the contents of statements on which the employer would rely in taking a decision to dismiss or confirm a previous dismissal. Wood J said: ‘It . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Limitation, Employment

Leading Case

Updated: 09 November 2021; Ref: scu.267933

Birmingham City Council v Abdulla and Others: SC 24 Oct 2012

Former employees wished to argue that they had been discriminated against whilst employed by the Council. Being out of time for Employment Tribunal Proceedings, they sought to bring their cases in the ordinary courts. The Council now appealed against the refusal to strike out the claims on the basis that they could more conveniently have been heard by the tribunals.
Held: The appeal failed (Wilson, Hale, Rogers LL majority, Sumption and Carnwath LL dissenting). The fact that the six months limit in the Tribunal had never allowed an extension by discretion, was enough to imply a recognition of the alternative jurisdiction available to claimants. Save for any other element of abuse, it could never be said that a case could be more conveniently disposed of where that disposal would be an inevitable dismissal without consideration of the merits or justice of the case.
Lord Sumption (dissenting) said that a decision in favour of the claimants would frustrate the underlying purposes of the 1970 Act. The availability of the limitation defence was of particular significance for employers. The notion of ‘convenience’ under section 2(3) was much wider than the mere efficient distribution of business. The fact that a claim in the tribunal would be out of time was highly relevant, but not conclusive.

Lady Hale, Lord Wilson, Lord Sumption, Lord Reed, Lord Carnwath
[2012] UKSC 47, [2013] IRLR 38, [2012] ICR 1419, [2012] Eq LR 1147, [2012] WLR(D) 294
Bailii, Bailii Summary
Employment Rights (Dispute Resolution) Act 1998 1(2)(a), Equal Pay Act 1970 2(3)
England and Wales
Citing:
At first instance – Abdulla and Others v Birmingham City Council QBD 17-Dec-2010
The defendant applied for an order declaring that the claim would better be brought in an employment tribunal and that accordingly the County court should decline jurisdiction.
Held: The application was dismissed: ‘ I reject the submission by . .
Appeal from – Birmingham City Council v Abdulla and Others CA 29-Nov-2011
The Council appealed against an order dismissing its application for the claimants’ claims under equal pay legislation to be struck out for want of jurisdiction. The claims had been brought in the High Court rather than te hEmployment Tribunal, thus . .
Cited – Spiliada Maritime Corporation v Cansulex Ltd, The Spiliada HL 1986
Forum Non Conveniens Restated
The House reviewed the authorities on the principle of forum non conveniens and restated how to apply the principle where the defendant seeks a stay of proceedings on the ground that there is another more appropriate forum.
Held: ‘In the . .
Cited – Ashby and Others v Birmingham City Council QBD 3-Mar-2011
The claimants appealed against the strike out of their claims for damages for breach of contract on imposing changes in employment contract and conditions. The County Court had accepted the Council’s arguments on the construction and application of . .
Cited – Litster and Others v Forth Dry Dock and Engineering Co Ltd HL 16-Mar-1989
The twelve applicants had been unfairly dismissed by the transferor immediately before the transfer, and for a reason connected with the transfer under section 8(1). The question was whether the liability for unfair dismissal compensation . .
Cited – Delaney v Staples HL 15-Apr-1992
The claimant had been dismissed but had been given no payment in lieu of notice. She claimed to the Industrial Tribunal that this was an unlawful deduction from her wages and that therefore the Industrial Tribunal had jurisdiction.
Held: The . .
Cited – Levez etc v T H Jennings (Harlow Pools) Ltd (No 2) EAT 1-Oct-1999
The restriction on the awards of compensation for sex discrimination to payments in respect of a period of two years prior to the claim was unlawful. Claims of other natures were not so limited, and this could not be supported, since it was in . .
Cited – Preston and Others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust and Others; Fletcher and Others v Midland Bank plc ECJ 16-May-2000
ECJ Social policy – Men and women – Equal pay – Membership of an occupational pension scheme – Part-time workers – Exclusion – National procedural rules – Principle of effectiveness – Principle of equivalence. . .
Cited – Preston and Others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust and Others, Fletcher and Others v Midland Bank Plc (No 2) HL 8-Feb-2001
Part-time workers claimed that they had been unlawfully excluded from occupational pension schemes because membership was dependent on an employee working a minimum number of hours per week and that that was discriminatory because a considerably . .
Cited – Radakovits v Abbey National Plc CA 17-Nov-2009
The Tribunal had considered the question of jurisdiction as a preliminary issue. It heard evidence, and considered that there was no jurisdiction. This was despite the fact that, at an earlier stage, the employer had said that it would not contest . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Discrimination, Limitation

Updated: 09 November 2021; Ref: scu.465179

Pegasus Management Holdings Sca and Another v Ernst and Young (A Firm) and Another: ChD 11 Nov 2008

The claimants alleged professional negligence in advice given by the defendant on a share purchase, saying that it should have been structured to reduce Capital Gains Tax. The defendants denied negligence and said the claim was statute barred.
Held: The defence in fact was that the claimant had both brought the claim too early because no tax liability had yet arisen, and too late because the arrangement had been set up several years before. Any contract breach took place when the breach occurred and that was time barred. In negligence, time ran from the time when any actual damage occurred, and ‘where the client has engaged professionals in connection with a transaction to secure for him some property or rights, and because of the negligence of those professionals, the client acquires less valuable property or rights than he would have done if he had been given correct advice, he suffers damage at the time of the transaction, even if the property or rights are worth no less than he actually paid for them.’ The damage occurred on the purchase of the shares, and the claim was time barred.

Lewison J
[2008] EWHC 2720 (Ch)
Bailii
Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992 164A, Finance Act 1997, Finance Act 1993, Limitation Act 1980
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Forster v Outred and Co CA 1981
A mother signed a mortgage deed charging her property to H as security for a loan to her son. She claimed the solicitor had been negligent in his advice. The solicitor replied that the claim was out of time. The loss accrued not when demand for . .
Cited – Watkins and Another v Jones Maidment Wilson (A Firm) CA 4-Mar-2008
The claimants alleged professional negligence by the defendant solicitors in advising them to agree to a postponment of a completion. The defendants raised as a preliminary issue the question of limitation. The claimant said that the limitation . .
Cited – Doncaster Pharmaceuticals Group Ltd and Others v The Bolton Pharmaceutical Company 100 Ltd CA 26-May-2006
Appeals were made against interlocutory injunctions for alleged trade mark infringement.
Held: The court should hesitate about making a final decision for summary judgment without a trial, even where there is no obvious conflict of fact at the . .
Cited – Nykredit Mortgage Bank Plc v Edward Erdman Group Ltd (No 2) HL 27-Nov-1997
A surveyor’s negligent valuation had led to the plaintiff obtaining what turned out to be inadequate security for his loan. A cause of action against a valuer for his negligent valuation arises when a relevant and measurable loss is first recorded. . .
Cited – Baker v Ollard and Bentley CA 12-May-1982
The plaintiff and a Mr and Mrs Bodman agreed to buy a house. The plaintiff intended to live on the first floor and the Bodmans on the ground floor. The solicitor should have advised them to convey the freehold into their joint names and then to . .
Cited – Knapp v Ecclesiastical Insurance Group Plc and Another CA 30-Oct-1997
A claim in negligence was brought against insurance brokers for failing to advise the claimant of certain matters with the result that an insurance policy entered into by the claimant was voidable for non-disclosure.
Held: The claimant . .
Cited – E D and F Man Liquid Products Ltd v Patel and Another CA 4-Apr-2003
The rules contained two occasions on which a court would consider dismissal of a claim as having ‘no real prospect’ of success.
Held: The only significant difference between CPR 24.2 and 13.3(1), is that under the first the overall burden of . .
Cited – Swain v Hillman CA 21-Oct-1999
Strike out – Realistic Not Fanciful Chance Needed
The proper test for whether an action should be struck out under the new Rules was whether it had a realistic as opposed to a fanciful prospect of success. There was no justification for further attempts to explain the meaning of what are clear . .
Cited – The Royal Brompton Hospital National Health Service Trust v Hammond and Others (No 5) CA 11-Apr-2001
When looking at an application to strike out a claim, the normal ‘balance of probabilities’ standard of proof did not apply. It was the court’s task to assess whether, even if supplemented by evidence at trial, the claimant’s claim was bound to fail . .
Cited – UBAF Ltd v European American Banking Corporation CA 1984
The defendant invited the plaintiff to take part in a syndicated loan. The defendant’s assistant secretary signed a letter to the plaintiff making representations, now claimed to be fraudulent. The defendant succeeded at first instance arguing that . .
Cited – DW Moore and Co Ltd v Ferrier CA 1988
A solicitor was instructed to prepare an agreement providing for the introduction of a new working director into an insurance broking business carried on by a company. His instructions called for the new director to enter into a restrictive covenant . .
Cited – Bell v Peter Browne and Co CA 1990
Mr Bell asked his solicitors to transfer the matrimonial home into his wife’s sole name. He was to receive a one-sixth interest of the gross proceeds on a sale. His interests were to be protected by a trust deed or mortgage. The solicitor drafted . .
Cited – Law Society v Sephton and Co (a Firm) and Others HL 10-May-2006
A firm of solicitors had a member involved in a substantial fraud. The defendant firm of accountants certified the firm’s accounts. There were later many calls upon the compensation fund operated by the claimants, who sought recovery in turn from . .
Cited – Watts and Co v Morrow CA 30-Jul-1991
The plaintiff had bought a house on the faith of the defendant’s report that there were only limited defects requiring repair. In fact the defects were much more extensive. The defendant surveyor appealed against an award of damages after his . .
Cited – Nykredit Mortgage Bank Plc v Edward Erdman Group Ltd (No 2) HL 27-Nov-1997
A surveyor’s negligent valuation had led to the plaintiff obtaining what turned out to be inadequate security for his loan. A cause of action against a valuer for his negligent valuation arises when a relevant and measurable loss is first recorded. . .
Cited – South Australia Asset Management Corporation v York Montague Ltd etc HL 24-Jun-1996
Limits of Damages for Negligent Valuations
Damages for negligent valuations are limited to the foreseeable consequences of advice, and do not include losses arising from a general fall in values. Valuation is seldom an exact science, and within a band of figures valuers may differ without . .
Cited – R P Howard Ltd and Witchell v Woodman Matthews and Co (a firm) 1983
The solicitor defendant knew that the company was a family company effectively run by Mr Witchell from whom they received their instructions. The question raised was as to the duty of the solicitor to company and director.
Held: There is no . .
Cited – First National Comercial Bank plc v Humberts CA 27-Jan-1995
The plaintiff loaned money on the basis of a negligent survey by the defendant. The borrower subsequently defaulted, and the lender issued a writ. The defendant said that the claim was time barred.
Held: The court allowed the plaintiff’s . .
Cited – Coulthard, Ashton Shuttleworth, and Dawes v Neville Russell (a Firm) CA 27-Nov-1997
Auditors who were in a position to advise a company’s directors as to the legality of them making loan payments to a shell company which was acquiring there shares had a duty so to advise. The directors of a company sued them for failing to warn . .
Cited – Shore v Sedgwick Financial Services Ltd CA 23-Jul-2008
The claimant said that the defendant had given him negligent advice on pensions, failing to say that he should stay within his occupational scheme. The defendant pleaded limitation.
Held: The claimant suffered damage when he made the transfer . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Professional Negligence, Limitation

Updated: 09 November 2021; Ref: scu.277737

Phillips and Others v Vaughan: LRA 4 Mar 2016

LRA Application to close registered title by documentary title owners/ first registration of possessory title based on adverse possession/ Whether factual and mental elements of adverse possession established/ Whether the occupation was with consent/ Whether witness statements made by their apparent author/ whether a witness offered an inducement to give evidence/ Whether a further adjournment of proceedings to facilitate a third opportunity to obtain handwriting evidence should be grant

[2016] EWLandRA 2014 – 0497
Bailii
Limitation Act 1980 15 17, Land Registration Act 2002 11(7)

Registered Land, Limitation

Updated: 02 November 2021; Ref: scu.564466

Ezekiel v Orakpo: CA 16 Sep 1996

A charging order was made in 1982 to secure pounds 20,000 under a judgment given in 1979. The judgment creditor did not seek to enforce the charging order until almost 12 years had elapsed since the making of the charging order. An order for possession was made so as to enforce the order. The debtor tendered a sum sufficient to pay the principal debt but not interest on it. The parties appealed a finding that the creditor was entitled to interest, but only for six years.
Held: The creditor was entitled to interest not limited to six years. A charging order carries a charge to secure interest, whether or not interest is specifically mentioned. Enforcement of a foreign currency judgment by means of a charging order required the judgment debt first to be converted to Sterling before completion of the enforcement by the making of the charging order. Enforcement of a judgment debt by means of a charging order under the Charging Orders Act 1979 is completed when the charging order is made final.
Millett LJ said that, for a judgement to carry judgment interest it is not necessary to say so specifically. Therefore it is also not necessary to mention interest in any Charging Order carrying the judgement into effect for such interest to be added to the security. He continued:-
‘Section 3(4) of the Charging Orders Act 1979 provides that the Charging Order takes effect as an equitable charge created by the judgment debtor by writing under his hand. It must therefore be given the same effect unless the Act itself provides otherwise as would an equitable charge on the land in question to secure a stated principle sum but with no mention of interest. Such a charge would carry interest even though there were no words allowing interest on the charge itself. That was decided at first instance in re Drax… which was followed . . in Stoker v Elwell . . The defendant invited us to over rule Stoker . . and re Drax although they have stood unchallenged for nearly a century.
His submission was founded on the well established principle that a Charging Order cannot be given except for an ascertained sum . . It is clear Law for example that a Charging Order cannot be made for untaxed costs. In the present case, of course, the costs were taxed. But it is said by parity of reasoning that it cannot be made to secure future interest since the amount of such interest cannot be ascertained in advance. However, the Charging Orders Act 1979 itself entitles the Court to make a Charging Order for monies due or to become due, and it appears to me that future interest at an ascertained rate (albeit a variable rate) from the date of judgment to the date of payment is an ascertained or at least an ascertainable sum for the purpose of the rule in question.
So far as the costs of enforcing the security are concerned, it is of course perfectly true that at the date of the Charging Order, or indeed subsequently, it was quite impossible to ascertain them. The Judge came to the conclusion that the Charging Order must, by the provisions of the statute, be given the same effect as if it were an equitable charge under hand only. If it were, the chargee would have the right in equity to add the costs of enforcing the security to the security. He considered that that should be implied into the Charging Order by virtue of section 3(4). I agree with him and do not think it necessary to add anything further on the matter.’

Millett LJ
Times 16-Sep-1996, [1997] 1 WLR 340
Judgments Act 1938 17
England and Wales
Citing:
Appeal from – Ezekiel v Orakpo ChD 4-Nov-1994
The claimant had obtained a charging order to secure a judgment debt, but took no steps to enforce it for more than twelve years. The chargee denied that it could any longer be enforced, and also that the order carried interest when interest had not . .
See Also – Ezekiel v Orakpo CA 1977
A lease had been forfeited for non payment of rent. The lessor then took proceedings for possession. The tenant claimed that the action was invalid because a receiving order had been made against him in the meantime.
Held: The Court rejected . .

Cited by:
Cited – Carnegie v Glessen and Others CA 1-Mar-2005
A dispute had been settled by imposition of a charging order against property expressed in a foreign currency. The claimant now said such an order was not possible, and had been made by mistake correctable under the slip rule.
Held: The Master . .
Applied – Yorkshire Bank Finance Ltd v Mulhall and Another CA 24-Oct-2008
The bank had obtained a judgement against the defendant, and took a charging order. Nothing happened for more than twelve years, and the defendant now argued that the order and debt was discharged.
Held: The enforcement of the charging order . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Litigation Practice, Land, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 02 November 2021; Ref: scu.80429

Brickfield Properties Ltd v Newton: CA 1971

Court’s Investigation of Construction Claims

The court heard an application to amend pleadings to add a claim about negligent supervision of a construction. Sachs LJ said: ‘Where there are found in completed buildings serious defects of the type here under review the facts relating to design, execution and superintendence are inextricably entangled until such time as the court succeeds in elucidating the position through evidence. The design has inevitably to be closely examined even if the only claim relates to superintendence, and all the more so if the designs are, as is further alleged here, experimental or such as need amplification in the construction progresses. The architect is under a continuing duty to check that his design will work in practice and to correct any errors as they emerge. It savours of the ridiculous for the architect to be able to say, as it was here suggested to him that he could say: ‘true, my design was faulty, but, of course, I saw to it that the contractors followed it faithfully’ and be enabled on that ground to succeed in the action.
The same, or substantially the same set of facts, falls to be investigated in relation to the design claim and the superintendence claim. The plans and specifications and ancillary documents are relevant to the superintendence claim as well as to the designer claim: hence the inability of the defendant to allege prejudice with regard to the preparation of his defence if this appeal is allowed. Accordingly, the ‘new cause of action’ falls within the ambit of RSC Ord. 20 r. 5(5), and it is one which the court has jurisdiction to permit to be pursued’.

Sachs LJ, Edmund Davies LJ
[1971] 1 WLR 862, [1971] 3 All ER 328
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Roberts v Gill and Co Solicitors and Others SC 19-May-2010
The claimant beneficiary in the estate sought damages against solicitors who had acted for the claimant’s brother, the administrator, saying they had allowed him to take control of the assets in the estate. The will provided that property was to be . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Limitation, Construction

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.415957

Rains v Buxton: 1880

rains_buxtonChD1880

Fry J said: ‘The difference between dispossession and the discontinuance of possession might be expressed in this way: the one is where a person comes in and drives out the others from possession, the other case is where the person in possession goes out and is followed in by others.’ A defendant to a claim for adverse possession does not escape it by proving that he had not known of the acts relied upon against him nor by proving that that omission was not attributable to some negligence or default on his part.

Fry J
[1880] 14 ChD 537
Cited by:
Cited – Buckinghamshire County Council v Moran CA 13-Feb-1989
The parties’ respective properties were separated by a fence or hedge and the true owner had no access to the disputed land. In 1967 the Defendants’ predecessors in title began to maintain the land by mowing the grass and trimming the hedges and . .
Cited – Roberts v Swangrove Estates Ltd and Another ChD 14-Mar-2007
The court heard preliminary applications in a case asserting acquisition of land by adverse possession, the land being parts of the foreshore of the Severn Estuary.
Held: A person may acquire title to part of the bed of a tidal river by . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.259703

Roberts v Gill and Co Solicitors and Others: SC 19 May 2010

The claimant beneficiary in the estate sought damages against solicitors who had acted for the claimant’s brother, the administrator, saying they had allowed him to take control of the assets in the estate. The will provided that property was to be transferred only if the claimant’s brother paid all the Inheritance Tax. It was transferred without that tax having been paid. The events were now several years outside the limitation period. The claim was framed as a duty by the solicitors to the claimant personally.
Held: The claimant’s appeal was dismissed. The claimant had to succeed not only in applying to alter his claim to make it on behalf of the estate, but also to add the administrator, his brother to the claim. If he had to do the latter, could he do so after commencing the action, and outside the limitation period. The claimant did not show either that he need not add the brother, nor that he could do so after commencing the claim.
A party could be added after the commencement of an action only where this was necessary in order to determine the original litigation, and the action against the brother was not such.
Here the proposed addition of a party and amendments were for a new action. That new action would be out of time.
Lord Clarke and Lord Hope dissented in part in allowing that the brother could have been added as a party after the action had been commenced to avoid injustice, but there were no such special circumstances in this case.

Lord Hope, Deputy President, Lord Rodger, Lord Walker, Lord Collins, Lord Clarke
[2010] WLR (D) 130, [2010] UKSC 22, [2010] PNLR 30, [2010] WTLR 1223, [2010] 2 WLR 1227, [2011] AC 240
WLRD, Bailii, SC, SC Summ, Bailii Summary
Limitation Act 1980 35, Civil Procedure Rules 19.5
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Weldon v Neal CA 1887
An amendment to pleadings should not be allowed so as to allow a plaintiff to set up a cause of action which would otherwise be barred by the Statutes of Limitation. . .
Appeal from – Roberts v Gill and Co and Another CA 15-Jul-2008
The claimant sought damages in negligence against solicitors who had advised the executors in an estate of which he was a beneficiary. He now sought to amend his claim to make a claim in his personal and in derivative capacities. Sums had been paid . .
Cited – Spokes v Grosvenor and West End Railway Terminus Hotel Co Ltd CA 1897
The court discussed the joinder of the company in a derivative action. A L Smith LJ said: ‘That in the circumstances of this case the company are necessary parties to the suit I do not doubt, for without the company being made a party to the action . .
Cited – Yorkshire Regional Health Authority v Fairclough Building Ltd and Another CA 16-Nov-1995
The substitution of a successor party to a claim does not constitute a new claim for limitation purposes. Millett LJ considered the objects of the 1980 Act: ‘The 1980 Act was enacted in order to implement the recommendations of the Twenty-First . .
Cited – Performing Right Society Limited v London Theatre of Varieties Limited HL 1924
The parties, the plaintiff who was the equitable assignee of performing rights and the infringing defendant, joined specific issue on the absence of the legal owner of the rights.
Held: His absence was critical. PRS failed to obtain a . .
Cited – Mabro v Eagle, Star and British Dominions Insurance Co Ltd CA 1932
Scrutton LJ said: ‘In my experience the Court has always refused to allow a party or a cause of action to be added where, if it were allowed, the defence of the Statute of Limitations would be defeated. The Court has never treated it as just to . .
Cited – Haq v Singh and Another CA 25-May-2001
The claimant had been made bankrupt, and when she sued the defendant, was challenged as to her standing. She obtained an assignment of the right of action from her trustee in bankruptcy. She then sought to amend her pleadings under the rule. It was . .
Cited – Harmer v Armstrong CA 1934
The court considered the position where the assignor of a contract was required to attend court as a party when the assignee sought to enforce the debt.
Held: A beneficiary under a bare trust could bring proceedings in his own name and, where . .
Cited – Royal Brunei Airlines SDN BHD v Tan PC 24-May-1995
(Brunei) The defendants were a one-man company, BLT, and the one man, Mr Tan. A dishonest third party to a breach of trust was liable to make good a resulting loss even though he had received no trust property. The test of knowledge was an objective . .
Cited – Hayim v Citibank NA PC 1987
(Hong Kong) The plaintiffs were the testator’s sons, who were beneficiaries under his American will. He also executed a Hong Kong will under which the residue of his property outside the United States was to be held on trust for sale on the trusts . .
Cited – Liff v Peasley CA 1980
The court will not add a person as a defendant to an existing action if the claim was already statute-barred and he wished to rely on that defence, and if the court allows such addition ex parte it will not, on objection allow the addition to stand. . .
Cited – Oates v Consolidated Capital Services Pty Ltd 3-Jul-2009
Austlii (Supreme Court of New South Wales – Court of Appeal) CORPORATIONS – derivative action – sections 236 and 237 Corporations Act 2001 (Cth) – meaning of ‘proceedings on behalf of a company’ – whether using a . .
Cited – Cooke v Gill CCP 11-Jan-1873
What constitutes a cause of action is ‘every fact which is material to be proved to entitle the plaintiff to succeed.’ . .
Cited – Ingall v Moran CA 1944
The plaintiff had issued a writ in 1942 as administrator of his deceased son’s estate. However, he did not take out letters of administration until the November. It was said that proceedings instituted by an applicant who at the time had no standing . .
Cited – Smith v Henniker-Major and Co CA 22-Jul-2002
The claimant appealed the strike-out of his claim for professional negligence against the respondent solicitors. He claimed that the solicitors had acted in breach of their duty, and he then called a company meeting. Only he attended. He mistakenly . .
Cited – Wallersteiner v Moir (No 2) CA 1975
The court was asked whether Moir would be entitled to legal aid to bring a derivative action on behalf of a company against its majority shareholder.
Held: A minority shareholder bringing a derivative action on behalf of a company could obtain . .
Cited – Hilton v Sutton Steam Laundry CA 1946
. .
Cited – Brickfield Properties Ltd v Newton CA 1971
Court’s Investigation of Construction Claims
The court heard an application to amend pleadings to add a claim about negligent supervision of a construction. Sachs LJ said: ‘Where there are found in completed buildings serious defects of the type here under review the facts relating to design, . .
Cited – Lucy v W T Henleys Telegraph Works Co Ltd (ICI Ltd, third party) 1970
Megaw LJ discussed the application of O 15 r 1(4): ‘Paragraph (2) of that rule provides that a court may allow a party to amend the writ ‘after any period of limitation current at the date of the issue of the writ has expired’ but this is expressly . .
Cited – Burns v Campbell 1951
An action commenced by a plaintiff in a representative capacity which the plaintiff does not in fact possess is a nullity, and, further, that it makes no difference that the claim made in such an action is a claim under the Fatal Accidents Acts . .
Cited – Finnegan v Cementation Co Ltd CA 1953
The plaintiff had obtained Letters of Administration in Southern Ireland only but sought to bring an action under the Fatal Accidents Act in England. There were two separate bases upon which the plaintiff (the widow of a workman killed in a work . .
Cited – Davies v Elsby Brothers Ltd CA 1961
The writ was issued within the limitation period for the claim against ‘Elsby Brothers (a firm)’. In fact, the firm’s business had been taken over by Elsby Brothers Ltd before the proceedings had been issued. By the time the plaintiff applied for . .
Cited – Letang v Cooper CA 15-Jun-1964
The plaintiff, injured in an accident, pleaded trespass to the person, which was not a breach of duty within the proviso to the section, in order to achieve the advantages of a six-year limitation period.
Held: Trespass is strictly speaking . .
Cited – Chatsworth Investments Ltd v Cussins (Contractors) Ltd CA 1969
. .
Cited – Braniff v Holland and Hannen and Cubitts (Southern) Ltd CA 1969
Widgery LJ said: ‘Again, I think that it would only complicate matters if I attempted to deal with the facts, but one thing is perfectly clear, namely, that in the view of Megaw J. the fact that in certain cases under Order 20 rule 5, amendments . .
Cited – Bickley v Dorrington 12-Nov-1737
A bill was brought by creditors, and by one of the residuary legatees of the testator, against his executors, the other residuary legatee, and the former partner of the testator to recover from the former partner money owing to the estate.
Cited – Alsager v Rowley 16-Mar-1802
Lord Eldon LC said: ‘The established rule of the Court is certainly . . that in ordinary cases a debtor to the estate cannot be made a party to a bill against the executor: but there must be, as the cases express it, collusion or insolvency. That . .
Cited – Bowsher v Watkins CA 16-Feb-1830
Residuary legatees brought suit against the estate executors and a surviving partner of the testator for an account. It was argued that there were no special circumstances justifying the action by legatees.
Held: Collusion between the executor . .
Cited – Davies v Davies CA 12-Jun-1837
Residuary legatees filed a bill against the executor and the surviving partner of the testator for an account of partnership transactions.
Held: In the absence of a charge of fraud or collusion, there were no special circumstances justifying . .
Cited – Barker v Birch 19-Jul-1847
There may be circumstances under which the Court will, at the suit of universal legatees under a will, direct an account against a debtor to the testator’s estate, without collusion being established between the debtor and the personal . .
Cited – In re Field 1971
The plaintiff had an order for maintenance against the deceased’s estate. She brought proceedings in her own name against an insurance company which had wrongly paid a claim to the widow and not to the estate. The insurer sought a strike out. The . .
Cited – Milne v Milne; Travis v Milne 29-May-1851
A suit by parties beneficially interested in the estate of a deceased partner could not be maintained against both his executors and surviving partners, in the absence of special circumstances; but collusion was not the only ground for such a suit; . .
Cited – Yeatman v Yeatman 1877
An action was brought by a residuary legatee against her mother-in-law’s executors and another member of the family, who it was alleged, had failed to account for partnership monies to the mother-in-law.
Held: A beneficiary of a trust could . .
Cited – Bradstock Trustee Services Ltd v Nabarro Nathanson ChD 1995
The plaintiffs were trustees of an occupational pension scheme. It began professional negligence proceedings to recover an expected surplus paid to the employer by the solicitors whose advice had been acted on. The anticipated costs were . .
Cited – Morrison v Morrison’s Executors 1912
Lord Skerrington said: ‘A decree in such an action would be res judicata, provided always that the whole trustees and beneficiaries had been called as defenders.’ . .
Cited – Armour v Glasgow Royal Infirmary 1909
Lord Ordinary, Lord Skerrington said that in the ordinary case the action could be brought only at the instance of the trustees. But the testamentary trustees had been called as defenders, and concurred with the Infirmary in maintaining that the . .
Cited – Rae v Meek HL 1889
The beneficiaries under a trust created by a marriage contract sued a trustee for having lost trust money which had been lent on the security of unfinished houses in a building speculation. The trustee was held liable to restore the trust fund. The . .
Cited – Konamaneni v Rolls Royce Industrial Power (India) Limited ChD 20-Dec-2001
The claimants founded their action on the assertion that the defendants had been corrupt in obtaining contracts in India. The defendants argued that the English courts had no jurisdiction. The claimants held various small shareholdings in a company . .
Cited – E M Bowden’s Patents Syndicate Ltd v Herbert Smith and Co 1904
Where an equitable assignee sues a third party, the assignor must be joined as a defendant. The Plaintiff as the equitable owner of a patent was given liberty to amend its pleading by joining the legal owner, (failing which the Plaintiff’s case . .
Cited – In Re Selectmove Ltd CA 21-Dec-1993
Promisse to Pay Tax due is not Consideration
The company appealed against an order for its winding up, saying that the debt was disputed, an accomodation having been reached with the Revenue.
Held: The court declined to regard a promise to the Revenue by a company to pay its existing . .
Cited – Nurcombe v Nurcombe CA 1985
The court discussed a minority shareholder’s action to enforce the company’s claim as a derivative claim. Browne-Wilkinson LJ said that such an action, where a courts in equity permitted a person interested to bring an action to enforce the . .
Cited – Vandepitte v Preferred Accident Insurance Corp. of New York PC 1933
The plaintiff was injured in a motor accident. He failed in a direct claim against the insurers of the negligent defendant driver. The insurance was effected by the father (Mr Berry) of the negligent driver and provided that an indemnity would be . .
Cited – William Brandt’s Sons and Co v Dunlop Rubber Co HL 1905
The court was asked whether instructions given by the bank’s customer to purchasers of rubber to make payment to its bank directly, amounted to an equitable assignment of debts, so that the bank could sue for their recovery. The bank sued the . .
Cited – Weddell v JA Pearce and Major 1988
A cause of action in negligence was assigned in February 1986. The writ was issued by the assignee alone on 2 May 1986, at which time no notice of the assignment had been given to the defendants. It was argued that the action was a nullity.
Cited – Robinson v Unicos Property Corpn Ltd CA 1962
The plaintiff sought an additional averment (unsuccessfully objected to as constituting the addition of a new cause of action) to plead that the first plaintiff sued as equitable assignee of the benefit of a contract made with the defendant (the . .
Cited – Central Insurance Co Ltd v Seacalf Shipping Corpn (The Aiolos) CA 1983
Where an insurer indemnifies the assured, he is entitled to exercise, through subrogation, any claim the assured may have against the person who caused the losses. Absent an assignment of the claim, it belongs to the assured and the insurer does not . .
Cited – Red Sea Insurance Co Ltd v Bouygues SA and Others PC 21-Jul-1994
Lex loci delicti (the law of the jurisdiction in which the act complained of took place) can exceptionally be used when the lex fori (the jurisdiction formally assigned) gives no remedy. In the case of a claim under a foreign tort, the double . .
Cited – Red Sea Insurance Co Ltd v Bouygues SA and Others 1993
Hong Kong . .
Cited – William Brandt’s Sons and Co v Dunlop Rubber Co HL 1905
The court was asked whether instructions given by the bank’s customer to purchasers of rubber to make payment to its bank directly, amounted to an equitable assignment of debts, so that the bank could sue for their recovery. The bank sued the . .
Cited – Three Rivers District Council and Others v Governor and Company of Bank of England CA 6-Dec-1994
Equitable assignors of a deposit cannot pursue a claim for recovery of the assigned debt without joining in the assignee as a party, though it can sue in its own name. . .
Cited – Welsh Development Agency v Redpath Dorman Long Ltd CA 4-Apr-1994
A new claim was not deemed to have been made until the pleading was actually amended for limitation purposes, and should not be allowed after the limitation period had expired. The date of the application for leave to amend was not at issue. The . .

Cited by:
Cited – NML Capital Ltd v Argentina SC 6-Jul-2011
The respondent had issued bonds but in 2001 had declared a moratorium on paying them. The appellant hedge fund later bought the bonds, heavily discounted. Judgment was obtained in New York, which the appellants now sought to enforce against assets . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Limitation, Litigation Practice

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.415923

Ministry of Defence v Iraqi Civilians: SC 12 May 2016

Iraqi citizens claimed to have suffered unlawful detention and/or physical maltreatment from British armed forces in Iraq between 2003 and 2009. The claims were brought in tort in England against the Ministry of Defence, but the torts were governed by Iraqi law. Under the 1984 Act where a claim is brought in England but governed by foreign law, the English courts are to apply the foreign law of limitation. In many of these cases the action was begun more than three years after the relevant claimant became aware of the injury and the person who caused it, and was therefore time-barred under article 232 of the Iraqi Civil Code.
Held: The appeal failed.
‘The real question is whether it is legally relevant when the claimants have brought proceedings in England what impediments might have prevented similar proceedings in Iraq. The judge, as I have observed, regarded that as depending on the territorial ambit of article 435 as a matter of Iraqi law. On that footing it is obvious that a procedural time-bar arising under Iraqi law applied only in Iraq. But in my opinion, this was not a question of Iraqi law but of English law. In English proceedings, the relevant law is the Foreign Limitation Periods Act. Where the cause of action is governed by a foreign law, the Act requires an English court to ascertain the relevant rules of the foreign law of limitation and then to apply it to proceedings in England. Because the foreign law of limitation will have been designed for foreign proceedings, that necessarily involves a process of transposition. There may be facts which the foreign law of limitation would treat as relevant to foreign proceedings but which are irrelevant to proceedings in England.’
and ‘ The claimants’ submission, if accepted, would mean that there was no limitation period at all affecting the present proceedings in England, by reason of a consideration (CPA Order 17) which had no relevance to English proceedings because it has no application outside Iraq and has never impeded resort to the English court. The main argument advanced in support of it was that an English court applying the Act of 1984 must give effect to the whole of the relevant Iraqi law of limitation, and not just to part of it. This point was reinforced by reference to section 2 of the Act of 1984. Section 2(1) disapplies the relevant foreign law of limitation so far as its application would conflict with English public policy, and section 2(3) disapplies it so far as it suspends the running of time on account of ‘the absence of a party to the action or proceedings from any specified jurisdiction or country’. The point made is that where the Act disapplies some part of the foreign law of limitation, it does so expressly, thereby impliedly excluding its disapplication in any other circumstances. I reject the submission because it assumes that because the Iraqi law of limitation would treat certain facts as relevant to Iraqi proceedings, to treat those facts as irrelevant to English proceedings involves disapplying part of Iraqi law. It does not. It simply involves applying the same principles of Iraqi law to different facts. The facts relevant to proceedings in England are not necessarily the same as those which would be relevant to proceedings in Iraq.’

Lord Neuberger, President, Lady Hale, Deputy President, Lord Mance, Lord Sumption, Lord Reed
[2016] UKSC 25, [2016] 1 WLR 2001, [2016] WLR(D) 261, UKSC 2015/0126
Bailii, Bailii Summary, WLRD, SC, SC Summary
Private International Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1995, Foreign Limitation Periods Act 1984
England and Wales
Citing:
At QBD – Iraqi Civilian Litigation v Ministry of Defence QBD 26-Jan-2015
The court considered limitation issues as an interim issue in this claim and particularly as it was affected by Iraqi law.
Held: The effective period of CPA 17 ended on 31 December 2008. No claim had been brought relating to any alleged act or . .
Appeal from CA – Ministry of Defence v Iraqi Civilians CA 9-Dec-2015
‘This appeal raises a short but elusive point concerning the manner in which the English Court applies a foreign law relating to limitation when required to do so by section 1 of the Foreign Limitation Periods Act 1984’ . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

International, Limitation

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.563387

Peacock and Another v Custins and Another: CA 14 Nov 2000

The conveyance of a field constituting the dominant land to the claimants was expressed to be subject to the benefit of a right of way over land owned by the defendants, enabling the claimants to reach the dominant land ‘at all times and for all purposes in connection with the use and enjoyment of the property hereby conveyed’. The purchaser came to farm the purchased field as one unit with another field, and sought a declaration that the right of way was for the benefit of both fields.
Held: In construing such a grant the court was concerned with the identity of the land, and purpose of the grant, not with the extent of its use. Nevertheless, the declaration sought to identify different land and must not be granted.
Schiemann LJ said: ‘where a court is being asked to declare whether the right to use a way comprises a right to use it to facilitate the cultivation of land other than the dominant tenement, the court is not concerned with any comparison between the amount of use made or to be made of the servient tenement and the amount of use made or that might lawfully be made within the scope of the grant. It is concerned with declaring the scope of the grant, having regard to its purposes and the identity of the dominant tenement. The authorities indicate that the burden on the owner of the servient tenement is not to be increased without his consent. But burden in this context does not refer to the number of journeys or the weight of the vehicles. Any use of the way is, in contemplation of law, a burden and one must ask whether the grantor agreed to the grantee making use of the way for that purpose all three judges (in Harris) were addressing not the question of additional user, but the different question: whether the white land was being used for purposes which were not merely adjuncts to the honest use of the pink land (the dominant tenement); or, rephrasing the same question, whether the way was being used for the purposes of the white land as well as the dominant tenement.
It is in our judgment clear that the grantor did not authorise the use of the way for the purpose of cultivating the blue land. This can not sensibly be described as ancillary to the cultivation of [Whiteacre].’

Schiemann, Mance LJJ, Smith J
Gazette 15-Dec-2000, Times 15-Dec-2000, [2000] EWCA Civ 1958, [2001] 2 All ER 827, [2002] 1 WLR 1815
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
Affirmed – Harris v Flower CA 1904
The servient land-owner alleged an excessive user by which it was attempted to impose an additional burden on the servient tenement in the use of a right of way for obtaining access to a factory erected partly on the land to which the right of way . .
Cited – Skull And Another v Glenister And Others 1864
A right of way appurtenant to land passes to the tenant by a parol demise of the land, though nothiiig is said about it at the time of the demise. – A, having a right of way to D close, demised the close to B. The latter, being possessed of an . .
Cited – Inverugie Investments Ltd v Hackett PC 1995
The plaintiff was the lessee of 30 apartments within a hotel complex. The defendants ejected the plaintiff and for some years used the apartments as part of the hotel with an average occupancy rate of not more than 40%.
Held: The defendants . .
Cited – Stoke-on-Trent City Council v W and J Wass Ltd CA 1988
The council had operated open markets on its land under statutory authority. In breach of the statute, the defendant operated a market on a different day, but within the excluded area. This was a nuisance actionable on proof of damage. The council . .

Cited by:
Cited – Sargeant and Another v Macepark (Whittlebury) Ltd ChD 5-Mar-2003
The servient owner granted a lease of easements to the dominant owner, to provide a means of access to the dominant land, and from the dominant land (an hotel) to the Silverstone racing circuit. Subsequently the hotel owner negotiated a more direct . .
Cited – Wall v Collins and Another CA 17-May-2007
Properties, when leasehold, had acquired rights of way by prescription over neighbouring land. The freehold interests were acquired, and the claimant now appealed a decision that the right of way acquired under his lease had disappeared.
Held: . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Land, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.145437

David T Morrison and Co Ltd (T/A Gael Home Interiors) v ICL Plastics Ltd and Others: SC 30 Jul 2014

The claimant sought damages after an explosion at the defender’s nearby premises damaged its shop. The defender said that the claim was out of time, and now appealed against a decision that time had not begun to run under the 1973 Act.
Held: (Lord Hodge and Lord Toulson dissenting) The appeal was allowed. The natural meaning of the words ’caused as aforesaid’ in section 11(3) was adjectival: they described the loss with which the provision was concerned, but did not have the effect of postponing the running of time until the creditor was aware that the loss had been caused by a breach of duty. Properly construed, section 11(3) was concerned with latent damage. Construing it subjectively, as was in practice being suggested, would be anomalous. For the prescriptive period to begin under section 11(3) of the 1973 Act, the creditor needed to be aware (actually or constructively, if the creditor could with reasonable diligence have been aware) only of the occurrence of the loss or damage and not of its cause.

Lord Neuberger, President, Lord Sumption, Lord Reed, Lord Toulson , Lord Hodge
[2014] UKSC 48, 2014 GWD 25-5, 2014 SLT 791, UKSC 2013/0104
Bailii, Bailii Summary, SC, SC Summary
Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973 6(1) 11(3), Public Authorities Protection Act 1893, Law Reform (Limitation of Actions) Act 1954
Scotland
Citing:
See Also – ICL Plastics Ltd and Others, Re Application for Judicial Review SCS 11-Mar-2005
The applicants were concerned at the decision to exclude them from their premises to investigate the cause of an explosion leading to the collapse of the factory. . .
At Outer House – David T Morrison and Co Ltd v ICL Plastics Ltd and Others SCS 9-Mar-2012
Outer House – Opinion – In May 2004 an explosion at the defenders factory caused nine deaths. A pipeline carrying LPG gas had not been assessed for risks. Morrison owned neighbouring premises which were damaged. They began an action for damages. The . .
Cited – Glasper v Rodger SCS 1996
First Division – Inner House – Lord President Hope said: ‘In our opinion the lack of awareness which requires to be established for the purposes of section 11(3) of the 1973 Act is a lack of awareness that a loss has occurred caused by an act, . .
Cited – Watson v Fram Reinforced Concrete Co (Scotland) Ltd HL 1960
A workman had been injured through the breaking of a defective part in the machine with which he was working. He brought an action of damages against his employers, and later convened as second defenders the manufacturers of the machine, who had . .
Cited – Dunlop v McGowans HL 6-Mar-1980
The landlord of a block of flats needed vacant possession to pursue redevelopment. The respondent solicitors failed to give the necessary notice in good time, delaying the development by a year. The landlord appellant delayed five years before . .
Cited – Greater Glasgow Health Board v Baxter Clark and Paul SCS 1990
Outer House Court of Session – Lord Clyde held (obiter) that the ordinary and natural meaning of the phrase ’caused as aforesaid’ included the distinct ingredient of causation by negligence: ‘The question is one of the interpretation of section . .
Cited – Kirk Care Housing Association Ltd v Crerar and Partners SCS 1996
Outer House – Lord Clyde reiterated his view, rejecting a challenge by counsel for the defenders, that section 11(3) was concerned only with awareness of loss, a matter of fact, and not with matters of legal liability. . .
Cited – Ghaidan v Godin-Mendoza HL 21-Jun-2004
Same Sex Partner Entitled to tenancy Succession
The protected tenant had died. His same-sex partner sought a statutory inheritance of the tenancy.
Held: His appeal succeeded. The Fitzpatrick case referred to the position before the 1998 Act: ‘Discriminatory law undermines the rule of law . .
Cited – AMN Group Ltd v Gilcomston North Ltd and others SCS 20-Jun-2008
Outer House – The phrase ‘aware . . that loss, injury or damage caused as aforesaid had occurred’ as meaning ‘aware . . that a stateable prima facie claim . . could properly be advanced against someone’ the resolution of that issue will ultimately . .
Cited – Pelagic Freezing Ltd v Lovie Construction SCS 28-Oct-2010
Outer House . .
Cited – Ghani v Peter T McCann and Co 2002
. .
Cited – Henderson v Henderson 20-Jul-1843
Abuse of Process and Re-litigation
The court set down the principles to be applied in abuse of process cases, where a matter was raised again which should have been dealt with in earlier proceedings.
Sir James Wigram VC said: ‘In trying this question I believe I state the rule . .

Cited by:
Cited – Gordon and Others v Campbell Riddell Breeze Paterson Llp SCS 8-Mar-2016
(Extra Division, Inner House) The claimant trustees appealed from rejection of their claims of professional negligence against the defendant solicitors as out of time. The parties disputed whether the limitation period ran from the service of . .
Cited – Gordon and Others (Trustees of The Inter Vivos Trust) v Campbell Riddell Breeze Paterson Llp SC 15-Nov-2017
The claimants appealed from rejection of their claims for losses saying that such losses had been caused by their solicitors in failing properly to identify the tenant and the relevant lease when issuing notices to quit. The solicitors argued that . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Negligence, Limitation

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.535437

Cave v Robinson Jarvis and Rolf (a Firm): HL 25 Apr 2002

An action for negligence against a solicitor was defended by saying that the claim was out of time. The claimant responded that the solicitor had not told him of the circumstances which would lead to the claim, and that deliberate concealment should extend the limitation period.
Held: Brocklesby was wrongly decided. Section 32 should deprive a defendant of his limitation defence where either he took active steps to conceal his failure, or the failure itself was deliberate and the concealment might not be discovered for sometime. Where the failing was non-deliberate negligence, a failure to disclose was not concealment. Deliberate commission did not require unconscionable behaviour, but was still to be contrasted with behaviour which was accidental, or inadvertent.
Lord Millettt said: ‘As I have explained, in enacting the 1980 Act Parliament substituted ‘deliberate concealment’ for ‘concealed fraud’. This is a different and more appropriate concept. It cannot be assumed that the law remained the same. But reference to the old law explains why Parliament enacted section 32(2) and did not rely on section 32(1)(b) alone to cover the whole ground. With all reference to fraud or conscious impropriety omitted, there was an obvious risk that ‘deliberate concealment’ might be construed in its natural sense as meaning ‘active concealment’ and not as embracing mere non-disclosure. Section 32(2) was therefore enacted to cover cases where active concealment should not be required. But such cases were limited in two respects: first, the defendant must have been guilty of a deliberate commission of a breach of duty; and secondly, the circumstances must make it unlikely that the breach of duty will be discovered for some time.
Given that section 32(2) is (or at least may be) required to cover cases of non-disclosure rather than active concealment, the reason for limiting it to the deliberate commission of a breach of duty becomes clear. It is only where the defendant is aware of his own deliberate wrongdoing that it is appropriate to penalise him for failing to disclose it.
In my opinion, section 32 deprives a defendant of a limitation defence in two situations: (i) where he takes active steps to conceal his own breach of duty after he has become aware of it; and (ii) where he is guilty of deliberate wrongdoing and conceals or fails to disclose it in circumstances where it is unlikely to be discovered for some time. But it does not deprive a defendant of a limitation defence where he is charged with negligence if, being unaware of his error or that he has failed to take proper care, there has been nothing for him to disclose.’
Lord Scott said: ‘If the claimant can show that the defendant knew he was committing a breach of duty, or intended to commit the breach of duty – I can discern no difference between the two formulations; each would constitute, in my opinion, a deliberate commission of the breach – then, if the circumstances are such that the claimant is unlikely to discover for some time that the breach of duty has been committed, the facts involved in the breach are taken to have been deliberately concealed for subsection (1)(b) purposes.
Morritt LJ said, in [Brocklesby v Armitage and Guest (Note) [2002] 1 WLR 598], that in general a person is assumed to know the legal consequences of his actions and that, therefore, if an act has been done intentionally, the actor’s unawareness of its legal consequences would be immaterial and no defence. The premise is, in my opinion, much too wide to constitute a satisfactory approach to construction of a statutory provision such as section 32(2). A person may or may not know that an act of his or an omission to do or say something or other constitutes a breach of tortious or contractual duty. His knowledge or lack of it may well be immaterial to the question whether a cause of action for which he is liable has accrued to the person injured by the act or omission. But that is no reason at all why Parliament, in prescribing the circumstances in which the person injured by the act or omission can escape from a Limitation Act defence, should not distinguish between the case where the actor knows he is committing a breach of duty and the case where he does not. The clear words of section 32(2) – ‘deliberate commission of a breach of duty’ – show that Parliament has made that distinction.
It follows that, in my opinion, the construction of section 32(2) adopted in the Brocklesby case was wrong.’

Lord Slynn of Hadley, Lord Mackay of Clashfern, Lord Hobhouse of Woodborough, Lord Millett and Lord Scott of Foscote
Times 07-May-2002, [2002] UKHL 18, [2003] 1 AC 384, [2002] 2 WLR 1107, [2002] 19 EGCS 146, (2002) 81 Con LR 25, [2002] 2 All ER 641, [2002] PNLR 25, [2003] 1 CLC 101, [2002] 19 EGCS 146, 81 Con LR 25, [2003] 1 CLC 101
House of Lords, Bailii
Limitation Act 1980 32(2)
England and Wales
Citing:
Overruled – James Brocklesby v Armitage and Guest (a Firm) CA 9-Jul-1999
A failure by an adviser to make his position clear when he thought he had been negligent, could constitute a ‘deliberate’ act within section 32 even if the defendant’s actions were not motivated by any intention to deceive the claimant: ‘it is not . .
Cited – Beaman v ARTS Ltd CA 1949
The italian plaintiff had left Egland in 1935 leaving certain valuables with the defendants for safe keeping. During the war, the property was released to the authorities as alien property, who, informed by the defemdant that they were of no value, . .
Appeal from – Cave v Robinson Jarvis and Rolf CA 20-Feb-2001
The court was asked as to the meaning of the word ‘deliberate’ as it appeared in section 32(2) of the 1980 Act. . .

Cited by:
Cited – Williams v Fanshaw Porter and Hazelhurst CA 18-Feb-2004
The claimant alleged that her solicitors had concealed from her the fact that they had entered a consent order which dismissed her claim for medical negligence.
Held: The solicitor had failed to inform the client that her original claim . .
Cited – Chagos Islanders v Attorney-General and Another CA 22-Jul-2004
The claimants sought leave to appeal against a finding that they had no cause of action for their expulsion from their islands.
Held: ‘Exile without colour of law is forbidden by Magna Carta. That it can amount to a public law wrong is already . .
Cited – The Law Society v Sephton and Co and others CA 13-Dec-2004
The Society appealed dismissal for limitation of its claim against the defendant firm of accountants arising from alleged fraud in approval of a solicitor’s accounts.
Held: The liability did not arise until the Society decided to make . .
Cited – Polley v Warner Goodman and Streat (A Firm) CA 30-Jun-2003
A cause of action in negligence is complete once the claimant has suffered loss as a result of the negligence, even if the existence of the loss (and indeed of the negligence) is not, and could not be, known to him, and even where that loss is much . .
Cited – Denekamp v Denekamp CA 8-Dec-2005
Appeal against striking out of claim and civil restraint order. . .
Cited – Mortgage Express v Abensons Solicitors (A Firm) ChD 20-Apr-2012
The claimant lender sought damages against the defendant solicitors alleging negligence and breach of fiduciary duty by them in acting for them on mortgage advances. The defendants now argued that the allowance of an amendment to add the allegation . .
Cited – Burnden Holdings (UK) Ltd v Fielding and Another CA 17-Jun-2016
The company, now in liquidation sought to claim for the alledged misapplication by former directors of its funds in 2007. It now appealed against a summary rejection of its claim as time barred.
Held: The appeal succeeded. Section 21(1)(b) . .
Cited – Siddiqui v University of Oxford QBD 5-Dec-2016
The University applied to have struck out the claim by the claimant for damages alleging negligence in its teaching leading to a lower class degree than he said he should have been awarded.
Held: Strike out on the basis that the claim was . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Limitation, Professional Negligence

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.170275

Forbes v Wandsworth Health Authority: CA 21 Mar 1996

The plaintiff had a history of circulatory problems in his legs. He underwent surgery losing his leg. The question was when he should have sought advice as to why an attempted by-pass operation had resulted in one leg having to be amputated. He enquired why only some 10 years after the event. He was told that it was because the operation had been unsuccessful and resulted in a loss of blood supply which threatened gangrene. This was not itself negligent, but the surgeon had made a second unsuccessful attempt to operate on the following day and the plaintiff was advised that he would have had a better chance of success if he had tried again earlier.
Held: The plaintiff did not have constructive knowledge that the loss of his leg was caused by any act or omission on the part of the surgeon. He trusted the surgeon (who had performed two previous successful operations on his legs) and thought he had simply suffered a misfortune. The limitation period begins to run after the Plaintiff has recovered sufficiently to be able to see need to take legal advice. The court applied a wholly objective test, holding that the average patient would have investigated the matter earlier, and doubted that the individual character and intelligence of the plaintiff was relevant to the inquiry: ‘It does not seem to me that the fact that a plaintiff is more trusting, incurious, indolent, resigned or uncomplaining by nature can be a relevant characteristic, since this too undermines any objective approach.’ and ‘In my judgment, a reasonable man in the position of the deceased, who knew that the operation had been unsuccessful, that he had suffered a major injury which would seriously affect his enjoyment of life in the future, would affect his employability on the labour market, if he had any, and would impose substantial burdens on his wife and family in looking after him, if he was minded to make a claim at any time, should and would take advice reasonably promptly.’
Evans LJ: ‘Since there is a wide discretionary power to extend the period in circumstances which Parliament has defined in section 33, there is no clear requirement to construe the knowledge provisions in section 14 narrowly or in favour of individual plaintiffs. I therefore consider that they should be interpreted neutrally so that in respect of constructive knowledge under section 14(3) an objective standard applies.’

Stuart-Smith LJ, Evans LJ
Gazette 24-Apr-1996, Times 21-Mar-1996, [1996/7] MLR 175, [1997] QB 402, [1996] EWCA Civ 1318, [1996] 3 WLR 1108, [1996] 7 Med LR 175, [1996] 4 All ER 881
Bailii
Limitation Act 1980 11(1)
England and Wales
Citing:
Doubted – Nash v Eli Lilly and Co CA 1993
The court considered whether a solicitor acting for a potential plaintiff was considered to be an expert for the purposes of the section.
Held: Purchas LJ said: ‘Of course as advice from a solicitor as to the legal consequences of the act or . .

Cited by:
Cited – O’Driscoll v Dudley Health Authority CA 30-Apr-1998
The plaintiff sought damages for the negligence of the respondent in her care at birth. Years later the family concluded that her condition was a result of negligence. They waited until she was 21, when they mistakenly believed that she became an . .
Persuasive – Adams v Bracknell Forest Borough Council HL 17-Jun-2004
A attended the defendant’s schools between 1977 and 1988. He had always experienced difficulties with reading and writing and as an adult found those difficulties to be an impediment in his employment. He believed them to be the cause of the . .
Cited – Smith v Leicestershire Health Authority CA 29-Jan-1998
The plaintiff appealed a finding that she had sufficient knowledge of her possible claim for medical negligence against the defendants, and that she was out of time. She had known of her condition, but said she had no sufficient reason to see that . .
Cited – McCoubrey v Ministry of Defence CA 24-Jan-2007
The defendant appealed a decision allowing a claim to proceed more than ten years after it had been suffered. The claimant’s hearing had been damaged after an officer threw a thunderflash into his trench on an exercise.
Held: The defendant’s . .
Cited – Buckler v J F Finnegan Ltd CA 21-Jun-2004
The claimant sought damages for personal injuries after ingesting asbestos while employed as a joiner by the defendant. The defendant appealed an order allowing the claim to go ahead despite being out of time. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Limitation, Negligence

Leading Case

Updated: 01 November 2021; Ref: scu.80628

Dowson and Others v Northumbria Police: QBD 30 Apr 2009

Nine police officers claimed damages for alleged harassment under the 1997 Act by a senior officer in having bullied them and ordered them to carry out unlawful procedures. Amendments were sought which were alleged to be out of time and to have arisen from different facts.
Held: Amendments were allowed where they arose from the facts and events already pleaded. Those rasing other issues which were now out of time were rejected.

Coulson J
[2009] EWHC 907 (QB)
Bailii
Protection From Harassment Act 1997, Limitation Act 1980
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Brookfield Properties Limited v Newton 1971
An allegation of negligence against an architect in the design of a building arose out of the same or substantially the same facts as an allegation of negligence against him in respect of the supervision of the construction of the same building, so . .
Cited – Paragon Finance Plc (Formerly Known As National Home Loans Corporation Plc v D B Thakerar and Co (a Firm); Ranga and Co (a Firm) and Sterling Financial Services Limited CA 21-Jul-1998
Where an action had been begun on basis of allegations of negligence and breach of trust, new allegations of fraud where quite separate new causes of claim, and went beyond amendments and were disallowed outside the relevant limitation period. . .
Cited – The Convergence Group Plc and Another v Chantrey Vellacott (a Firm) CA 16-Mar-2005
An accountant sought payment of his professional fees. The defendants had sought to re-amend their defence and counterclaim. Appeals had variously been allowed to go ahead or denied after the master had not been able to deal with all of them for . .
Cited – Hughes and others (By Their Litigation Friend) v Richards (Trading As Colin Richards and Co ) CA 9-Mar-2004
Parents and their children claimed against a tax adviser for negligence in relation to setting up an offshore trust. The defendant applied to strike out the children’s claim on the basis that the defendant owed them no duty of care and only the . .
Cited – Palmer (Administratrix of the Estate of Rose Frances Palmer) v Tees Health Authority and Hartlepool and East Durham NHS Trust CA 2-Jun-1999
A claim for damages on behalf of a murdered child’s estate and the child’s mother for psychiatric damage against a health authority for negligence in having failed to manage a psychiatric outpatient who had abducted and murdered the child, was bound . .
Cited – Cobbold v London Borough of Greenwich CA 9-Aug-1999
The tenant had sought an order against the council landlord for failure to repair her dwelling. The defendant appealed refusal of leave to amend the pleadings in anticipation of the trial, now due to start on the following day.
Held: Leave was . .
Cited – Aldi Stores Ltd v Holmes Buildings Plc CA 1-Dec-2003
What makes a claim a ‘new claim’ as defined in section 35(2) of the Limitation Act 1980 is not the newness of the case according to the type or quantum of the remedy claimed, but the newness of the cause of action that it involves. A cause of action . .
Cited – Savings and Investment Bank Ltd (In Liquidation) v Fincken CA 14-Nov-2003
Parties to litigation had made without prejudice disclosures. One party sought to give evidence contradicting the dsclosure, and the other now applied for leave to amend based upon the without prejudice statements to be admitted to demonstrate the . .
Cited – Harris v Bolt Burdon (A Firm) CA 2-Feb-2000
A case is suitable for striking out which raises an unwinnable case, where continuance of the proceedings is without any possible benefit and would waste resources on both sides. . .
Cited – Senior and Another v Pearson and Ward (A Firm) CA 26-Jan-2001
An amendment outside the limitation period against solicitors alleging a failure to advise was permitted, where the original allegation was simply that the solicitors had acted without or in disregard of instructions. . .
Cited – E D and F Man Liquid Products Ltd v Patel and Another CA 4-Apr-2003
The rules contained two occasions on which a court would consider dismissal of a claim as having ‘no real prospect’ of success.
Held: The only significant difference between CPR 24.2 and 13.3(1), is that under the first the overall burden of . .
Cited – Hoechst United Kingdom Ltd v Inland Revenue ChD 11-Apr-2003
If an amendment to a pleading proposes a new claim which does not arise out of the same or substantially the same facts, the court has no discretion and may not allow the amendment. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Torts – Other, Limitation, Litigation Practice

Updated: 31 October 2021; Ref: scu.341875

Hopkins v Mackenzie: CA 27 Oct 1994

A loss arising from a solicitor’s failure to pursue a case arose only when the claim was struck out, not earlier when compromised, and even though value already diminished. Accordingly the limitation period began to run from that time.
Hobhouse LJ
Times 03-Nov-1994, Independent 27-Oct-1994, Gazette 07-Dec-1994, [1995] PIQR 43
Limitation Act 1980
England and Wales
Cited by:
Disapproved – Khan v R M Falvey and Co (a Firm) CA 22-Mar-2002
The claimant sought damages from his former solicitors for failing to act to avoid his case being struck out. The second action was itself delayed, and the defendants asserted that the cause of action occurred not when his claim was actually struck . .
Cited – Iqbal v Legal Services Commission CA 10-May-2005
The claimant had been a partner in a firm of solicitors. They came to be suspected by the respondent of overclaiming legal aid payments and sums were withheld. For this and other reasons the practice folded, and the claimant became insolvent. He . .
Cited – Vision Golf Ltd v Weightmans (A Firm) ChD 26-Jul-2005
A lease had been forfeited. The defendant firm of solicitors had negligently failed to apply for relief. They argued that that failure had in fact caused no loss to the claimants, since they would have lost the lease anyway.
Held: The ‘but . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 15 October 2021; Ref: scu.81467

Re Farmizer (Products) Ltd: ChD 19 Jun 1995

The limitation period for an action for wrongful trading under insolvency legislation is six years. Where the statute relied upon enables the court to give relief in monetary or non-monetary form the court should look to see what is actually claimed
Ind Summary 19-Jun-1995, [1997] 1 BCLC 589
Insolvency Act 1986 214, Limitation Act 1980 9(1)
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – Hill (As Trustee In Bankruptcy of Nurkowski) v Spread Trustee Company Ltd and Another CA 12-May-2006
The defendants sought relief for transactions entered into at an undervalue. The bankrupt had entered into charges and an assignment of a loan account in their favour before his bankruptcy, and the trustee had obtained an order for them to be set . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 October 2021; Ref: scu.85776

J A Pye and Another v Graham and Another: ChD 14 Mar 2000

The fact alone of being prepared to take a licence of land would not defeat an application for adverse possession, but a request for a licence would be relevant. The adverse possession commenced from the time when the licence expired, given that a sufficient animus was then established. The reference in the section to the taking of action did not apply to an application to warn off the cautions made to the Land Registry which was not a court, and the application was not an application to recover land. Since the Grahams enjoyed factual possession of the land from January 1984, and adverse possession took effect from September 1984, the applicant company’s title was extinguished pursuant to the 1980 Act, and the Grahams were entitled to be registered as proprietors of the land. ‘[The Grahams] sought rights to graze or cut grass on the land after the summer of 1984, and were quite prepared to pay. When Pye failed to respond they did what any other farmer in their position would have done: they continued to farm the land. They were not at fault. But the result of Pye’s inaction was that they enjoyed the full use of the land without payment for 12 years. As if that were not gain enough, they are then rewarded by obtaining title to this considerable area of valuable land without any obligation to compensate the former owner in any way at all. In the case of unregistered land, and in the days before registration became the norm, such a result could no doubt be justified as avoiding protracted uncertainty where the title to land lay. But where land is registered it is difficult to see any justification for a legal rule which compels such an apparently unjust result, and even harder to see why the party gaining title should not be required to pay some compensation at least to the party losing it. It is reassuring to learn that the Land Registration Act 2002 has addressed the risk that a registered owner may lose his title through inadvertence. But the main provisions of that Act have not yet been brought into effect, and even if they had it would not assist Pye, whose title had been lost before the passing of the Act. While I am satisfied that the appeal must be allowed for the reasons given by my noble and learned friend, this is a conclusion which I (like the judge [Neuberger J]…) ‘arrive at with no enthusiasm’.’
Neuberger J
Gazette 17-Feb-2000, Gazette 24-Feb-2000, Times 14-Mar-2000, [2000] Ch 676, [2000] 3 All ER 865
Limitation Act 1980 15(1) 17
England and Wales
Citing:
Distinguished – Walters v Webb 1870
. .
Cited – Vandeleur v Sloane 1919
. .

Cited by:
Appeal from – J A Pye (Oxford) Ltd and Another v Caroline Graham and Another CA 6-Feb-2001
Where a tenant under a grazing license had stayed over after the end of the tenancy, and had been refused a renewed licence, and had continued to graze the land for over twelve years, the mere overstaying was not enough to evidence an animus . .
At first instance – J A Pye (Oxford) Ltd and Others v Graham and Another HL 4-Jul-2002
The claimants sought ownership by adverse possession of land. Once the paper owner had been found, they indicated a readiness to purchase their interest. The court had found that this letter contradicted an animus possidendi. The claimant had . .
At first instance – J A Pye (Oxford) Ltd v The United Kingdom ECHR 15-Nov-2005
The claimants had been the registered proprietors of land, they lost it through the adverse possession of former tenants holding over. They claimed that the law had dispossessed them of their lawful rights.
Held: The cumulative effect of the . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 01 October 2021; Ref: scu.85085

Martin v Kaisary and Another (1): CA 16 Mar 2005

Substitution of other party after limitation period expiry. The court considered the Law Committee’s recommendations on limitation and noted the intention to allow the addition of defendants out of time where this might validate a claim.
Brooke LJ
[2006] PIQR 5, [2005] EWCA Civ 594
Bailii
Limitation Act 1980
England and Wales
Cited by:
See Also – Martin v Kaisary and Another QBD 5-Apr-2005
. .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 29 September 2021; Ref: scu.226044

Sheldon and Others v R H M Outhwaite (Underwriting Agencies) Ltd: QBD 8 Dec 1993

Deliberate concealment could prevent the limitation period from running.
Times 08-Dec-1993
Limitation Act 1980 32
England and Wales
Citing:
Appealed to – Sheldon and Others v R H Outhwaite (Underwriting Agencies) Ltd and Others CA 1-Jul-1994
Concealment by Defendant after the event does not stop time running against Plaintiff. . .

Cited by:
Appeal from – Sheldon and Others v R H Outhwaite (Underwriting Agencies) Ltd and Others CA 1-Jul-1994
Concealment by Defendant after the event does not stop time running against Plaintiff. . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 28 August 2021; Ref: scu.89214

Preston and Others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust and Others, Fletcher and Others v Midland Bank Plc (No 2): HL 8 Feb 2001

Part-time workers claimed that they had been unlawfully excluded from occupational pension schemes because membership was dependent on an employee working a minimum number of hours per week and that that was discriminatory because a considerably higher proportion of part-time workers were women.
Held: The restriction on claims under the Act for membership of a pension scheme to a period of two years was incompatible with Community law, since it would deprive many of any substantial opportunity to claim. The effect was disproportionate in its effect on women. The limitation period requiring a claim to be made within six months was not incompatible in the same way or at all.
Lord Slynn explained the meaning of the ECJ judgment: ‘A stable employment relationship
The employees concerned in these appeals were variously employed, some under consecutive, but separate, contracts of service with breaks in between (e.g. teachers on a termly or academic year contract); some were regularly employed over a long period on this basis, others were not regularly employed but were employed from time to time and in that category some had what has been called an ‘umbrella’ contract. Where there is an ‘umbrella’ contract there is an ongoing contractual relationship but in the other cases there are separate contracts of employment. The Employment Appeal Tribunal . . and the Court of Appeal . . held that s 2(4) was dealing with specific contracts so that as a matter of interpretation a claim could only be brought in respect of employment in existence within the six months preceding the reference of the claim to the industrial tribunal. Your Lordships . . agreed with that interpretation but the question inevitably arose as to whether or not such interpretation meant that s 2(4) was incompatible with art 119. The Court of Justice, whilst accepting that time limits could be imposed in the interests of legal certainty, considered: ‘Whilst it is true that legal certainty also requires that it be possible to fix precisely the starting point of a limitation period, the fact nevertheless remains that, in the case of successive short-term contracts of the kind referred to in the third question, setting the starting point of the limitation period at the end of each contract renders the exercise of the right conferred by article 119 of the Treaty excessively difficult.
Where, however, there is a stable relationship resulting from a succession of short-term contracts concluded at regular intervals in respect of the same employment to which the same pension scheme applies, it is possible to fix a precise starting point for the limitation period.
There is no reason why that starting point should not be fixed as the date on which the sequence of such contracts has been interrupted through the absence of one or more of the features that characterise a stable employment relationship of that kind, either because the periodicity of such contracts has been broken or because the new contract does not relate to the same employment as that to which the same pension scheme applies.’
Accordingly, it is clear that where there are intermittent contracts of service without a stable employment relationship, the period of six months runs from the end of each contract of service, but where such contracts are concluded at regular intervals in respect of the same employment regularly in a stable employment relationship, the period runs from the end of the last contract forming part of that relationship.’
Lord Slynn of Hadley Lord Goff of Chieveley Lord Nolan Lord Hope of Craighead Lord Clyde
Gazette 08-Mar-2001, Times 09-Feb-2001, [2001] UKHL 5, [2001] 2 WLR 448, [2001] ICR 217, [2001] Emp LR 256, [2001] 3 All ER 947, [2001] 2 AC 455, [2001] IRLR 237, [2001] Pens LR 39, [2001] OPLR 1, [2001] 1 CMLR 46
House of Lords, Bailii
Sex Discrimination Act 1975 Sch 1 Part 1, Occupational Pension Schemes (Equal Access to Membership) Regulations 1976 (1976 No 142) 12, ECTreaty (OJ 1992 C 224, p 6) Art 119, Equal Pay Act 1970 2(4) 2(5)
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Rewe-Zentralfinanz eG v Landwirtschaftskammer fur das Saarland (Judgment) ECJ 16-Dec-1976
‘the right of individuals to rely on the directly effective provisions of the Treaty before national courts is only a minimum guarantee and is not sufficient in itself to ensure the full and complete implementation of the Treaty’ . .
See Also – Fletcher and others and Preston and others v Midland Bank Plc and Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust Secretary of State for Health and others EAT 24-Jun-1996
EAT Equal Pay Act – Addendum to principal judgment. Part timers’ claims for membership of pension schemes only made out of time.
EAT Equal Pay Act – (no sub-topic). . .
Returned from ECJ – Preston and Others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust and Others; Fletcher and Others v Midland Bank plc ECJ 16-May-2000
ECJ Social policy – Men and women – Equal pay – Membership of an occupational pension scheme – Part-time workers – Exclusion – National procedural rules – Principle of effectiveness – Principle of equivalence. . .
See Also – Preston and Others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS and Others; Fletcher and Others v Midland Bank Plc HL 26-Feb-1998
‘Employment’ in context of a sex discrimination claim referred to a current employment contract even in context of there having been a series of repeated contracts of employment. The question was referred to the European Court of Justice. . .
See Also – Preston and others v Wolverhampton Healthcare Trust Secretary of State for Health CA 13-Feb-1997
. .

Cited by:
At HL – Preston and others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust and others EAT 3-Nov-2003
EAT Judge McMullen QC adopted a limited view of the scope of the new principle of stable employment set out at the ECJ and HL. He thought it was intended ‘to rescue employees who do not have a permanent job’; and . .
See Also – Preston and others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust and Others (No 3) CA 7-Oct-2004
The claimants had had their employments transferred to another body under TUPE. They complained that their pension rights had been discriminatory. The employer appealed a finding that their claim had not been out of time.
Held: The effect of . .
See Also – Powerhouse Retail Ltd and others v Burroughs and others; Preston and others v Wolverhampton Healthcare NHS Trust and others (No 3) HL 8-Mar-2006
The appellants said they had been had been discriminated against on the grounds of their sex by the TUPE Regulations. Their discrimination cases had been dismissed as out of time.
Held: The employees’ appeals were dismissed: ‘A statute cannot . .
At HL – Bainbridge and others v Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council EAT 23-Mar-2007
EAT Practice and Procedure – Compromise
Equal Pay Act – Work rated equivalent; Damages/Compensation
This case raises three issues, two of which are of particular significance in the field of equal . .
Cited – North Cumbria University Hospitals NHS Trust v Fox and Others CA 30-Jun-2010
ncumbria_foxA10
The employer had altered existing employment contracts. The claimants having commenced discrimination claims then sought to add to the existing proceedings comparators from different job groups. The tribunal had been asked whether, given that this . .
Cited – Abdulla and Others v Birmingham City Council QBD 17-Dec-2010
The defendant applied for an order declaring that the claim would better be brought in an employment tribunal and that accordingly the County court should decline jurisdiction.
Held: The application was dismissed: ‘ I reject the submission by . .
Cited – Birmingham City Council v Abdulla and Others SC 24-Oct-2012
Former employees wished to argue that they had been discriminated against whilst employed by the Council. Being out of time for Employment Tribunal Proceedings, they sought to bring their cases in the ordinary courts. The Council now appealed . .
Cited – Totel Ltd v Revenue and Customs SC 26-Jul-2018
The taxpayer challenged the ‘pay first’ rule under VAT which required them, before challenging a VAT assessment, first to deposit the VAT said to be due under the assessment.
Held: The appeal failed. There had not been shown any true . .

Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Updated: 10 August 2021; Ref: scu.85027

Housemaker Services Ltd v Cole and Another: ChD 7 Apr 2017

Part 8 Claim seeking a direction from the Court that the period of 608 days from November 2014 to July 2016, during which it was struck off the register and thus ceased to exist, should be discounted for the purposes of limitation in relation to the Claimant’s claim against the Defendants in respect of unpaid invoices delivered for building services.
Matthews HHJ
[2017] EWHC 753 (Ch)
Bailii
Companies Act 2006 1028(3)
England and Wales
Cited by:
See Also – Housemaker Services Ltd and Another v Cole and Another ChD 26-Apr-2017
Appeal from limitation direction, and third party costs order: ‘in order to make it just to order a director to pay the costs of unsuccessful company litigation, it is necessary to show something more. This might be, for example, that the claim is . .

These lists may be incomplete.
Updated: 16 July 2021; Ref: scu.581734

Siddiqui v The Chancellor, Masters and Scholars of The University of Oxford: QBD 7 Feb 2018

[2018] EWHC 184 (QB)
Bailii
England and Wales
Citing:
See Also – Siddiqui v University of Oxford QBD 2016
Kerr J refused an application for him to recuse himself based inter alia on the fact that counsel for the Defendant before him was a member of his former chambers: ‘It is true that I was a member of the same chambers of Mr Milford until June 2015. . .
See Also – Siddiqui v University of Oxford QBD 5-Dec-2016
The University applied to have struck out the claim by the claimant for damages alleging negligence in its teaching leading to a lower class degree than he said he should have been awarded.
Held: Strike out on the basis that the claim was . .

These lists may be incomplete.
Updated: 17 June 2021; Ref: scu.604813

Stubbings v Webb and Another: HL 10 Feb 1993

Sexual Assault is not an Act of Negligence
In claims for damages for child abuse at a children’s home made out of the six year time limit time were effectively time barred, with no discretion for the court to extend that limit. The damage occurred at the time when the child left the home. A woman suffered child abuse and claimed as an adult. The limitation period for non-accidental personal injuries arising from complaints of rape or of indecent assault is six years (section 2).
Held: The damage arising from injuries deliberately inflicted arose at the time, or if the victim was a child, at the age of attaining majority. The time did not begin to run only when the claimant became aware of a causal connection between her damage and the injuries. An action for damages for deliberate assault or trespass to the person was not an ‘action for damages for negligence, nuisance or breach of duty’ in respect of personal injuries within the meaning of section 11(1) of the 1980 Act. Such an assault or trespass was not a breach of duty within the meaning of the section. It followed that, on the one hand, the limitation period was six years and, on the other hand, the court had no discretion under section 33 to extend the six year period.
References: Gazette 10-Feb-1993, [1993] AC 498, [1993] 2 WLR 120, Times 17-Dec-1992, [1993] 1 All ER 322, [1992] 1 QB 197
Judges: Griffiths L
Statutes: Limitation Act 1980 2 33 11(1) 11(2)
Jurisdiction: England and Wales
This case cites:

  • Appealed to – Stubbings and Others v The United Kingdom ECHR 22-Oct-1996 (Times 24-Oct-96, (1996) 23 EHRR 213, , [1996] ECHR 44, 22083/93, 22095/93, )
    There was no human rights breach where the victims of sex abuse had been refused a right to sue for damages out of time. The question is whether and to what extent differences in otherwise similar situations justify a different treatment in law: . .
  • Appeal from – Stubbings v Webb CA 1992 ([1992] QB 197)
    The claimant sought damages for having been raped. The defendant said the claim was out of time. . .
  • Cited – Letang v Cooper CA 15-Jun-1964 ([1965] 1 QB 232, , [1964] EWCA Civ 5, [1964] 2 Lloyd’s Rep 339, [1964] 2 All ER 929, [1964] 3 WLR 573)
    The plaintiff, injured in an accident, pleaded trespass to the person, which was not a breach of duty within the proviso to the section, in order to achieve the advantages of a six-year limitation period.
    Held: Trespass is strictly speaking . .

This case is cited by:

  • Cited – KR and others v Bryn Alyn Community (Holdings) Ltd and Another CA 12-Feb-2003 (, Times 17-Feb-03, [2003] EWCA Civ 85, [2003] QB 1441, [2003] Fam Law 482, [2004] 2 All ER 716, [2003] 1 FLR 1203, [2003] Lloyd’s Rep Med 175, [2003] 3 WLR 107, [2003] 1 FCR 385)
    The respondent appealed decisions by the court to allow claims for personal injury out of time. The claims involved cases of sexual abuse inflicted by its employees going back over many years.
    Held: The judge had misapplied the test laid down . .
  • Cited – Barry Young (Deceased) v Western Power Distribution (South West) Plc CA 18-Jul-2003 (, [2003] EWCA Civ 1034, Times 18-Jul-03, [2003] 1 WLR 2868, [2003] 1 WLR 2868)
    The deceased had begun an action on becoming ill after exposure to asbestos by the defendant. He withdrew his action after receiving expert evidence that his illness was unrelated. A post-mortem examination showed this evidence to be mistaken. His . .
  • Mentioned – McDonnell v Congregation of Christian Brothers Trustees (Formerly Irish Christian Brothers) and others HL 4-Dec-2003 (, [2003] UKHL 63, , Times 05-Dec-03, [2004] 1 AC 1101)
    In 2000, the claimant sought damages for sexual abuse from before 1951. The issue was as to whether the limitation law which applied was that as at the date of the incidents, or that which applied as at the date when he would be deemed uner the . .
  • Cited – A v Hoare QBD 14-Oct-2005 (, [2005] EWHC 2161 (QB), Times 27-Oct-05, [2006] ACD 12)
    The defendant had been convicted and sentenced for the attempted rape of the claimant. He had subsequently won a substantial sum on the lottery, and she now sought damages. He replied that the action was statute barred being now 16 years old. The . .
  • Criticised – A v Hoare; H v Suffolk County Council, Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs intervening; X and Y v London Borough of Wandsworth CA 12-Apr-2006 ([2006] Fam Law 533, [2006] 2 FLR 727, [2006] 1 WLR 2320, [2006] 3 FCR 673, , [2006] EWCA Civ 395, Times 28-Apr-06, [2006] 1 WLR 2320)
    Each claimant sought damages for a criminal assault for which the defendant was said to be responsible. Each claim was to be out of the six year limitation period. In the first claim, the proposed defendant had since won a substantial sum from the . .
  • Cited – KR and others v Royal and Sun Alliance Plc CA 3-Nov-2006 (, [2006] EWCA Civ 1454, Times 08-Nov-06)
    The insurer appealed findings of liability under the 1930 Act. Claims had been made for damages for child abuse in a residential home, whom they insured. The home had become insolvent, and the claimants had pursued the insurer.
    Held: The . .
  • Overruled – A v Hoare HL 30-Jan-2008 (, [2008] UKHL 6, Times 31-Jan-08, [2008] 2 WLR 311, Gazette 14-Feb-08, [2008] 1 AC 844, (2008) 11 CCL Rep 249, [2008] 1 FCR 507, [2008] Fam Law 402, [2008] 1 FLR 771, (2008) 100 BMLR 1, [2008] 2 All ER 1)
    Each of six claimants sought to pursue claims for damages for sexual assaults which would otherwise be time barred under the 1980 Act after six years. They sought to have the House depart from Stubbings and allow a discretion to the court to extend . .
  • Appeal from – Stubbings and Others v The United Kingdom ECHR 22-Oct-1996 (Times 24-Oct-96, (1996) 23 EHRR 213, , [1996] ECHR 44, 22083/93, 22095/93, )
    There was no human rights breach where the victims of sex abuse had been refused a right to sue for damages out of time. The question is whether and to what extent differences in otherwise similar situations justify a different treatment in law: . .
  • Cited – Stingel v Clark 20-Jul-2006 ((2006) 80 ALJR 1339, , (2006) 228 ALR 229, [2006] HCA 37)
    Asutlii (High Court of Australia) Limitation of Actions – Appellant alleged respondent had raped and assaulted her in 1971 – Appellant alleged that she suffered post-traumatic stress disorder of delayed onset in . .
  • Reversed by Hoare – RAR v GGC QBD 10-Aug-2012 (, [2012] EWHC 2338 (QB))
    The claimant alleged that the defendant, her stepfather, had sexually and otherwise assaulted her when she was a child. He had pleaded guilty to one charge in 1978, and now said that the claim was out of time. The claimant sought the extension of . .
  • Cited – Alves v Attorney General of The Virgin Islands (British Virgin Islands) PC 18-Dec-2017 (, [2017] UKPC 42)
    From the Court of Appeal of the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court (British Virgin Islands) . .
  • Cited – Archbishop Bowen and Another v JL CA 21-Feb-2017 (, [2017] EWCA Civ 82)
    The defendants appealed against finding that they were responsible for the assaults by a priest on the claimant. . .
  • Cited – F and S v TH QBD 1-Jul-2016 (, [2016] EWHC 1605 (QB))
    Claim for damages as victims of sexual abuse alleged against father. . .

These lists may be incomplete.
Last Update: 22 September 2020; Ref: scu.89598

Jameson and Wyatt (Executors of the Estate of David Allen Jameson) v Central Electricity Generating Board and Babcock Energy Limited; 10 Mar 1995

References: Unreported, 10 March 1995
Coram: Tudor Evans J
The plaintiff claimed damages for mesothelioma. CEGB had provided a contractual indemnity in respect of damage or injury occurring before building works were taken over by a client in 1960. The question was whether a workman who died from mesothelioma well after 1960 but was exposed during the building work before 1960 had suffered damage or injury before 1960.
Held: The evidence did not establish even that minimal microscopic changes had occurred before 1960 and that the damage or injury occurred many years after the deceased had finished working.
This case is cited by:

(This list may be incomplete)
Last Update: 13-Dec-15 Ref: 238333

KM v HM; 29 Oct 1992

References: (1992) 96 DLR (4th) 289, [1992] 3 SCR 6, 14 CCLT (2d) 1, AZ-92111111, EYB 1992-67549, JE 92-1644, [1992] SCJ No 85 (QL), 36 ACWS (3d) 466, 57 OAC 321
Links: Canlii
Coram: La Forest, L’Heureux-Dube, Sopinka, Gonthier, Cory, McLachlin and Iacobucci JJ
Supreme Court of Canada – Limitation of actions – Torts – Assault and battery – Incest – Woman bringing action against father for damages for incest – Whether or not action limited by Limitations Act – Application of the reasonable discoverability principle – Whether or not incest a separate and distinct tort – Limitations Act, R.S.O. 1980, c. 240, s. 45(1)(j), 47.
Limitation of actions – Equity – Fiduciary relationship – Parent/child – Woman bringing action against father for incest – Whether incest constitutes a breach of fiduciary duty by a parent – Whether limitation period applicable and whether the defence of laches applies.
Limitation of actions – Fraudulent concealment – Incest – Whether a limitation period in an incest action is postponed by defendant’s fraudulent concealment.
This case is cited by:

  • Cited – AIB Group (UK) Plc -v- Mark Redler & Co Solicitors SC (Bailii, [2014] UKSC 58, [2014] 3 WLR 1367, [2014] WLR(D) 466, WLRD, Bailii Summary, UKSC 2013/0052, SC, SC Summary)
    The court was asked as to the remedy available to the appellant bank against the respondent, a firm of solicitors, for breach of the solicitors’ custodial duties in respect of money entrusted to them for the purpose of completing a loan which was to . .

(This list may be incomplete)
Last Update: 03-Nov-15 Ref: 554205

Brooksbank v Smith; 24 Feb 1836

References: , [1836] EngR 447, (1836) Donn Eq 11, (1836) 47 ER 193 (B)
Links: Commonlii
Coram: Baron Alderson
In this case, trustees under a will, who were solicitors, had by mistake transferred stock to a person not entitled. Baron Alderson said, this being under circumstances of mistake, it appeared clear to him that the Plaintiffs were entitled to equitable relief ; for, on looking into the authorities he found that fraud or mistake were each of them grounds for relief in equity. Then came the question, whether the Statute of Limitations was a bar? The Statute of Limitations did not apply to Courts of Equity so as to bind them, Undoubtedly, they had exercised discretion, and very rightly, upon the rules laid down. For instance, in cases of fraud, Courts of Equity did not apply the rule in the same manner as Courts of law, which were so bound by the words of the statute, that if the cause of action bad occurred more than six years before, however equitabIe it might be, they could not permit the statute to run. Courts of Equity held, that in cases of fraud, the statute of Limitations ran from the discovery of the fraud, It appearet to jim that cases of mistake fell under the same rule, and that it would be inequitable to apply the Statute of Limitations, except in cases where a party had lain by after the mistake had been discovered, more than six years ; in this case the mistake had been discovered within six years, the statute did not, therefore, bar the Plaintiff’s claim.
This case cites:

  • See Also – Smith -v- Brooksbank (, Commonlii, [1834] EngR 880, (1834) 7 Sim 18, (1834) 58 ER 743 (B))
    A bequeathed a reversionary interest, expectant on his wife’s death, in a sum of stock to B. B. bequeathed it to C., and C. bequeathed it to D, who, on the death of A’s wife, filed a bill against the trustees to have the stock transferred to him, . .

This case is cited by:

  • See Also – Brooksbank And Another -v- Smith (, Commonlii, [1836] EngR 446, (1836) 2 Y & C Ex 59, (1836) 160 ER 311)
    The testatrix died in 1818 leaving a fund in trust, subject to a life interest, for her children in equal shares, with substitutional gifts if any child predeceased her leaving issue. Her daughter Elizabeth did predecease her by two months, but on . .
  • Cited – Test Claimants In The Franked Investment Income Group Litigation -v- Inland Revenue SC (Bailii, [2012] UKSC 19, [2012] WLR(D) 161, [2012] STC 1362, [2012] 2 WLR 1149, [2012] 3 All ER 909, [2012] BTC 312, [2012] 2 AC 337, [2012] Bus LR 1033, [2012] STI 1707)
    The European court had found the UK to have unlawfully treated differently payment of franked dividends between subsidiaries of UK companies according to whether all the UK subsidiaries were themselves UK based, thus prejudicing European . .

Randall v Stevens And Others; 25 Jun 1853

References: [1853] EngR 767, (1853) 2 El & Bl 641, (1853) 118 ER 907
Links: Commonlii
Coram: Lord Campbell LC
A landlord evicted a tenant who had failed to pay any rent for twenty years. Statute provided that a house could not be repossessed simply by exercising a right of entry.
Held: Lord Campbell LC, giving the judgment of the Court of Queen’s Bench on appeal from a judgment given at assizes, held that entry could be made ‘by stepping on any corner of the land in the night time and pronouncing a few words, without any intention or wish to take possession.’ However, where possession was taken with an intention to possess, then ‘whether possession was retained by the landlord an hour or a week must for this purpose [i.e. taking possession other than by mere entry] be immaterial.’
This case is cited by:

  • Cited – Zarb and Another -v- Parry and Another CA (Bailii, [2011] EWCA Civ 1306, [2011] WLR (D) 331, WLRD)
    The parties disputed the position of the boundary between their neighbouring properties. The appellant Z had succeeded in establishing that the the boundary was as they decribed on paper, but the respondents had succeeded in their claim for adverse . .

Whitehouse v Fellowes; 12 Feb 1861

References: (1861) 10 CB (NS) 765, [1861] EngR 314, (1861) 10 CB NS 765, (1861) 142 ER 654
Links: Commonlii
Coram: Williams J, Byles J
The trustees of a turnpike road converted an open ditch by the side of the road into a covered drain but did so negligently, and the catch pits were constructed and kept, so that the drain was at times of heavy rain insufficient to carry off the water to its accustomed channel and was diverted onto other land causing damage. The issue was whether time began to run against a plaintiff from the date of the original construction of the works.
Held:’the continuance by the defendants of that negligent and improper condition of the road under their charge, if accompanied by fresh damage to the plaintiff, constitutes a new cause of action’. And ‘Suppose an action to have been commenced immediately after the first injury accrued to the plaintiff’s pits from the flow of water down the road in question: when that cause came to be tried, the only question would be how much damage the plaintiff had actually sustained. It would be monstrous injustice to hold that the damages must be assessed upon that assumption. All that the jury could do would be to find what damages the plaintiff had sustained from the wrongful act complained of: and they would be told to give him such damages as they might find he has sustained down to the time of the commencement of the action. According to the assumption, the plaintiff has sustained damage from the wrongful construction of the nuisance. Did the statute intend that he should have no remedy for that? The true answer to this objection, as it seems to me, is, that no fresh cause of action arises from each fresh damage, but that, where there is not only a fresh damage but a continuance of the cause of damage, such continuance of the wrongful act which caused the damage constitutes a fresh cause of action.’
Byles J said: ‘There would be a new and distinct injury every time a storm came; and this declaration is in form a declaration for a continuation of a nuisance.’
Keating J stated:
‘Here is a continuation of the nuisance, and a new distinct and complete cause of action in respect thereof, for which I think the plaintiff had a right to sue.’

Peconic Industrial Development Ltd v Lau Kwok FAI; 27 Feb 2009

References: [2009] HKCFA 16, [2009] 5 HKC 135, [2009] 2 HKLRD 537, (2009) 12 HKCFAR 139
Links: HKLii
Coram: Mr Justice Bokhary PJ, Mr Justice Chan PJ, Mr Justice Ribeiro PJ, Mr Justice Litton NPJ and Lord Hoffmann NPJ
Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal. The limitation period for a claim in dishonest assistance is 6 years. For limitation purposes a distinction is to be made between two kinds of constructive trustees: those who are fiduciaries and those who are non-fiduciaries. The distinction between the two classes was made clear in the judgment of Lord Hoffmann: ‘First, there are persons who, without any express trust, have assumed fiduciary obligations in relation to the trust property; for example as purchaser on behalf of another, trustee de son tort, company director or agent holding the property for a trustee. I shall call them fiduciaries. They are treated in the same way as express trustees and no limitation period applies to their fraudulent breaches of trust. Then there are strangers to the trust who have not assumed any prior fiduciary liability but make themselves liable by dishonest acts of interference. I shall call them non-fiduciaries. They are also called constructive trustees but this, as Ungoed-Thomas J said in Selangor United Rubber Estates Ltd v Cradock (No 3) [1968] 1 WLR 1555, p1582 is a fiction: ‘nothing more than a formula for equitable relief’. They are not constructive trustees within the meaning of the law of limitation.’
This case cites:

  • Cited – Soar -v- Ashwell CA ([1893] 2 QB 390)
    Trustees under a will had entrusted the trust fund to a solicitor for investment. The solicitor exercised all of their administrative and investment powers for them and distributed part of the fund invested to the beneficiaries under the will but . .

This case is cited by:

  • Highly Persuasive – Williams -v- Central Bank of Nigeria QBD (Bailii, [2011] EWHC 876 (QB))
    The claimant had been defrauded by a customer of the defendant bank. He brought a claim against the bank, saying that they knew or ought to have known of the fraudster’s activities, and were liable. The Bank denied that the UK courts had . .
  • Cited – Williams -v- Central Bank of Nigeria SC (Bailii, [2014] UKSC 10, 16 ITELR 740, [2014] WLR(D) 88, [2014] 2 All ER 489, [2014] 2 WLR 355, [2014] WTLR 873, WLRD, Bailii Summary, UKSC 2012/0113, SC Summary, SC)
    The appellant sought to make the bank liable for a fraud committed by the Bank’s customer, the appellant saying that the Bank knew or ought to have known of the fraud. The court was asked whether a party liable only as a dishonest assistant was a . .

Smith v Clay; 10 May 1767

References: [1767] EngR 55, (1767) 3 Bro CC 646, (1767) 29 ER 743
Links: Commonlii
Coram: Lord Camden LC
Ratio Review was sought of a decree pronounced some thirty or forty years before. The defect was apparent on the face of the record.
Held: The review was barred by the length of time elapsed.
Ratio Lord Camden LC applied the doctrine of laches, saying: ‘A Court of Equity has always refused its aid to stale demands, where a party has slept upon his right and acquiesced for a great length of time. Nothing can call forth this Court into activity, but conscience, good faith, and reasonable diligence; where these are wanting, the Court is passive, and does nothing.’ Equity would not countenance laches beyond the period for which a legal remedy had been limited by statute, and that where the legal right had been barred, the equitable right to the same thing was also barred: ”Expedit reipublicae ut sit finis litium’, is a maxim that has prevailed in this court at all times, without the help of parliament.
But, as the Court has no legislative authority, it could not properly define the time of bar, by a positive rule, to an hour, a minute, or a year; it was governed by circumstances.
But as often as parliament had limited the time of actions and remedies, to a certain period, in legal proceedings, a Court in Chancery adopted that rule, and applied to similar cases in equity.
For when the Legislature had fixed the time at law, it would have been preposterous for equity (which, by its own proper authority, always maintained a limitation), to countenance laches beyond the period, that law had been confined to by parliament.
And therefore in all cases where the legal right has been barred by parliament, the equitable right to the same thing has been concluded by the same bar.’
This case cites:

  • See Also – Smith -v- Clay (Commonlii, [1767] EngR 54, (1767) Amb 645, (1767) 27 ER 419)
    Bill of review for error apparent will not lie after twenty years from the making of the decree. The time runs from the decree, not from the inrolment. . .

(This list may be incomplete)
This case is cited by:

  • Cited – Adamson and Others -v- Paddico (267) Ltd SC (Bailii, [2014] UKSC 7, [2014] 1 AC 1072, [2014] 1 P & CR 24, [2014] 2 WLR 300, [2014] 2 All ER 1, [2014] JPL 745, [2014] WLR(D) 51, [2014] BLGR 249, [2014] 1 P &CR 24, WLRD, Bailii Summary, SC Summary, SC, UKSC 2012/0089)
    Land had been registered as a town or village green but wrongly so. The claimant had sought rectification, but the respondents argued that the long time elapsed after registration should defeat the request.
    Held: The appeal were solely as to . .

(This list may be incomplete)

Last Update: 25-Mar-16
Ref: 374834

Keenen v Miller Insulation and Engineering Ltd; 8 Dec 1987

References: Unreported, 8 December 1987
Coram: Piers Ashworth QC
The claimant’s cause of action for lung fibrosis did not arise at the time he was exposed to asbestos between August 1952 and May 1953 because at that stage he had not suffered physical injury by May 1953. Basing himself on the evidence of Dr Rudd the court held that for a long time after exposure the defence mechanisms of the body held their own and only became exhausted after a period of equilibrium which lasted well after 4th June 1954, the relevant date for limitation.
This case is cited by:

  • Approved – McCaul -v- Elias Wild (Unreported, 14 September 1989)
    The plaintiff who had suffered pleural thickening from inhalation of asbestos fibres in 1943 – 1950 suffered no actionable injury until about 1985, when he first experienced breathlessness. . .
  • Cited – Bolton Metropolitan Borough Council -v- Municipal Mutual Insurance Ltd CA (Bailii, [2006] EWCA Civ 50, Times 09-Feb-06, [2006] 1 WLR 1492, [2007] Lloyd’s Rep IR 173)
    The deceased had come into contact with asbestos when working on building sites for more than one contractor. The claimant here sought contribution from the defendants for the damages it had paid to his estate. The issue was as to liability on . .