Where one joint tenant had given notice and the landlord mistakenly excluded the other tenant, the husband, from possession, the landlord could not rely on the defence of ‘reasonable cause’. The tenant has the choice of possession or statutory damages. Statutory damages had been agreed between the parties’ representatives at 30,000 pounds. The Council now argued that the true figure should have been nil, because of the precarious nature of the husband’s rights of occupation, he being vulnerable to the giving of a 28 day valid notice to quit by the wife to the council, after which he would have no defence to eviction.
Held: The husband’s appeal succeeded. The parties should not be allowed, on appeal, to go back on their agreement as to damages.
Simon Brown LJ, said that if the point had remained open, it would: ‘have had a very considerable impact upon the damages. As at 18 June 1990, the respondent’s tenure was in the highest degree precarious, wholly dependent in law upon his wife not serving a valid notice to quit as she was clearly anxious to do. Even giving the respondent the benefit of all possible doubts as to the true extent to which his continuing rights in the property reduced its open market value, and recognising not least that he could undoubtedly have put the local authority to some expense and delay in securing the wife’s necessary further co-operation and obtaining and executing the necessary court order for possession, I would have assessed statutory damages here at no more than andpound;2,000.’
It was argued for the husband that since the notional sale contemplated by the formula in s.28(1) and (3) was deemed to take place at the time of the valuation, a purchaser from the council would have had no power to compel or persuade the wife to give a notice to quit (for example by offering her alternative accommodation), so that the husband’s tenancy was by no means as fragile as it might seem. Simon Brown replied: ‘The clear answer to this argument, I am satisfied, lies in Mr Arden’s submission that what is being valued is the interest of the landlord in default, not the abstract interest of a notional willing buyer. Although the concept of a willing buyer helps to fix the respective valuations, one postulates the landlord’s continuing ownership in fact.’
Judges:
Simon Brown, Pill, Thorpe LJJ
Citations:
Times 04-Nov-1998, Gazette 04-Nov-1998, Gazette 25-Nov-1998, [1998] EWCA Civ 1594, [1999] L and TR 246, (1999) 31 HLR 515, [1999] 1 WLR 1011
Links:
Statutes:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Cited by:
Cited – London Borough of Lambeth v Loveridge CA 10-May-2013
The Council had been found to have unlawfully evicted the respondent, and now appealed against the calculation of statutory damages awarded. It said that the court should in its valuation have allowed for the propensity for a move from a secure . .
Cited – Loveridge v London Borough of Lambeth SC 3-Dec-2014
The Council had granted a weekly secure tenancy of the premises to the appellant. The Court considered the calculation of damages awarded for an unlawful eviction of a residential tenant.
Held: Section 28(1)(a) requires the basis of the . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Housing, Landlord and Tenant
Updated: 25 November 2022; Ref: scu.90285
