Equitable Mortgage in UK Law

My Lords, there is no general doctrine of unjust enrichment recognised in English law. It is a convenient way of describing a transfer of rights from one person to another, without assignment or assent of the person from whom the rights are transferred and which takes place by operation of law in a whole variety of widely different circumstances.

The Land Registry have taken the point in correspondence that, as the charge was unregistered, it took effect in equity only and that, as an equitable mortgage, albeit made by deed, the power of sale did not arise. This, it seems to me, is erroneous. The power of sale, as I have said, arises under section 101 of the 1925 Act, and that merely requires that a mortgage be made by deed, which this one was.

This does not of course mean that questions of intention may not be highly relevant to the question of whether or not enrichment has been unjust.

In my judgment the case in United Bank of Kuwait v Sahib does not help Mr Green, because that was a case where there was no deed, unlike this case. There was in that case a purely informal equitable mortgage by deposit of title deeds. That had no effect because, as a contract, it was required to comply with section 2 and it did not comply. In my judgment His Honour Judge Jones was right to reject the submission that Mr Green made on the effect of section 2.

A related objection is that, once departmental spending policy has been fixed and budgeted for, the various items or heads of expenditure should be regarded as commitments which have to be honoured, and are thus analogous with debts which have to be paid off in one way or another, rather like the mortgage in Scottish Equitable v Derby.

(1) Interpretation is the ascertainment of the meaning which the document would convey to a reasonable person having all the background knowledge which would reasonably have been available to the parties in the situation in which they were at the time of the contract.

Plainly there are large areas where the two concepts do not overlap : when a landowner stands by while his neighbour mistakenly builds on the former's land the situation is far removed (except for the element of unconscionable conduct) from that of a fiduciary who derives an improper advantage from his client. But in the area of a joint enterprise for the acquisition of land (which may be, but is not necessarily, the matrimonial home) the two concepts coincide.