Gilbert (Valuation Officer) v S. Hickinbottom & Sons Ltd
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | LORD JUSTICE DENNING,LORD JUSTICE MORRIS,LORD JUSTICE PARKER |
| Judgment Date | 23 March 1956 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1956] EWCA Civ J0323-1 |
| Date | 23 March 1956 |
| Court | Court of Appeal |
[1956] EWCA Civ J0323-1
In The Supreme Court of Judicature.
Court of Appeal
Lord Justice Denning
Lord Justice Morris and
Lord Justice Parker
In the Matter of the Local Government Act, 1948
In the Matter of An Appeal to the Lands Tribunal Against a Decision or the South Staffordshire Local Valuation Court
In the Matter of the Lands Tribunal Act, 1949, Section 3(4)
Mr. C.H. HARVEY, Q.C. and Mr. PATRICK BROWNE (instructed by the Solicitor of Inland Revenue) appeared for the Appellant.
Mr. HAROLD WILLIAMS, Q.C. and Mr. J.F. BOURKE (instructed by Messrs. Gregory, Rowcliff & Co., Agents for Messrs. Shakespeare & Vornon) approach for the Respondents.
Hickinbottom, Limited. are the owners and occupiers of two properties in Wodnesbury. Those properties are separated by a public road called Albert Street, which is 36 feet wide. On one side of the road the Company run a large Bakery which is fully equipped with machinery for making and packing bread. On the other side they have a Repair Depot which they use principally for the repair and maintenance of their 72 vehicles: but they also use it for repairing the plant and machinery in the Bakery, and in this respect the Repair Depot is essential to the efficient working of the Bakery itself.
The question for determination is whether the Bakery and the Repair Depot are separate hereditaments for rating purposes or only one hereditament. The answer is very material, because if they are one, the whole will be entitled to the benefit of industrial de-rating: whereas if they are two, the Bakery will be so entitled but the Repair Depot may not.
The case therefore raises the important question, What is a separate hereditament for rating purposes? The Statutes contain no definition, but the practice which has prevailed for many years past warrants the following general rules:
First, take the case where two or more properties are within the same curtilage or contiguous to one another, and are in the same occupation. In that case they are as a general rule to be treated for rating purposes as if they formed parts of a single hereditament. There are, however, exceptional cases where for some special reason they may be treated as two or more hereditaments. That may happen, for instance, when they are situate in different rating areas, or because they were valued at different times, (see section 3(3) of the 1928 Act): or because they were at one time in different occupations, (sec Spillers Case. 1931, 2 K.B. at page 47: per Mr. Justice Avery); or because one part is used for an entirely different purpose, (sec N.E. Railway v. York Union, 1900, 1 Q.B., 733).
Secondly, take the case where the two properties are in the same occupation but are not within the same curtilage norcontiguous to one another. In that case each of the properties must as a general rule be treated as a separate hereditament for rating purposes: and this is the case even though they are used by the occupier for the purposes of his one whole business. That was the position in the first four of the Five Rating Cases considered in 1931, 2 Kind's Bench, page 21. The two properties of the occupier were separated by the property of someone else, such as a dwelling-house, a canal or a railway. No one doubted that they should be traced as two separate hereditaments unless they could be said to be "contiguous" to one another, which the Court held not to be the case.
Thirdly, take the case where two properties are separated by a public highway, the surface of which is vested in the highway authority and the soil is vested in the occupier of the two properties. In that case the position in general seems to me to be the same as if the two properties were separated by a canal, a railway or a dwelling-house occupied by somebody else. They are normally to be treated as two separate hereditaments for rating purposes. This was certainly assumed to be so in the fifth of the Five Racing Cases (1932, 1 King's Bench, at page 44). It was assumed that the properties on either side of the road should be separately rated unless they could be held to be "contiguous" within section 3 (3) of the 1928 Act; and, on this point of "contiguous or not", despite the admission made by Mr. Wilfrid Lowis, the Court clearly indicated their view that in the ordinary way houses on opposite sides of the road were not contiguous. I must say that I agree with that view. The fact that the one occupier owns the subsoil of the road does not make them contiguous any more than if he owned the minerals underneath. It has nothing to do with the occupation.
Our present case comes within the third general rule. The two properties ought, therefore, prima facie to be rated as two aspirate hereditaments. But this third rule is not inflexible. There are exceptional cases where two properties, separated by a road, may be treated as one single hereditamentfor rating purposes. That nay happen when a nobleman's park, or a farm (when agricultural land was rated), or a golf course, is bisected by a public road. In such cases the two properties on other side of the road are so essentially one whole - by which I mean, so essential in use the one to another - that they should be regarded as one single hereditament.
Where does this case come? Within the third general rule or the exception so it? This is a question of degree and therefore of fact which is for the tribunal of fact, so long as it properly directs itself on the matter. Three cases were quoted to us where the tribunal of fact hold that two properties on opposite sides of the road were two separate hereditaments although used as parts of one single undertaking. These cases are the Glasgow University Case (1952 Session Cases, 504), the Hinckley Case (1952 Rating Appeals, 192), the Thurrock Case (1954 Rating Appeals, 211), Those cases commend themselves to my mind: and I confess that I find it very difficult to distinguish our present case from those on the facts: but there must be some distinction because the Chairman of the Lands Tribunal had those cases well in mind; and he had the advantage of a view, which we have not. We can only reverse his decision if it was one to which he could not reasonably come. I am not prepared to go so far and I would therefore dismiss the appeal.
The facts as proved or admitted are clearly recorded in the Case stated and I need not recapitulate them. The Bakery and the Repair Depot were entered on the Valuation List as being one hereditament. The Local Valuation Court declined to delete the entry and declined to treat the Bakery as one hereditament and the Repair Depot as a separate hereditament. On appeal to the Lands Tribunal the first question for determination was as to whether the Bakery and Repair Depot could properly be treated as one hereditament, or whether they ought to be entered, as two. It was held that in the circumstances of the case they should be treated as one.
In the case of North Eastern Railway Company v. Guardians of York Union (1900, 1 Queen's Bench, page 733), the question for the Court was whether the whole of the railway property in a parish other than a hotel and refreshment rooms should be rated in one gross sum. It had been agreed that a separate value could and would be put of the hotel and refreshment rooms as a separate item.
In giving Judgment Mr. Justice Channel, at page 739, said: "I agree that it is almost entirely a question of fact. If the whole of these different portions of property were one hereditament, they ought to be rated in one lump sum, and whether they are one hereditament or more seems to me to be a question of fact. One thing I think is clear, that property rust "be rated according to what it is, and not according to what it might be. You may have a thing which, as it is, is one hereditament, but which is quite capable of being made into two. The owner of a field may sell half of it, and it may become two hereditaments in different occupations; but while it is undivided it is one hereditament. The fact that the different portions of the property hero are capable of being made separate hereditaments is immaterial. The facts stated by the arbitrator shew that at present they are one, though possibly with some slight alteration they might be made into separate hereditaments."
The decision in the present case fell to be made as a question of fact, but a question of law may nevertheless arise as to whether there was some erroneous approach or whether weight was given to...
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...in s 6(2). This has to be borne in mind when reading the English case law. 32 Gilbert (Valuation Officer) v S Hickinbottom & Sons Ltd [1956] 2 QB 40 at 49–50; see also Woolway (Valuation Officer) v Mazars LLP [2015] AC 1862 at [14], approving this statement of principle. 33 Woolway (Valuati......