Harvey v Crawley Development Corporation
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | LORD JUSTICE DENNING,LORD JUSTICE ROMER,LORD JUSTICE SELLERS |
| Judgment Date | 24 January 1957 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1957] EWCA Civ J0124-1 |
| Court | Court of Appeal |
| Date | 24 January 1957 |
[1957] EWCA Civ J0124-1
Lord Justice Denning,
Lord Justice Romer and
Lord Justice Sellers.
In The Supreme Court of Judicature
Court of Appeal
MR G.D. SQUIBB. Q.C. and MR LESLIE SCARMAN (instructed by Messrs Sharpe, Pritchard & Co., agents for Mr P.K.S. Wilkinson, Crawley, Sussex) appeared on behalf of the Appellants, Crawley Development Corporation.
MR MICHAEL ROWE, Q.C. and MR J.C. LEONARD (instructed by Messrs Peacock & Goddard, agents for Messrs Bevan, Hancock & Co., Bristol) appeared on behalf of the Respondent (Claimant).
Mrs Harvey used to own a house, "St. Raphael's", Three Bridges Road, Crawley, Sussex. The Crawley Development Corporation decided to acquire that house compulsorily. When Mrs Harvey was faced with the request for acquisition, she agreed to let the Crawley Development Corporation have the house at a price to be settled by the Lands Tribunal in accordance with the statutory provisions. The question before us is as to the way in which the compensation should be assessed. The Crawley Development Corporation agree that she is entitled to the value of the house with vacant possession in the open market; also the surveyors' fees and the legal costs which she incurred in disposing of her house to the Crawley Development Corporation. She has also been allowed the expenses of removing her furniture to other premises, and the cost of alterations to her curtains and carpets, and so on, in order to fit them for use in her new house. The agreed total sum which she has been awarded for those items comes to 54,148. 1s. 0d. There is no question about them. But the question in the case arises in this way. Mrs Harvey tried to find another house for herself to go into. She saw a house which she liked and was proposing to buy it, but she had a surveyors' report for it and when she got the surveyors' report she discovered it was an unsatisfactory house and she did not go on with the purchase of it. Afterwards she did find a house which suited her and she bought it. She had to pay the solicitors' costs and the surveyors' fees when she bought it; she had some travelling expenses, and so on. The total expense to which she was put for surveyors' fees and legal costs (on the proposed house and the house she bought) comes altogether to £241. 10s. 1d.; and the question is whether she is entitled by way of compensation to have that sum in addition to the £4,148. 1s. 0d. which I. have already mentioned. It has been found by the Lands Tribunal that those expenses were all reasonably incurred by her in finding another house, and the Tribunal has awarded that sum to her as compensation. The Crawley Development Corporation appeal to this Court and say that in point of law such compensation is not to be granted to Mrs Harvey.
The principles of compensation have been gradually developed over the years in cases decided on the 1845 Lands Clauses Act, but specific rules are now stated in section 2 of the Acquisition of Land (Assessment of Compensation) Act, 1919. Under those Acts the law is settled, both in this country and Scotland, by two cases. The Scottish case is ( Venables v. Department of Agriculture for Scotland 1932 Session Cases, page 573), and the English case is Horn v. Sunderland Corporation, in this Court ( 1941, 2 King's Bench, page 26). Those cases show that, in addition to the actual market value of the house, when sold with vacant possession, Mrs Harvey is entitled to "compensation for disturbance", which is specifically preserved by section 2, sub-section 6 of the 1919 Act and includes all damage directly consequent on the taking of the house under statutory powers. The question is whether these costs of 5241. 10s. 1d. come within that head.
I would like to say at the outset that the sum of £4,148. 1s. 0d. which Mrs Harvey has already received does not include anything in respect of these costs of £241. 10s. 1d. to which she has been put in getting another house. If you sell your house for £4,000, you can put the £4,000 into the Bank and keep it. If you buy another house for £4,000, you can take the money out of the Bank to pay for it, and you have your value of £4,000 in the shape of the new house. But you have to find the costs from some other pocket. They are extra costs not included in the £4,000. A good illustration is the decision of this Court in ( Beard v. Porter 1948, 1 King's Bench, page 321). It seems to me that, as these costs of 5241. 10s. 1d. were reasonably incurred by Mrs Harvey in getting another house, they can fairly be regarded as a direct consequence of the compulsory acquisition. Prima facie, therefore, they fall within the heading of compensation for disturbance. But it is said that they are not properly compensation for disturbance-, but only compensation for reinstatement: and that the cost of reinstatement of a person in other premises can never be the subject of compensation; and subsection 5 of section 2 was relied upon. I do not think that subsection 5 supports that proposition. It is only dealing with the value of land when there is no market for it. Take, for instance, a church, for which there is no market. Under subsection 5 you can come times get the cost of buying another piece of land and putting up a church on it. The fact that the cost of reinstatement is there specifically allowed does not mean that in every other case anything in the nature of reinstatement is to be disallowed. It all depends on whether it comes properly within "compensation for disturbance".
Next it was said that Mrs Harvey was really seeking compensation for the acquisition being compulsory, and subsection 1 was referred to, which says that no allowance shall be made on account of the acquisition being compulsory. Subsection 1 is, however, only directed to the added sop (which was in the old days always given in these cases)of 10 per cent to soften the blow of compulsory acquisition. Subsection 1 disallows that 10 per cent. It leaves untouched the rule that everything which is a direct consequence of the compulsory acquisition can be recovered under the head of "compensation for disturbance". Instances were given in this very case. Mrs Harvey gets compensation for having to move out her furniture and put it into the new house: she gets compensation for having to alter the curtains and carpets and remake them to fit the new windows and floors. Take business premises where fixtures and fittings have to be moved; or there is loss of business through being turned out; or loss of goodwill. All that loss and expense is the proper subject of "compensation for disturbance" in addition to the open market value of the land.
I would therefore say that this money which has...
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