Williams v Staite
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | THE MASTER OF THE ROLLS,LORD JUSTICE GOFF |
| Judgment Date | 01 December 1977 |
| Judgment citation (vLex) | [1977] EWCA Civ J1201-3 |
| Court | Court of Appeal (Civil Division) |
| Docket Number | 74/50524 |
| Date | 01 December 1977 |
[1977] EWCA Civ J1201-3
The Master of the Rolls
(Lord Denning)
Lord Justice Goff and
Lord Justice Cutting-Bruce
In The Supreme Court of Judicature
Court of Appeal
On Appeal from the Fontypool and Abergavenny County Court
County Court Final Appeal No. 141
(His Honour Judge Hopkin Morgan, Q.C.)
MR. P. BAKER, Q.C. and MR. D. MORRIS (instructed by Messrs. Le Brasseur Davis & Sons, Solicitors, Gwent) appeared on behalf of the Plaintiff (Respondent).
MR. H.E. FRANCIS. Q.C. and MR. FRANCIS (instructed by Messrs. Emmanuel Marks & Cocker, Solicitors, Gwent) appeared on behalf of the Defendants (Appellants).
This is an unfortunate dispute between neighbours in two small cottages in Vales, Nos. 1 and 2 Brook Cottages, Llangibby. They are both owned by Mr. Williams. He occcupies No. 1. Mr. and Mrs. Staite occupy No. 2. Mr. Williams wants to turn the Staites out of No. 2.
The case arises out of a family arrangement made 17 years ago, 8 Both cottages were then owned by Mrs. Staite's mother, Mrs. Moore. She had owned them both from 1946 onwards. She had a daughter who lived at home. Then in 1960 the daughter married Mr. Staite. The mother said to her daughter: "You can live in and have No. 2 as a wedding present. You can live there as long as you wish". She said that to the bride and bridegroom on their wedding. The bridegroom, Mr. Staite, was not keen to move into No. 2: because he had a cottage a mile or two away which went with his job. But the mother Mrs. Moore wanted the young couple to move into No. 2 Brook Cottages. She wanted them next to her so that the daughter could look after her parents as they got older. That is what happened. The young couple moved in. Mr. Staite, the bridegroom, gave up any chance of keeping his other cottage. The young couple moved into No. 2 so as to look after the father and mother in No. 1 as they got older.
A year or so later the father and mother died. The father in 1961 and the mother in 1963. They had a son (Mrs. Staite's brother). He stayed on in No. 1. So there it was. The brother in No. 1. The daughter and her husband in No. 2. That went on for years until the year 1971. The mother's executors then determined to sell the property.
Mr. and Mrs. Staite would have liked to have bought, No. 2 but they did not have any money. The executors sold all the property to Mr. Carver, a builder and developer. The sale included thetwo cottages, the garden and the paddock. It was worth £1,000 but, as the Staites were there and Mr. Carver, the buyer, knew the Staites were there, the price of the cottages was reduced to £600 or thereabouts.
As soon as Mr. Carver bought the properties he gave notice to the Staites. He said, "This is my property. You only have a licence to be here. Cut you go". That upset Mr. and Mrs. Staite. Mr. Carver brought an action. They resisted the claim. The case was tried by Judge Bulger. He decided in 1972 that the Staites were right and that Mr. Carver, the builder and developer, had no right to turn them out. He accepted Mrs. Staite's evidence that on her marriage in 1960 her father, as agent for her mother, said they could have the cottage as long as they wished and, further, it was a wedding present. The judge also accepted Mr. Staite's evidence that, before he married, he had a cottage a mile or two away that went with his job but he was persuaded to live at Brook Cottages because the old people wanted them near. The judge went on to find that the Staites had done work on the property. It was a very poor property, but they had spent money and done work to the amount of £100 on it. In the circumstances, the judge posed for himself this question: "The Staites clearly had a licence to live at No. 2 until the date (Mr. Carver) purported to revoke the licence, but have they got an equity to stay there after that date? I think they have". He was influenced by the decision of this court in Inwards v. Baker (1965) 2 Queen's Bench 29. It arose out of a family arrangement between father and son. It was held that the son had an equity and the court would look at the circumstances so as to decide in what way it would be satisfied. I said at the bottom of page 37: "I am quite clear in this case the equity can be satisfied by holdingthat the defendant can remain there as long as he desires to as his home". Following that case Judge Bulger in 1972 found a similar equity here. He held that Mr. and Mrs Staite could not be turned out.
That did not suit Mr. Carver. He could not get possession of No. 2. So he sold the property. He sold it to Mr. Williams, the present plaintiff. Mr. Williams knew perfectly well that Mr. And Mrs. Staite were there and were claiming an equity to he there for their lives or as long as they wished.
Mr. Williams went to his solicitors. They wrote a letter in August 1972 to Mr. and Mrs Staite. In it they said that Mr. Williams would very shortly be moving in to No. 1 and that Mr. and Mrs. Staite were not entitled to use the paddock. The paddock is only half an acre, Mr. and Mrs. Staite had. used it for 16 years or more. They had put their pony out to graze in it. But Mr. Williams said they were not entitled to use that paddock. Mr. and Mrs. Staite did not agree. They put up a small stable. They culverted the stream. Mr. Williams objected to all this. He moved himself into No. 1. and claimed the paddock. In August 1974 his solicitors wrote a letter of complaint to Mr. and Mrs. Staite in these terms:
"We understand from our Client that despite this letter you have continued to occupy the paddock adjoining the above property, and in addition have continued to carry out construction works at the above property in express contravention of the instruction not to do so contained in our letter".
This was followed up by an action in the county court. In it Mr. Williams claimed possession, not only of the paddock, but also of No. 2 - the house where Mr. and Mrs. Staite had lived for all these years.
There were negotiations for a settlement. They failed. The action eventually came before Judge Hopkin Morgan in September 1976. Mr. Williams claimed that the licence had been determined. The judge accepted, of course, Judge Bulgers findings that the Staites had an equitable licence to be in the house for life. But he found that their conduct had been such that the licence could be revoked. He held that Mr. and Mrs. Staite had lost any right to be there because of their conduct. So he ordered them out. I will read the judge's findings. It raises quite an interesting point of law. He asked this question: "Can the equitable licence for life pronounced by Judge Bulger be revoked by virtue of the subsequent conduct of the Defendants?" He held that it could. He said: "This conduct, as I have found, consisted in (a) bringing improper and unjustifiable pressure to bear on the Plaintiff" - that is, Mr. Williams - "in an attempt to persuade him, quite deliberately falsely, that they, the Defendants, were entitled to do whatever they wished as regards number 2, it's garden and the paddock without reference to or permission of the owner whereas in fact their licence was only to occupy the cottage and it's garden and no more; (b) in acting in deliberate, even though minor, breach of their solemn promise to (the judge) on the 16th August 1974 … and (c) in giving false evidence in an attempt to deceive the Court as to the extent of their licence".
Those findings show that the judge took a very poor view of Mr. and Mrs. Staite. He did not believe them: and he thought they had wrongly laid claim to the paddock. (His finding about the paddock is not challenged in this court). The judge held that, because of their conduct, Mr. and Mrs. Staite had forfeited any right even to live in No. 2 and its garden.
We have had much discussion as to the circumstances in whichthe court can revoke a licence of this kind. It is considered in Megarry and Wade on Real Property, 4th Edition (1975) paragraph 772 in a section headed "Licence protected by estoppel or in equity". The distinguished authors say this: "The principle of estoppel may operate to prevent revocation of a right which one party has led the other to...
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