Bell & Ors v General Accident Fire & Life & Anor

The Court of Appeal may permit a respondent to raise a relevant, significant and potentially decisive point by a respondents’ notice served out of time, despite prejudice caused by the delay, where the balance of justice requires it. Leave may be conditional on an appropriate costs order compensating the appellant for the procedural disadvantage. Where the new point requires substantive reconsideration, the appeal may be relisted for a fresh hearing before a differently constituted court.

The appeal arose from an interim-rent application under Part II of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954. The district judge dismissed the application, but His Honour Judge Moseley QC reversed that decision on 7 March 1996. The lessees appealed to the Court of Appeal.

After the appeal had been argued and judgment reserved, the court identified a new point concerning whether adverse possession had extinguished the true owner’s title under section 15 and Schedule 1 of the Limitation Act 1980, potentially feeding the tenancy by estoppel. The issue was whether the respondents should be permitted to raise that point by a respondents’ notice served out of time.

1. Leave granted. The court exercised its discretion to allow the respondents to file a respondents’ notice out of time. The proposed point was relevant, significant and potentially decisive. Although the appellants faced prejudice and disadvantage, the balance of justice favoured allowing the issue to be considered, provided that the prejudice could properly be compensated in costs.

2. Leave was conditional on the respondents paying all costs of the appeal down to and including the hearing of the application, in any event. The respondents could abandon the application if that condition proved too onerous.

3. If the respondents’ notice was filed, the appeal was to be relisted for hearing afresh before three Lords Justices, including a Lord Justice with Chancery experience. The court considered that difficult questions of law required that direction. If no notice was filed, the reserved judgment was to be handed down as soon as possible.

4. The formal order was: appeal allowed; order as per judgment.

1. Court of Appeal (Civil Division) — In [1997] EWCA Civ 1553, the court granted conditional leave to file a respondents’ notice out of time and directed that the appeal be relisted for a fresh hearing if the notice was filed.
2. Cardiff County Court — On 7 March 1996, His Honour Judge Moseley QC reversed the district judge’s dismissal of the interim-rent application and ruled in favour of the lessors.
3. Cardiff County Court — The district judge had dismissed the lessors’ interim-rent application as misconceived.