Markfield Investments Ltd v Evans

Proceedings for possession commenced within the 12-year limitation period preserve the paper owner’s ability to obtain and enforce relief in those proceedings. They do not interrupt adverse possession or restart the limitation period for a later action.

If the earlier proceedings are dismissed without establishing the owner’s right to possession, the occupier may rely in a subsequent action on continuous adverse possession during the period for which the earlier proceedings remained pending. Issuing or serving proceedings is neither constructive possession nor equivalent to physical re-entry.

The paper title holders appealed from a preliminary ruling of Judge Samuels QC in the Truro County Court. The respondent claimed continuous and exclusive possession of the property from 1977. The appellants’ predecessor commenced possession proceedings in 1990, but those proceedings were dismissed for want of prosecution in 1999. The appellants commenced a second action later that year.

The central issue was whether the commencement of the first action prevented the respondent from relying, in the second action, on the eight and a half years of adverse possession which elapsed while the first action remained pending.

1. Appeal dismissed unanimously. Simon Brown LJ held that the first action, having been dismissed for want of prosecution, did not interrupt the respondent’s adverse possession or prevent her from relying on the occupation which continued while that action was pending. Mummery and Latham LJJ agreed.

2. Under section 15 of the Limitation Act 1980, the relevant period for any particular action is the period of adverse possession which elapsed before that action was commenced. Proceedings brought before 12 years have accrued preserve the owner’s claim in those proceedings. If the owner does not pursue those proceedings successfully, the commencement of that action has no further effect in a subsequent action.

3. Issuing or serving possession proceedings does not give the paper owner constructive possession and is not equivalent to physical re-entry. Nor does it cause time to begin afresh. For the purposes of a later action, an earlier writ is no more effective in interrupting adverse possession than a demand for possession. A contrary rule would permit an owner indefinitely to defeat adverse-possession claims by periodically issuing proceedings without pursuing them.

4. The expression “stopping time from running” is non-statutory and potentially misleading. Commencement of proceedings has the limited effect that, within the action thereby begun, the owner is not barred if 12 years’ adverse possession had not already accrued. It does not terminate the occupier’s possession or erase the subsequent passage of time.

5. Adverse possession ordinarily ceases where the occupier vacates, gives a written acknowledgement of the owner’s title, accepts a tenancy or licence from the owner, or the owner physically re-enters. Continuous adverse possession for 12 years bars the owner’s action under section 15 and engages the consequences for title prescribed by section 17 of the Limitation Act 1980 and section 75 of the Land Registration Act 1925.

1. Court of Appeal: Dismissed the paper title holders’ appeal and affirmed the determination of the preliminary issue, with costs.
2. Truro County Court: Judge Samuels QC ruled on 22 May 2000 that the respondent’s adverse-possession claim was not interrupted by the commencement and subsequent dismissal for want of prosecution of the earlier possession action.