Morris v Beaconsfield Motors

A worker exercising a common-law lien over a chattel may retain it until paid for work and materials, but the lien does not ordinarily secure warehousing or storage charges incurred merely to maintain possession. Expenses incurred to preserve the chattel or an asset forming part of it may be recoverable where they benefit the owner. On a second appeal, the Court of Appeal is confined to points of law and will not reopen factual findings or investigate the price obtained on a sale properly authorised below.

The appellant delivered an Alvis motorcar to the respondents for repair work. The respondents retained possession after payment disputes arose and claimed repair costs, storage charges and the cost of preserving the vehicle’s registration mark. The district judge awarded those sums and authorised sale of the vehicle if the judgment was unpaid.

The circuit judge held that storage charges could not form part of the sums recovered through the lien, but left the monetary judgment for those charges standing. The appellant brought a second appeal, challenging the storage charges and seeking to reopen factual and sale-related matters. The central issue was whether storage charges were recoverable where the respondents’ possession rested on a repairer’s lien.

1. The appeal was allowed in part. The order for £3,216 storage charges was set aside. In all other respects the judgment stood.
2. On a second appeal from the small claims jurisdiction, the Court considered only the legal issue properly arising. It was not open to the Court to reopen factual issues that had been raised, or could have been raised, before the district judge, or to investigate whether the vehicle had been sold for the best possible price.
3. The respondents’ possession was exercised as a repairer’s lien. No collateral contractual arrangement for storage charges had been found, and the notice under the Torts (Interference with Goods) Act 1977 did not create such a contract.
4. The general principle was that a worker’s lien covered remuneration for work and materials, but not charges for warehousing or storage, even during the period of the lien. The principle drawn from Somes v British Empire Shipping Company Limited [1860] 8 H.L. Cas. 338 and explained through China Pacific SA v Food Corporation of India [1982] AC 939 applied to the storage charges claimed here.
5. The £105 expenditure incurred to preserve the valuable registration mark was different. It was for the eventual benefit of the owner and was therefore justified, subject to any credit already given in subsequent dealings.
6. Mr Justice Rimer agreed. There was no finding of a contractual obligation to pay storage charges, and the judgment for those charges could not be supported as a claim in trespass while the respondents asserted a lien.

• Court of Appeal (Civil Division): Allowed the second appeal to the extent of setting aside the storage-charge award; otherwise the judgment stood.
• Brighton County Court: The district judge awarded repair costs, the cost of retaining the registration mark and storage charges, with a conditional sale order. The circuit judge removed the storage charges from the lien but left the monetary judgment for them standing.