Savva & Ors v Galway-Cooper

Under Part I of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987, rights arising from a relevant disposal made without the required notice are group rights. The statutory time limit begins only when the qualifying tenants have been formally served with documents indicating that the disposal has occurred. Service requires a formal and specific act of delivery in the statutory relationship between the parties, sufficient to alert a reasonably informed tenant to the significance of the documents and the running of time. Mere receipt of information from a tenant’s own solicitor, office copy entries, a previous tenant, or a newspaper does not amount to service. The precise minimum requirements were left open.

Six lessees of four flats sought to enforce rights under Part I of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 concerning leases of the front garden and roof space granted to the respondent in 1995. It was common ground that the grants were relevant disposals, that no notice had been served under section 5, and that the claimants were the qualifying tenants entitled to exercise the statutory rights.

A judge held that service simply meant receipt of documents indicating the disposal. He found that documents had reached tenants, predecessors, or agents at different times and concluded that the purchase notice served on 16 May 2003 was out of time. The appeal concerned whether, before 16 February 2003, the relevant documents had been served on the requisite majority so as to trigger the statutory period.

Disposition and statutory framework

The Court of Appeal unanimously allowed the appeal. Consideration was to be determined by a Leasehold Valuation Tribunal, and costs were awarded to the appellants.

1. Group rights and time limits. Part I of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 gives qualifying tenants rights following a relevant disposal made without the notice required by section 5. The rights under sections 11 and 12 are group rights exercisable by the requisite majority. The periods for exercising them must be construed so that the tenants know that the opportunity has arisen and that time is running. Whether the requisite majority must comprise the same tenants for every purpose was left unresolved.
2. Meaning of service. Carnwath LJ held that the ordinary meaning of served, read in context, did not extend to the mere receipt of information from any source. Section 11(2), applied through section 12(2), contemplated a formal and specific supply of documents which would fairly alert a reasonably informed tenant to their significance. The passive wording accommodated service by the transferor or transferee. Carnwath LJ noted the lower judge’s reliance on dicta in Re Harris [1931] 1 Ch 138, but considered Re 88 Barclay Road [1971] Ch 641, Sun Alliance and London Assurance Co v Hayman [1975] 1 WLR 177, and Hastie and Jenkerson v McMahon [1991] WLR 1575 unhelpful because each arose in a different statutory context.
3. Application. Letters from a tenant’s own solicitor, Land Registry office copy entries supplied to a solicitor, and other historical documents received from varying sources did not satisfy the statutory requirement. The judge was therefore wrong, at least in relation to the lower ground and first-floor flats, to find that the requisite service had occurred. That conclusion was sufficient to allow the appeal.
4. Additional clarification. Chadwick LJ stated that service required an act of physical delivery on behalf of the landlord which brought the documents to the recipient’s attention and, in light of the statutory provisions, made clear that the right had arisen and the period had begun. He also considered that all potential members of the group should ordinarily be aware of the right before time began to run. Carnwath LJ expressly left the precise minimum requirements open, partly because the later amendments were not applicable.

1. Court of Appeal (Civil Division) — In [2005] EWCA Civ 1068, the appeal was allowed unanimously.
2. First-instance decision — The judge held that service meant receipt of documents indicating the disposal and concluded that the purchase notice was out of time. The Court of Appeal rejected that construction.