Port of London Authority v Stapleford Frog Island (Rainham) Limited

Where a lease plan is ambiguous and does not accurately reflect works as constructed, the extent of the demise must be determined from the lease as a whole and the objective factual background. A scaled overlay which produces further inconsistencies does not conclusively define the boundary.

In particular, land created by infilling outside the approved works will not fall within a demise merely because it is physically connected to the tenant’s access road or forms part of reclaimed land. Evidence of later conduct may provide only limited support and cannot displace the construction reached from the lease and its relevant context.

The respondent applied for first registration of a small area of reclaimed land by adverse possession. The Port of London Authority objected, contending that the land had been included in a 1988 lease of infill and a causeway. If it had been demised, the respondent’s occupation was consensual rather than adverse.

Principal Judge Cooke in the First-tier Tribunal held that the disputed land was outside the demise and directed registration. Permission to appeal was limited to construction of the lease, and the order was stayed pending the appeal.

The central issue before the Upper Tribunal was whether the lease, read with its plan, the topography and admissible contextual evidence, included any part of the application land.

1. Appeal dismissed. The First-tier Tribunal was entitled to ask whether the only part of the application land apparently falling within the scaled lease plan—the “nib”—was within the demise. It did not need to determine every precise boundary of the lease. This was not a true boundary dispute, so the observations in Neilson v Poole (1969) 20 P & CR 909 concerning land left uncertain at its edges did not govern.

2. The lease plan was prepared before the works and was unreliable if treated as a scaled representation of the constructed topography. Scaling it up placed the proposed accessway and northern boundary about 25 metres from their actual positions and also suggested an implausible inclusion of part of the Ingrebourne River.

3. The correct construction was that the demise comprised the causeway and its embankment, but nothing north of the embankment. The definition of the accessway placed it at the north-western edge of the premises, and the plan was expressed to identify its position only. The parcels clause also confined the premises to land filled and reclaimed in accordance with the agreement for lease. The approved plans did not authorise infilling north of the causeway, and no written variation was shown.

4. The authority’s alternative contention, that all infill formed part of the demise, was untenable. It would disregard the red edging and make the lease uncertain by extending it to whatever unauthorised infill the tenant had constructed in the creek.

5. Later conduct gave, at most, very limited support for that construction. It was unnecessary to rely on it. The application land was not demised, so its occupation was not consensual and the First-tier Tribunal’s direction for registration stood.

• Upper Tribunal (Tax and Chancery Chamber): dismissed the Port of London Authority’s appeal and upheld the conclusion that the application land was outside the 1988 demise.

• First-tier Tribunal: Principal Judge Cooke, on 30 June 2016, held that the application land was not included in the infill lease and directed the Chief Land Registrar to give effect to the respondent’s adverse-possession application. Permission to appeal was confined to construction of the lease.