Canterbury City Council v Persons Unknown

Valid service of the Claim Form, or an order permitting alternative service or dispensing with service, is an essential prerequisite to jurisdiction over defendants sued as persons unknown. An injunction made without jurisdiction cannot be enforced and must be set aside. A final injunction is ordinarily the end of the litigation; the jurisdiction to extend or amend a time-limited final injunction against persons unknown remains unresolved, but such an order cannot simply be treated as interim relief. Final injunctions generally bind only parties who fall within the defined class and have been served. Local authorities must remedy promptly any failure to establish jurisdiction and must not continue relying on an injunction obtained without valid service.

Canterbury City Council obtained an interim injunction without notice against persons unknown in April 2019 and a time-limited final injunction in June 2019. The orders prohibited unauthorised encampments and occupation at numerous sites. The Claim Form was not personally served, no order for alternative service was made, and service was not dispensed with.

The Council later sought to extend and amend the injunction. After the Court raised the validity of service and the Court’s jurisdiction to extend a final injunction, the Council withdrew the application and sought discharge of the existing orders. The issues were whether jurisdiction had ever been established and what consequences followed.

1. Disposition. The Claim Form had not been validly served on any defendant. No order permitted alternative service, and the Court had not dispensed with service. The Court therefore had no jurisdiction over any defendant. The interim and final injunctions were set aside, the later purported extension was discharged, the displayed orders were to be removed, and the claim was dismissed.
2. Service and jurisdiction. The Court generally acts in personam. Although proceedings are constituted on issue of the Claim Form for some purposes, service of originating process ordinarily subjects the defendant to the Court’s jurisdiction. Interim relief before service is an exceptional, provisional and conditional jurisdiction. The same principles apply where defendants are anonymous or sued as persons unknown.
3. Alternative service under CPR 6.15 requires an order and a method reasonably expected to bring the proceedings to the defendant’s attention. Affixing an injunction order to sites and placing documents on a website, without an order authorising alternative service of the Claim Form, did not establish jurisdiction.
4. Final injunctions. A final order ordinarily ends the litigation. The Court expressed doubt whether it has a general jurisdiction to extend or vary a time-limited final injunction. The issue was not finally determined, but a purported extension does not become an interim injunction merely because the original final injunction was time-limited. It was also arguable that a programme of renewal against persons unknown is legally incompetent where it purports to bind newcomers.
5. The Council’s failure to give notice of the interim application, explain that failure, provide a skeleton argument, preserve a hearing note and address the significance of Bromley London Borough Council v Persons Unknown was criticised. If a local authority discovers that it obtained an injunction without valid service, it must act immediately to remedy the position if possible and must not continue relying on the injunction meanwhile.
6. The Court did not determine the unresolved jurisdictional issue concerning costs for an interested party under section 51 of the Senior Courts Act 1981 and CPR 46.2, because the Council agreed to pay the costs sought.

First-instance decision. No appellate history was stated in the judgment.