MBR Acres Limited & Ors v Michael Maher (aka John Thibeault) & Anor

An injunction order must ordinarily be personally served on the person alleged to have breached it before contempt proceedings can succeed. That requirement is part of the substantive law of contempt and was not removed by the revision of Civil Procedure Rules 1998 Part 81. Service on a solicitor on the record is insufficient unless the court has authorised an alternative method or dispensed with personal service.

Retrospective alternative service requires both a good reason for the non-prescribed method and proof to the criminal standard that the order reached the respondent. Dispensing with service likewise requires proof that the respondent knew the material, specific terms of the order. General awareness of an injunction is insufficient.

The claimants had obtained an injunction restricting conduct outside the Wyton Site. They brought two contempt applications alleging that Mr Maher and Ms Laidlaw had entered an exclusion zone or obstructed vehicles leaving it.

Mr Maher accepted the effectiveness of alternative service on him and admitted specified breaches. Ms Laidlaw admitted specified breaches in the second application, but contested liability under the first application because the injunction had been sent only to her solicitors before the alleged breaches. The claimants contended that the revised Part 81 required that method of service. Alternatively, they sought retrospective alternative service or dispensation from service.

The central issues were whether service on solicitors was good service of an injunction for contempt purposes, and whether the defects could retrospectively be cured.

1. The First Contempt Application was dismissed as against Ms Laidlaw. Service of the injunction on her solicitors was not good service. Mr Maher was found guilty of contempt in respect of his admitted breaches. Ms Laidlaw was found guilty of contempt in respect of the admitted breaches in the Second Contempt Application. Penalty was reserved for further submissions.

2. The ordinary requirement that an injunction be personally served on a defendant, unless the court orders otherwise, survives the revision of Civil Procedure Rules 1998 Part 81. It is a substantive requirement of contempt law, directed to procedural fairness where liberty may be at stake. CPR 81.4(2)(c), which requires confirmation of personal service or of dispensation, is consistent with that requirement.

3. CPR 6.22(1) must therefore be read as requiring personal service of an injunction. A party does not dispense with that requirement merely by instructing solicitors. Service on solicitors may be effective only if an alternative-service order has authorised it, or the court has exceptionally dispensed with service.

4. The retrospective application under CPR 6.15 and 6.27 failed. The court had to be satisfied both that there was a good reason to validate the non-prescribed method and that the steps taken had in fact brought the injunction to Ms Laidlaw’s attention. Expediency and the claimants’ mistaken interpretation of the rules were not a good reason. The evidence did not make the court sure that the solicitors had supplied the injunction to her or explained its terms.

5. The court also refused to dispense with service. The relevant question was whether the material terms said to have been breached had been effectively communicated to Ms Laidlaw to the criminal standard. Her general knowledge that an injunction and an exclusion zone existed was insufficient. She had mistakenly understood the zone to extend only 10 metres from the gate, rather than 20 metres, and had not been shown to know the specific terms of the order.

6. The judge further stated that Form N600 should ordinarily be used for a contempt application. Its standardised contents implement the procedural safeguards required by CPR 81.4(2).

High Court (Queen’s Bench Division): In the same proceedings, an injunction was granted on 10 November 2021, with reasons reported at [2021] EWHC 2996 (QB). This judgment determined the ensuing contempt applications.