St Nicholas Grammar School Ltd v Sylvie Arnulphy and another (Mauritius)

On an appeal limited to points of law, a tribunal’s finding of fact may be challenged as an error of law only where there was no evidence on which it could be based or the finding was so unreasonable as to be perverse. Where the evidence supports the finding and makes it the only reasonable conclusion, concurrent findings should stand. A wholly new point raised immediately before the hearing will ordinarily be excluded unless a sufficiently exceptional basis for admitting it is shown.

St Nicholas Grammar School Ltd, a school tenant in Mauritius, occupied premises under lease agreements describing the demised premises as a concrete house. The landlord sought a market-rent determination on the basis that the School occupied the whole site. The Fair Rent Tribunal fixed the rent at Rs 94,000 per month and found that the School occupied the whole site. The Supreme Court of Mauritius dismissed the School’s appeal by way of case stated. Before the Board, the School challenged the evidential basis for that finding and sought to raise a new argument that the premises were residential rather than business premises. The central issue was whether the Tribunal had made an error of law.

Appeal dismissed. Lord Briggs delivered the judgment of the Board.

1. Appeals from the Fair Rent Tribunal were limited by section 15(1) of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1999 to points of law. A factual finding could therefore be challenged only on a recognised error-of-law basis.
2. A finding of fact may involve an error of law where there was no evidence before the tribunal capable of supporting it, or where the finding was so unreasonable as to be perverse.
3. The Board refused to entertain the School’s new argument that the premises were residential. It had been raised only one day before the hearing, while the case had proceeded below on the agreed basis that the premises were business premises. No sufficiently exceptional basis for departing from the settled practice against allowing wholly new points was shown.
4. The evidence supported the Tribunal’s conclusion that the School occupied the whole site. The valuation evidence described the School’s use of the whole premises, including the playgrounds, and the School’s own expert confirmed that the site consisted of the concrete house and the school playground. The conclusion was the only reasonable one available on the evidence and was, in substance, undisputed.
5. The Supreme Court was correct to hold that the Tribunal’s finding disclosed no error of law sufficient to justify intervention. The surviving ground of appeal was therefore without foundation.

• Privy Council — In [2022] UKPC 23, the Board dismissed the School’s appeal.
• Supreme Court of Mauritius — On 11 May 2018, dismissed the School’s appeal by way of case stated from the Tribunal’s decision.
• Fair Rent Tribunal — On 10 November 2015, fixed the market rent for the premises at Rs 94,000 per month.