Tingdene Marinas Limited v Janet Maureen Jaffe

A statutory caravan does not cease to be stationed on land merely because it stands on a float above water covering land. Where an agreement permits occupation of that caravan in that position, it may satisfy section 1 of the Mobile Homes Act 1983.

Planning permission for houseboats can amount to permission for a caravan site where each houseboat includes a statutory caravan, although the permission is limited to caravans in that form. A certificate of lawful existing use for sole residential occupation may replace an earlier holiday-use limitation for the relevant pitch. By virtue of section 191(7) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, it can operate as the relevant planning permission, making the pitch a protected site.

Tingdene Marinas Limited, the owner of Hartford Marina, appealed from a decision of the First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber) under section 4 of the Mobile Homes Act 1983. The tribunal held that the Act applied to Ms Jaffe's agreement to occupy a houseboat at the marina.

The houseboat consisted of a Willerby caravan, complete with wheels, placed on a specially designed float and moored to the appellant's pontoon. The parties agreed that the caravan alone was a statutory caravan, but not that the houseboat as a whole was capable of movement.

The appeal raised two issues: whether Ms Jaffe was entitled by agreement to station a mobile home on land, and whether the water-covered area occupied by her houseboat was part of a protected site. The latter issue depended on the effect of a 1998 holiday-use planning permission and a 2014 certificate of lawful existing use for occupation as a sole residence.

1. Appeal dismissed. The Upper Tribunal reached the same conclusions as the First-tier Tribunal, although it clarified the reasoning.
2. The relevant statutory caravan was the Willerby caravan, not the caravan-and-float houseboat taken as a whole. It was agreed that the caravan itself satisfied the statutory definition. The fact that it formed part of a houseboat did not require it to be ignored. By analogy with Howard v Charlton [2002] EWCA Civ 1086, an attachment which prevents movement of the combined structure does not necessarily deprive the caravan of its identity as a statutory caravan.
3. Ms Jaffe's agreement entitled her to station that caravan on land. Land includes land covered by water. The float was a support analogous to a concrete or brick base; its presence between the caravan and the water did not mean that the caravan was not stationed on land. It was unnecessary for Ms Jaffe to have permission to place the caravan directly on water or on dry land.
4. The 1998 planning permission for houseboats permitted statutory caravans, as components of houseboats, to be stationed on the land. That was a limited form of caravan-site permission, confined to houseboats on water and not permitting ordinary caravans on dry land. The functional limitation did not prevent the relevant pitch from being a caravan site.
5. The 2014 certificate certified the lawful existing use of the pitch for occupation as a sole residence. Properly construed, it operated under section 191(1)(a), rather than merely declaring an unenforceable breach of a condition under section 191(1)(c). It made residential use lawful and rendered obsolete, for that pitch, the earlier holiday-use limitation. Under section 191(7), it had effect as planning permission for section 3(3) of the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960. It was therefore the relevant planning permission under section 1(2) of the Caravan Sites Act 1968, and the pitch was a protected site.
6. Accordingly, the Mobile Homes Act 1983 applied to the agreement under which Ms Jaffe occupied her houseboat.

• Upper Tribunal (Lands Chamber): Appeal dismissed in [2023] UKUT 16 (LC). The Tribunal affirmed the First-tier Tribunal's conclusion that the Mobile Homes Act 1983 applied, while restating the reasoning.
• First-tier Tribunal (Property Chamber): Held that Ms Jaffe's agreement entitled her to station a mobile home on land and that her pitch was a protected site. The decision was issued on 25 November 2021 and a corrected version on 13 January 2022; no citation is stated in the judgment.