Compensation for compulsory purchase – Limitation – Land Compensation Act 1973 – Rules 10 and 11 of Lands Tribunal Rules 1996 – Date on which proceedings brought for limitation purposes – Whether date when notice of reference sent to tribunal or date when number allocated to reference – Whether reference invalid if failing to identify all persons interested in land – Preliminary issues determined in favour of claimant
The claimant was one of more than 200 homeowners who lived in the vicinity of Manchester airport and who made claims for compensation, under Part I of the Land Compensation Act 1973, for depreciation in the value of their properties as a consequence of the noise created by the use of runway 2. The runway first came into use in February 2001; pursuant to section 3(2) of the 1973 Act, the homeowners’ claims arose 12 months after that date, namely on 6 February 2002.
On that date, the claimant’s parents gave a notice of claim under Part I, which that the claimant had a long leasehold interest in the relevant property. On 5 February 2008, the claimant sought to refer the question of compensation to the Lands Tribunal, under section 16 of the 1973 Act, by sending it a completed form. The tribunal received that notice on 7 February but, since it was not in the tribunal’s standard form, it sent a further form to the claimant for completion; it received the completed form on 12 February. In both versions, only the claimant was mentioned as claiming compensation.
The acquiring authority contended that the claim for compensation was statute-barred by section 9(1) of the Limitation Act 1980, having been brought more than six years from the date on which the cause of action accrued. It accepted that a notice of reference did not have to be on the tribunal’s standard form. However, it contended that the posting of the 5 February notice did not constitute the bringing of an action within section 9(1) of the 1980 Act since: (i) under CPR 7PD5.1, a claim was brought at the earliest when the claim form was received by the court office and, under the Lands Tribunal Rules 1996, the allocation of a number to the reference signified the start of proceedings; and (ii) the claimant’s notice was invalid because it did not list the names and addresses of all the persons interested in the land, as required by r 10(3) of the 1996 Rules, omitting as it did his mother, who was one of the registered proprietors of the land. Those matters were tried as preliminary issues.
Held: The preliminary issues were determined in favour of the claimant.
(1) The claim was not statute-barred. Proceedings in the Lands Tribunal on a claim for compensation were “brought” when reference of the dispute was made. By r 10(1), reference was made by sending a notice of reference to the registrar, and there was nothing to suggest that the reference was not made until it was received. Nor could it be concluded that proceedings were not brought until the registrar had allocated them a number under r 11. The CPR did not apply in the Lands Tribunal and could not be used to construe the 1996 Rules.
(2) The tribunal had received what, on the face of it, appeared to be a valid notice of reference and there was no reason to treat it otherwise. There was not doubt that the question of disputed compensation to which the proceedings related was the amount of compensation payable in respect of the long leasehold interest in the property. If, in the course of such proceedings, it was discovered that a part-owner had not been identified in the notice of reference, it would not be difficult to amend the record so that it was correct in that respect. There was no justification for treating the proceedings as a nullity so that they had to be restarted. The tribunal had jurisdiction to determine the question of disputed compensation.
Moreover, the acquiring authority’s contention was without merit since the Part I claim of February 2002 had mentioned the claimant’s mother, and the authority had corresponded with the claimant’s parents until 2007; it had not raised the question of invalidity until 17 months after receiving notice of the reference.
Joseph Harper QC (instructed by Orr Litchfield LLP) appeared for the claimant; Patrick Walker, barrister, of Hammonds LLP, of Leeds, appeared for the acquiring authority.
Sally Dobson, barrister
