Mining subsidence – Compensation – Coal Mining Subsidence Act 1991 – Coal Mining Subsidence (Blight and Compensation for Inconvenience During Works) Regulations 1994 – Claimant seeking to claim compensation for inconvenience caused by delay in carrying out works to remedy mining subsidence in garden – Claimant seeking order requiring compensating authority to serve schedule of remedial works under section 6 of 1991 Act – Whether schedule served – Whether still possible to serve schedule – Whether non-service precluding compensation claim under 1994 Regulations – Claim dismissed
The claimant owned a detached bungalow with a garden to the rear. In February 2008, mining subsidence caused a large hole to appear in her back garden and in an adjacent area of land beyond her rear fence. She sent a damage notice to the compensating authority pursuant to section 3 of the Coal Mining Subsidence Act 1991. In February 2008, the authority gave notice, under section 4, agreeing that it was under a remedial obligation to repair the damage. It included a document entitled “Schedule of Accepted Liability”, which quoted the provisional figure of £2,000 to be charged by its nominated contractor for “work or costs which cannot be entirely foreseen, defined or detailed” in respect of the claimant’s land. Remedial works were begun in July 2008; the authority wrote to the claimant, indicating that it did not know how long the works would take but that the affected areas would be reinstated on a “like-for-like” basis. The works were completed in May 2009.
The claimant brought a claim against the compensating authority. She sought an order that the authority should send her a schedule of remedial works pursuant to section 6 of the 1991 Act, that being a necessary precondition for claiming compensation for inconvenience under regulation 7 of the Coal Mining Subsidence (Blight and Compensation for Inconvenience During Works) Regulations 1994. She reserved the right to claim such compensation on the ground that the remedial works had not been completed within the six-month period prescribed by regulation 6(1)(d). The authority disputed that claim and contended that its schedule of accepted liability was a schedule of remedial works that complied with the requirements of the regulations.
Held: The claim was dismissed.
The authority’s schedule of accepted liability was not a schedule of remedial works within section 6 of the 1991 Act. It was merely an instruction to the contractor to undertake initial investigations and identified a provisional cost sum only for that stage of the process. It did not comply with the requirements of section 6(2)(b) since it did not contain a breakdown of the costs that “the [authority] consider it would be reasonable for a person to expend in order to secure that the work is executed”. Notwithstanding the authority’s argument that it would not have known how much the project would cost until the works were done and that the final bill could be broken down on an individual property-by-property basis, the fact remained that the authority had not complied with its obligation.
It could not serve a schedule of remedial works at a later stage because that schedule had to set out the proposed remedial action and that action had now already been undertaken. It followed that the requirements of regulation 6(1)(d) of the 1994 Regulations with regard to compensation claims had not been met. That regulation applied where works a specified in a schedule of remedial works served in accordance with section 6(1) had not been completed within six months of their commencement. It was possible to identify what the remedial works were only by reference to that schedule, and since such a schedule had not been drawn up, there were no remedial works for the purposes of regulation 6(1)(d). That finding precluded any claim for compensation under regulation 7.
Adam Tedstone, of Tedstone George & Tedstone, of Penkridge, appeared for the claimant; Michael Wright, of DLA Piper UK LLP, of Sheffield, appeared for the compensation authority.
Sally Dobson, barrister
