School Sites Acts 1841 to 1844 – Education Act 1973 – Reverter of Sites Act 1987 – Land granted for Church of England school – Denominational requirement removed in 1874 – Whether change triggered reverter which was subsequently statute-barred – Whether right to claim reverter limited to personal representatives – Whether claimant had to be owner of land out of which grant made – Meaning of “estate” for purpose of 1841 Act – Whether reverter extinguished by sale made by order under 1973 Act – Appeal dismissed
In March 1872 L conveyed a small part of land that he owned in Kent (the 1872 land) to the minister and churchwardens of the parish of Chartham. He directed them to hold the land, for the purposes of the School Sites Acts 1841 to 1844 (the 1841 Act), upon certain trusts for the education of the poor in the parish, such education to accord with, and promote, the principles of the Church of England. By section 2 of the 1841 Act, L’s “estate” obtained a right of reverter in the event (a triggering event) of the 1872 land “ceasing to be used for the purposes in this Act mentioned”, such purposes being “a site for a school for the education of poor persons… [a teacher’s residence], or otherwise for the purposes of the education of such poor persons in religious and useful knowledge”.
In October 1872 a school was opened on the site. In July 1874 the school, having previously been a “voluntary school”, became a “provided school” upon its transfer to the School Board pursuant to an arrangement made under the Education Act 1870. When the Education Act 1944 came into force, the school, which had, in the meantime, expanded onto land owned by Kent County Council, became known as Chartham County Primary School.
In August 1975 an order was made, under the Education Act 1973, appointing Canterbury Diocesan Board as trustee of the school. The order gave the board authority to sell the site at a price to be approved by the Charity Commissioners and to apply the proceeds for charitable purposes, which were not limited to the provision of a school in Chartham. By the Reverter of Sites Act 1987, rights of reverter subsisting under the 1841 Act were attached, so far as necessary, to the proceeds of sale of the relevant sites. In April 1992 the board sold the 1872 land for £50,000 to a property company, and it ceased to be used as a school.
The residuary estate of L, who died in 1917, eventually vested in his grandson, GL, who died in 1994. GL bequeathed his entire residuary estate to EL. In April 1998 EL sought a declaration that the board held the proceeds of sale of the 1872 land upon trust for GL. In October 1999 EL assigned her rights of action to the appellants. At a High Court hearing, the judge dismissed the claim, the main ground being that a triggering event had occurred when the status of the school changed in 1874, thus giving rise to a reverter, which had subsequently become barred by lapse of time. The judge proceeded to uphold three further objections to the claim that would have been applicable had a reverter not arisen in 1874. The appellant appealed.
Held: The appeal was dismissed.
1. The judge’s ruling upon the main ground had correctly followed Attorney-General v Shadwell [1910] 1 Ch 92 and Habermehl v Attorney-General [1996] EGCS 148 in holding that “the purposes in this Act mentioned” included purposes declared by the grantor that were narrower than, but still within, the purposes declared by the Act. Accordingly, a reverter had occurred when the school lost its distinctive Church of England character in 1874.
2. If no such reverter had occurred, then, contrary to the views of the trial judge:
(i) The claim to the reverter was not extinguished by the sale in 1992. As there was no intention to use the proceeds for the purposes for which the original site was held, the sale could not have been made under section 14 of the 1841 Act. Nor was there anything in the 1975 order that empowered the board to extinguish the reverter by sale.
(ii) The board could not contend that the reverter belonged, not to the appellant, but to the owner, at the material time, of the land out of which the 1872 land was carved and conveyed. When section 2 of the 1841 Act spoke of an “estate”, it did so in the context of the common law scheme for the division of land holdings in terms of time: see Walsingham’s Case (1573) 2 Plowd 547 at p555. The relevant estate was, accordingly, the estate vested in the claimant: Marchant v Onslow [1994] 1 EGLR 187 overruled.
(iii) It was no objection that EL could not claim to be the last link in a chain of personal representatives. Since such a person would necessarily hold the proceeds of sale upon bare trust for EL, she could properly be described, for the purpose of section 1 of the 1987 Act, as a person “who but for this Act would from time to time be entitled to the ownership of the land by virtue of its reverter”.
Charles Turnbull (instructed by William Blakeney) appeared for the appellants; Vivian Chapman (instructed by Furley Page Fielding & Barton, of Canterbury) appeared for the respondent.
Alan Cooklin, barrister
