Compulsory purchase order – Acquiring authority entering land in 1982 – Claim brought in 1994 – Whether claim subject to limitation period even though amount of compensation payable not yet determined – Whether Lands Tribunal a court of law for purposes of Limitation Act 1980, section 9
In 1972 ARC Ltd, became the lessee of land bordering the Grand Union Canal on which it operated a depot. The lease was for a period of 35 years from December 24 1970. In 1980 Hillingdon London Borough Council, the authority, made a complusory purchase order, the CPO, for land for the Yiewsley bypass including parts of ARC’s depot, which were required for the construction of a flyover. In December 1981 the CPO was confirmed without amendment and the authority proceeded to serve the relevant statutory notices including a notice of intention to enter. On April 19 1982 ARC served a claimant’s claim for compensation amounting to £400,000. On April 26 the authority entered to construct works, the phase 1 works, which were completed by April 1984 and officially opened in May 1984.
However, no detailed claim was put forward until January 2 1992 when the authority received ARC’s claim in resepct of both the phase I works and certain phase 2 works carried out in the interim. That claim and a subsequent claim under section 52 of the Land Compensation Act 1973 were both rejected by the authority for failing to provide sufficient proof to justify ARC’s claims. By notice dated September 6 1995 ARC made a reference to the Lands Tribunal under section 1 of the Land Compensation Act 1961 in respect of both the phase 1 and 2 works. The authority contended that the claim in respect of phase 1 was not capable of precise investigation so long after the events to which it referred. The Lands Tribunal identified one of the points of law in issue as whether ARC’s claim for compensation was time-barred under section 9 of the Limitation Act 1980, the 1980 Act, but declined jurisdiction to decide that issue. The authority then sought a declaration in the High Court and the judge determined that ARC’s claim was time-barred. ARC appealed contending that the judge had wrongly concluded that its cause of action accrued at the time of the authority’s entry on the land pursuant to section 11 of the Compulsory Purchase Act 1965.
Held The appeal was dismissed.
1. It had been established that a cause of action for a sum recoverable by virtue of an enactment “accrued”, notwithstanding that it remained to be quantified and, further, that the quantification might have to be made by a tribunal rather than a court of law. It was therefore clear that, for the purposes of section 9(1) of the 1980 Act, the cause of action for compensation, resulting from entry pursuant to section 11 of the 1965 Act, accrued on date of entry: see cf Re Farmizer Products Ltd, Moore v Gadd [1997] 1 BCLC 589, per Peter Gibson LJ, at p599. The right to compensation then arising was an immediate right which could only be enforced, absent any agreement, at the suit of the claimant by initiating proceedings to quantify the sum due: see West Riding County Council v Huddersfield Corporation [1957] 1 QB 540, per Lord Goddard CG, at p546.
2. The decision in Turner v Midland Railway Co [1911] 1 KB 832 could not be authority on the question of what amounted to a cause of action for the purposes of section 9 of the 1980 Act.
3. For future guidance, the court considered that the Lands Tribunal was a court of law for the purposes of the 1980 Act and that it was appropriate to regard a reference to it by a claimant, for the purposes of resolving a question of disputed conpensation, as “an action to recover” under section 9 of that Act.
Neil King (instructed by Lawrence Tucketts, of Bristol) appeared for the appellant; Joseph Harper QC (instructed by the solicitor to Hillingdon London Borough Council) appeared for the respondents.