Mobile Homes – Protected site – Site rules – Mobile Homes (Site Rules) (England) Regulations 2014 – Respondent site owner sending consultation response document to occupiers notifying them of decision on new site rules – Appellant occupier appealing within 21 days of receipt of that document as required by regulation 10(1) of 2014 Regulations – Appeal struck on grounds of failure to notify respondent of appeal and serve relevant documents on it under regulation 10(3) – Whether regulation 10(3) complied with – Whether non-compliance invalidating appeal – Appeal allowed
The appellant occupied a park home on a site in Wantage, Oxfordshire, owned by the respondent and having the status of a protected site for the purposes of the Mobile Homes Act 1983 and Mobile Homes (Site Rules) (England) Regulations 2014. The respondent proposed to introduce new site rules pursuant to the 2014 Regulations and, accordingly, engaged in consultation with occupiers and issued the required consultation response document setting out its decision.
The appellant sought to appeal to the first-tier tribunal (FTT) against the respondent’s decision. However, the FTT struck out the appeal, pursuant to r 31(4) of the Tribunal Procedure (First-tier Tribunal) (Property Chamber) Rules 2013, on the ground that the appellant had not complied with the time limit under the 2014 Regulations, which, by regulation 10(1) and (3) respectively, required the appeal to be brought “within 21 days of receipt of the consultation response document” and the site owner to be notified and provided with a copy of the application within the same 21-day period. The FTT found that the appellant had brought her appeal in time but had failed to comply with regulation 10(3) since she had not notified the respondent of her appeal or served the relevant papers on it within the 21-day period.
The appeal consultation response document was deemed to have been served on the appellant on 25 July 2014. The appellant had not herself notified the respondent of her appeal or sent it the relevant documents, but the FTT had done so on 15 August 2014. On appeal from the FTT’s decision, issues arose as to: (i) when the 21-day period started to run, and consequently whether the respondent had been notified just in time or a day late; (ii) whether notification by the FTT was sufficient or whether it had to come from the appellant herself; and (iii) whether the omission to provide the respondent with the relevant documents was fatal to the FTT’s jurisdiction to hear the appeal or was merely a procedural defect which could be corrected.
Held: The appeal was allowed.
(1) The general rule for measuring a period of time within which a person was to take some action was that the day of the act or event from which the period ran should not be counted against that person. The appellant had received the consultation response document on 25 July 2014. In the absence of any contrary indication in the 2014 Regulations, the period of 21 days within which the appellant could appeal began with the first moment of 26 July, the day after receipt of that document, and ended with the last moment of 15 August 2014. There was nothing in the 2014 Regulations to indicate that a different method of calculating the period should be adopted.
(2) It followed that the respondent had been notified in writing of the appeal, and had received the documentation required by regulation 10(3), within the relevant 21-day period. It could not matter that the information and documentation had come from the FTT rather than being sent by the appellant personally. if the appellant omitted herself to comply with regulation 10(3), she was taking the chance that the relevant information and documentation might not be sent to the site owner within the relevant time period. However, where she left it to the FTT to serve the documents and it in fact did so, such that the respondent was in possession of all the relevant information and documents within the relevant 21-day period, the appellant could take advantage of the fact that this had fortuitously occurred.
(3) The appellant had brought her appeal comfortably within the time limit prescribed by regulation 10(1). From the date when she did so, there was before the FTT a validly made appeal. There was no provision in regulation 10(1) itself that, in order to make a valid appeal, it was not only necessary to make the appeal to the FTT within 21 days but also to serve certain documents on the respondent. The provisions of regulation 10(3) came into operation once a valid appeal was made. It would require clear language, which was not present in regulation 10(3), to hold that a subsequent failure to comply with the notification requirements in regulation 10(3) had the effect of rendering a previously valid appeal invalid. While the FTT had no power to extend a time limit under the 2014 Regulations, it was not being asked to do so in the instant case. It was merely being asked to conclude that, if the time limit in regulation 10(3) had been missed, the consequences were not such as to deprive it of the jurisdiction to continue to entertain the appeal which had been validly brought within the relevant time limits. The FTT was in error in declining so to conclude.
(4) While the regulations laid down a procedural code with various steps leading to the deposit of valid new site rules, and the proper working of the code might be thrown out if an appellant could pursue an appeal in circumstances where the site owner had been told nothing about it and had perhaps already gone to the next step of depositing rules, the FTT had power to strike out proceedings if it considered that the proceedings, or the manner in which they were being conducted, was frivolous or vexatious or otherwise an abuse of the process of the tribunal. That provision could enable the FTT adequately to protect a site owner from an appeal which had been notified to the site owner too late to avoid prejudice to it.
Neil Wylie (instructed by Barcan+Kirby Solicitors, of Bristol) appeared for the appellant; John Clement (instructed by Charles Simpson Organisation Ltd) appeared for the respondent.
Sally Dobson, barrister
Read the transcript here: O’Kane v Charles Simpson Organisation Ltd
