From time to time, a family tree can bear a valuable fruit in the shape of a right of reverter under the School Sites Acts. The prospect arises where your client can point to: (i) a gift of land by a relevant ancestor to be used for the education of the poor; and (ii) some event that brought about the cessation of that use, thus triggering the right to demand the return of the land.
But don’t expect the prize to drop into your client’s lap. The current owner may have a good limitation defence because the alleged triggering event happened many years ago. The right of reverter may have been extinguished for other reasons. Your client may not be the person (or the only person) entitled to the original benefactor’s estate.
All these questions, and more, fell for consideration in Fraser v Canterbury Diocesan Board of Finance [2000] EGCS 141, where the judgment of Peter Gibson, Mummery and Latham LJJ affords as good an introduction as any to this little visited corner of the law.
From time to time, a family tree can bear a valuable fruit in the shape of a right of reverter under the School Sites Acts. The prospect arises where your client can point to: (i) a gift of land by a relevant ancestor to be used for the education of the poor; and (ii) some event that brought about the cessation of that use, thus triggering the right to demand the return of the land.
But don’t expect the prize to drop into your client’s lap. The current owner may have a good limitation defence because the alleged triggering event happened many years ago. The right of reverter may have been extinguished for other reasons. Your client may not be the person (or the only person) entitled to the original benefactor’s estate.
All these questions, and more, fell for consideration in Fraser v Canterbury Diocesan Board of Finance [2000] EGCS 141, where the judgment of Peter Gibson, Mummery and Latham LJJ affords as good an introduction as any to this little visited corner of the law.
