Chancery Division

Published June 26, 2007

Polarpark Enterprises Inc v Allason

A licensee who occupied a property under a trust deed, which contained an obligation to repair and insure the property, had a protected licence.

Mr Justice Briggs so held in the Chancery Division on April 18, 2007 when allowing an application by the defendant, Rupert Allason, under rule 3.1(7) of the Civil Procedure Rules that part of an order, made by his Lordship on January 22, 2007, permitting the claimant, Polarpark Enterprises Inc, to issue a writ of possession, be revoked as having been made without jurisdiction.

The defendant contended that he was the lawful occupier of the property when the licence terminated in 1996 so that the Protection from Eviction Act 1977 protected him from enforcement by the claimant of its right to possession, otherwise than in the relevant county court.

HIS LORDSHIP said that having the property kept repaired and insured was a valuable benefit to the claimant and was the quid pro quo for the licence.

Accordingly, the licence was not excluded from protection under section 3A(7)(b) of the 1977 Act, as inserted by section 31 of the Housing Act 1988, because it was granted for “money or money’s worth”.

The defendant was a lawful occupant of the property when the licence ended and was therefore to be afforded the protection of the Act, so that those parts of the order made in the High Court in January had been made without jurisdiction.

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