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Landlord and Tenant
An option to renew a lease "at a rent to be fixed having
regard to the market value of the premises at the time of
exercising this option taking into account to the advantage of
the tenant any increased value of such premises attributable to
structural improvements made by the tenant" during the lease
was held to be valid and enforceable and provided a formula
for fixing the rent.
[Brown v Gould and Others;
The Times,
30th April 1971.]
Licensing
The Vice-Chancellor refused to grant to Newark Livestock
Auctions, a consortium of ten individual auctioneers, injunc-
tions seeking to prevent Newark Corporation and another
group of eleven auctioneers, known as the Gascoine consor-
tium, from excluding from Newark cattle market livestock
sent to them for sale by auction. His Lordship held that the
corporation, in the exercise of its powers of management, had
lawfully granted to the Gascoine consortium an exclusive
licence to use the market facilities.
[Eden and Others v Newark Corporation and Others;
The
Times,
20th May 1971.]
Licensing Appeal
Although a Magistrates' Court hearing an appeal from a licen-
sing authority's refusal to grant a heavy goods vehicle driver's
licence has power to "make such order as it thinks fit and an
order so made shall be binding on the licensing authority"
under Section 195 (2) of the Road Traffic Act, 1960, the
Magistrates' Court cannot order the licensing authority to do
something which the authority otherwise has no power to do.
The Divisional Court so held when granting an application
by Mr. Herbert Ernest Robson, chairman of the Eastern traffic
area commissioners, for an order of
certiorari
quashing an
order by Ipswich justices that Mr. R. F. K. Callaway be
granted a heavy goods vehicle driver's licence. He was stated
to have been driving heavy goods vehicles for over ten years.
[Regina v Ipswich Justices, ex parte Robson;
The Times,
15th May 1971.]
Matrimonial
Love letters assumed to have been written by the named co-
respondent to a wife before the trial of her husband's petition
for divorce on the ground of her adultery were held to be
"very solid grounds" for ordering a new trial in which the
letters will be admitted as further evidence, even though they
might have been but were not made available at the trial.
[Skore v Skore and Another;
The Times,
14th May 1971.]
Negligence
See under
Damages;
Eley v Bedford;
The Times,
5th May 1971.
See under
Procedure;
White v London Transport Executive
and Another;
The Times,
4th May 1971.
Practice and Procedure
The Court settled a difference in the authorities as to the test
whether a Judge's order was interlocutory or final, and held
that it depended on the nature of the application and not on
the nature of the order as made. Their Lordships decided that
an appeal from a County Court Judge's refusal to order a new
trial, as also the grant of a new trial, was interlocutory and not
final so that notice of appeal should be set down within four-
teen days of the order made.
They dismissed an application by Dr. S. R. Ghosh, of Howitt
Road, N.W., for leave to appeal against the refusal of Judge
Leslie in Bloomsbury and Marylebone County Court to grant
him a new trial of an action by Salter Rex & Co., auctioneers
and valuers, in which they had been given judgment for
professional fees of £47 for valuing his house.
[Salter Rex & Co. v Ghosh;
The Times,
21st April 1971.]
Procedure
Where large sums of money are deposited by trustees with
banks for fixed terms the fact that another bank may have a
claim of some kind or another against the trustees does not
mean that it has any title to the funds deposited in inter-
pleader proceedings. Interpleader only deals with the title to
the fund.
[Bank of the Commonwealth v Banco de Bilbao and Another;
The Times,
1st May 1971.]
Judge's Interrogations
The Court ordered a new trial-of a case where the Judge acted
as the main interrogator of the witnesses and asked 334 ques-
tions—more than both counsel had asked.
TAli v London Spinning Co. Ltd.; The Times, 20th April
The latest agreement between the Minister of Transport and
the Motor Insurers' Bureau for the compensation of victims of
untraced drivers gives the Bureau such wide powers to require
the victim to bring proceedings against an identified person
involved in the same accident as to make the Bureau the person
standing behind the victim's action. Therefore the Court's
power under the Rules of the Supreme Court to order joinder
of any party necessary to determine any cause or matter should
not be used to allow the Bureau, on their own application, to
be joined as defendants to any such action.
[White v London Transport Executive and Another;
The
Times,
4th May 1971.]
A widow claiming damages under the Fatal Accidents Acts for
the death of her husband should not be compelled to be
subjected to a medical examination at the request of the
defence to help to ascertain her expectation of life.
[Baugh v Delta Water Fittings Ltd. and Another;
The
Times,
13th May 1971.]
Property
The President held that Section 4 of the Matrimonial Pro-
ceedings and Property Act, 1970, is retrospective. He granted
an application by Mrs. V. Williams under Section 4 (a) for
the transfer to her of the house where she lives with her
children in Geoffrey Road, S.E., which was vested in her for-
mer husband, Mr. J. S. Williams, from whom she obtained a
divorce.
Section 4 provides: "On granting a decree of divorce . . . or
at any time thereafter (whether, in the case of a decree of
divorce . . . before or after the decree is made absolute), the
Court may . .. make . . . (a) an order that a party to the
marriage shall transfer to the other party .. . such property as
may be specified, being the property to which the first-menti-
oned party is entitled, either in possession ór reversion .. ."
[Williams v Williams;
The Times,
8th April 197l.j
Tax
The expenses a subcontracting bricklayer incurred in travelling
daily to the various sites where he was working were held to
be deductible in arriving at his taxable profits under Schedule
D on the ground that the base of his business was his home.
[Horton v Young (Inspector of Taxes);
The Times,
7th
May 1971.]
Expense incurred by newspaper publishers in providing meals
and drinks for contributors, informants, and other contacts was
held not to be allowable as a deduction in computing their
profits for tax purposes, on the ground that it was the trade of
the taxpayers, Associated Newspapers Ltd., to provide news-
papers, not entertainment. They were, therefore, within the
provisions of Section 15 of the Finance Act, 1965, which
disallow the deduction of business entertainment expenses in
computing profits for tax purposes, and were not saved by
Section 15 (9).
Subsection (9) provides: "Nothing in this section shall be
taken as precluding the deduction of expenses incurred in ..
the provision by any person of anything which it is his trade to
provide, and which is provided by him in the ordinary course
of that trade for payment or, with the object of advertising to
the public generally, gratuitously."
[Fleming (Inspector of Taxes) v Associated Newspapers
Ltd.;
The Times,
13th May 1971.]
Income arising to an Irish company the shares of which were
settled on Major Antony Philippi, of Barrymore Lodge, Co.
Cork, by his father when he was nine, was held to be caught
by Section 412 of the Income Tax Act, 1952, and deemed to
be his income.
The preamble to Section 412 provides: "For the purpose of
preventing the avoiding by individuals ordinarily resident in
the United Kingdom of liability to income tax by means of
transfers of assets by virtue of or in consequence whereof,
either alone or in conjunction with associated operations,
income becomes payable to persons resident or domiciled out
of the United Kingdom, it is hereby enacted as follows .. ."
Subsection (3) provides that the "section shall not apply if the
individual shows in writing or otherwise . .. that the purpose
of avoiding liability to taxation was not the purpose or one of
the purposes for which the transfer or associated operations or
any of them were effected . . . "
[Philippi v Inland Revenue Commissioners;
The Times,
18th May 1971.]
Shipping
Their Lordships held, dismissing an appeal by Timber Ship-
ping Co. S.A. (the charterers) from a decision of the Court
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