Cases - Rice v Great Yarmouth Borough Council

Record details

Name

Rice v Great Yarmouth Borough Council

Date

[2000]

Citation

AII ER (D) 902

Keywords

Contract - cumulative breaches - repudiatory breach - termination - whether the existence of cumulative breaches could justify the grant of an immediate remedy

Summary

In a claim concerning an alleged repudiatory breach of a maintenance contract, Lady Justice Hale in the Court of Appeal noted the parallels with building contracts, 'in the number and variety of the obligations involved and the varying gravity of the breaches which may be committed, some of which may be remediable and some not.'

The court below had been correct to ask itself whether the cumulative breaches would continue to deliver a substandard performance. Thus, the concept of a contractor's work containing a sufficient extent of defects to warrant the grant of an immediate remedy – rather than waiting to the date for completion – was established as relevant.