Cases - Beaumont Business Centres Ltd v Florala Properties Ltd

Record details

Name

Beaumont Business Centres Ltd v Florala Properties Ltd

Date

[2020]

Citation

EWHD 550 (Ch)

Keywords

Easements - nuisance - remedy - award of injunction - damages in substitution for an injunction - award of damages in substitution an exceptional remedy - whether damages should be granted instead of an injunction - rights of light.

Summary

This ruling reinforced the recent trend to recommend a nuanced (rather than rigid) application of what are known as the Shelfer criteria for awarding damages in lieu of granting an injunction for rights of light infringement (see Shelfer v City of London Electric Lighting Co [1895]). This nuanced approach, first clearly expressed by Lord Neuberger in Coventry and others v Lawrence and another (2014) as a correction to the more rigid interpretation taken in Regan v Paul Properties Ltd (2006), allows for factors other than the Shelfer criteria to be taken into account, while also maintaining that the burden of proof is on the plaintiff to demonstrate why an injunction should not be granted.

The judge in this case drew heavily upon the arguments of Lord Neuberger in Coventry and ultimately granted an injunction, in part on grounds that the plaintiff, Florala Properties Ltd, had acted ‘in a high handed, or at least unfair and un-neighbourly, manner’ (recalling a similar judgement reached in Ottercroft Limited v Scandia Care Limited [2016]) and that several of the Shelfer criteria for awarding damages in lieu of granting an injunction had not been met (i.e. the injury to the claimant, Beaumont, was neither small nor easily quantifiable, and an injunction would not be an ‘oppressive’ outcome for Florala; par. 341).