CASE SUMMARIES 27 January 1997

The following notes of judgments were prepared by the reporters of the All England Law Reports.

Children

Devon CC v B; CA (Sir Stephen Brown P, Pill LJ, Sir Patrick Russell) 11 Dec 1996.

A local authority, having the care of a child under s 31 of the Children Act 1989, applied to the county court for an injunction to restrain the child's mother from visiting the town where the child was to be placed for adoption. Apart from the question whether the terms of the injunction itself were too wide, the injunction had been made in support of an order to place the child pursuant to a care order. In seeking to invoke the exercise of the court's inherent jurisdiction, the leave of the High Court was required under s 100(3) of the 1989 Act. No such leave had been obtained nor had s 100(3) been brought to the attention of the judge. The county court had no inherent jurisdiction to grant an injunction, its jurisdiction being derived from statute alone. The injunction would be set aside and the appeal allowed.

George Meredith (solicitor, Devon CC) for the local authority; Richard Hickmet (Wolfestans, Plymouth) for the mother; Lawrence Deegan (Stanton & Walker, Chesterfield) for the father; Michael Melville-Shreeve (Messrs Gill Akaster, Plymouth) for the guardian ad litem.

Land

Thames Heliport plc v Tower Hamlets LBC; CA (Beldam, Ward, Schiemann LJJ) 28 Nov 1996.

Because the environmental impact was quite different from that created by inland navigational use, the employment of floating platforms at various points on the Thames between Chelsea and Greenwich for the launching and landing of helicopters could amount to a material change of use of "land" (the river and banks) and hence "development" for the purposes of statutory planning control. The court could not declare in advance whether limiting such use to not more than 28 days a year at any one location would cause it to be permitted (without prior application) under the General Development Order 1995 as on each occasion it would be up to the relevant enforcing authority to determine what area had been affected.

Michael Fitzgeral QC , Robert Fookes (Frere Cholmeley Bischoff) for the applicants; David Widdicombe QC, Michael Druce (Simmons & Simmons) for the respondents.

Titterrell v Tunbridge Wells BC; CA (Sir Stephen Brown P, Pill LJ, Sir Patrick Russell) 4 Dec 1996.

The applicant sought compensation in respect of land adjoining his house which had been allocated to the green belt and which he claimed had therefore been blighted. The decision of the Lands Tribunal, hearing a preliminary point of law, that land allocated to the Green Belt was not blighted land within the meaning of s 149(1) and Sched 13 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 was upheld on appeal.

The applicant in person; David Lamming (FM Harris, solicitor to the council) appeared for the respondent.

Negligence

National Home Loans Corp plc v Giffen Couch & Archer (a firm); QBD (G Hamilton QC, Dep J) 6 Dec 1996.

A solicitor instructed by both a mortgagee and a mortgagor on a remortgage was under a duty to inform the lender if he discovered the proposed buyer had a bad record of repayment with a previous lender, and his failure to do so could render him liable in negligence.

Daniel Serota QC, Peter Kirby (Eversheds, Cardiff) for the plaintiff; Nicholas Davidson QC, Elizabeth Weaver (Mills & Reeve, Cambridge) for the defendant.