There have been several decisions regarding limitation periods over this last week and they are worth a quick mention of those of you in the process of studying the LPC. They could be particularly relevant if you are doing a Masters and addressing this issue in your long essay.
The first case was pretty straightforward and defines when time runs from. It is established law that for the purposes of calculating a limitation period, the clock starts to run on the first full day after the actionable event. So what if that event occurs at midnight? Does the day which is about to begin count? Yes it does! The Supreme Court in Matthew v Sedman has conclusively ruled on the point.
The next two cases were sadly both about negligence of legal professionals. In Sciortino v Beaumont the Court of Appeal was faced with the situation where a barrister had given advice on two completely separate occasions about the same matter. On the second occasion more documents had been provided and he had been asked to give different and more comprehensive advice. The court had to decide whether this was a continuous pattern of advice (in which case a claim would be time barred) or if it was two separate instances of advice, in which case time had not expired for bringing an action in respect of the second advice. The court found that a fresh breach of duty could occur each time advice was provided and that accordingly the negligence on the second advice was actionable.
The final case was also in the Court of Appeal. In Elliot v Hattens Solicitors, the solicitors had negligently carried out work in respect of a grant to their client of a lease and the onward grant by her of a sub-lease. The solicitors had failed to ensure that intended guarantors assumed any risk on the sub-lease and had failed to advise their client to insure the property in accordance with her obligation under the terms of the lease! The problem came to light when the property was damaged by fire. The claimant issued proceedings more than 6 years after the original transaction but less than 6 years after the fire. The court had to decide when the cause of action accrued.
The court relied on a previous precedent (Maharaj v Johnson) in which “no transaction cases” were distinguished from “flawed transaction cases”.The former related to the situation where the claimant would not have entered into the transaction at all but for the solicitors’ negligence and the second were where the transaction would have been a better one but for the negligence.This case was a “flawed transaction case”, damage had occurred