Latest Cases

Local authority – Residential care home. The claimant care home owners and operators sought judicial review of the defendant local health boards' (LHBs) decisions setting the funded nursing care rate. The Administrative Court, in allowing the application, held that, in restricting the services which s 49 of the Health and Social Care Act 2001 prohibited local authorities from providing to those individual tasks which, by virtue of their expertise and experience, only a registered nurse could perform, the defendants' approach had been fundamentally flawed. 

Land – Possession. The Chancery Division granted the University of Birmingham's application for an order extending a writ of possession in respect of student protests on its campus, ruling that a possession order was still needed where further protests were planned to take place and the means adopted of disrupting University life to the extent of closing it down where possible, were not legitimate and made trespassers of those who took part in the protests. 

Husband and wife – Joint property and matrimonial causes. Shortly before her marriage had ended, the wife had received a lump sum payment from her mother (the lump sum), which was derived from her late father's estate. Some of that money had been transferred to the husband. In subsequent matrimonial proceedings, the wife claimed the lump sum. A district judge ruled that that sum had become a matrimonial asset. The Family Division, in granting permission to appeal and allowing the appeal, held that the treatment of the evidence by the district judge, which had led to that conclusion, had been erroneous and that she had erred in the exercise of her discretion. 

Medical practitioner – Negligence. The claimant, who had diabetes, brought proceedings for negligence against the defendant health authority. She contended that, had she been told of the options available at the birth of her baby, she would have chosen a caesarian section, rather than to go ahead with a vaginal birth, which had resulted in injury to him. In allowing the claimant's appeal, the Supreme Court held that, among other things, the approach of the court in such cases, previously governed by the case of Sidaway v Board of Governors of the Bethlem Royal Hospital and the Maudsley Hospital ([1985] 1 All ER 643), was to be reconsidered. There could be no doubt that it had been incumbent on the claimants' obstetrician to advise her of the risks if she were to have her baby by vaginal delivery, and to discuss with her the alternative of delivery by caesarian section. In the circumstances, the claimant would probably have elected to be delivered of the baby by caesarian section. 

Criminal law – Manslaughter. The defendants, then aged 14 and 16, started a fire in an derelict building which spread causing the death of a homeless man. The Court of Appeal, Criminal Division, in dismissing their appeals against their conviction for manslaughter, considered issues of intent and forseeability and held that the judge had correctly directed the jury on the basis of the well-established law and had given no misdirection adverse to the defendants. In the circumstances, the court quashed the sentences of three years' detention and substituted a 24 month detention and training order. 

European Union – Employment. The Court of Justice of the European Union gave a preliminary ruling concerning the interpretation of the first sentence of the first subparagraph of art 27(2) of the Convention defining the Statute of the European Schools between the member states and the European Union. The requests had been made in two sets of proceedings between the European School, Munich, and, respectively, Ms Oberto and Ms O'Leary concerning the jurisdiction of the German courts to deal with actions seeking an examination of the validity of the fixed-term nature of the employment contracts of the parties concerned. 

Child – Medical treatment. A 19-month-old child choked on some food and, after being taken to the applicant NHS Trust, was placed on life support. His Saudi parents, who were Muslim, were against turning off life support after he was assessed to be brain dead. The Family Division held that death had been established and granted a declaration that the ventilator be turned off. Further, the court considered that it could not conceive of any circumstances in which a coroner should seek to intervene where a body remained ventilated, beyond those circumstances concerning the removal of organs where the family were consenting 

Contract – Intention to create legal relations. The appellant property developer appealed against a decision of the Second Division of the Inner House of the Court of Session that, on an objective assessment, the respondent Royal Bank of Scotland plc had not intended to enter into a legally binding promise to advance sums in the future to the appellant to purchase a development plot and to fund its development. The Supreme Court allowed the appellant's appeal, deciding that there had been a reasonable basis for the Lord Ordinary's finding that, on an objective analysis, the bank had made such a legally binding promise. Consequently, there was no adequate basis for overturning the Lord Ordinary's findings of fact. 

Housing – Homeless person. The issue before the court was whether a court in possession proceedings under the Housing Act 1996 should approach a defence based on disability discrimination in the the Equality Act 2010 in the same way as it would approach one based on art 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The Supreme Court held, disagreeing with the approach of the lower courts, that the substantive right to equal treatment protected by the 2010 Act was different from the substantive right which was protected by art 8 of the Convention. Parliament had expressly provided for an extra right to equal treatment for people to be protected against direct and indirect discrimination in relation to eviction. Nevertheless, applying that correct approach, the defendant's eviction was inevitable. 

Family proceedings – Orders in family proceedings. The parties married in 1981 and separated in 1984. In 2011, the appellant wife applied for financial remedy from the respondent husband. The deputy judge made a costs allowance order and refused to strike out the wife's application. On the husband's appeal, the Court of Appeal, Civil Division, set aside the orders of the deputy judge, struck out the wife's substantive application and made a repayment order. The Supreme Court, in allowing the wife's appeal against the strike-out of her application, ruled as to the extent of the jurisdiction to strike out a spouse's application for a financial order, under r 4.4 of the Family Procedure Rules 2010, SI 2010/2955. The deputy judge's costs allowance order was restored and the Court of Appeal's repayment order set aside.