We are no longer publishing new items on this blog. Instead, we now publish articles covering similar issues on Practical Law (see Practical Law Construction homepage).
You can also listen to The Construction Briefing podcast, which is an alternative way of learning about key developments in construction law from the Practical Law Construction editorial team.
All good things come to an end, and sadly this will be our last blog for Practical Law Construction. However, fear not as we will continue to write some articles for them in the future, and we hope to relaunch the blog on a separate platform later this year. We’re afraid you can’t get rid of us that easily!
We’ve never done a joint blog before, and so welcome to our first and last joint blog for Practical Law Construction. Rather than both try and write about a recent case, we thought we’d each do a whistle stop tour of some of our highlights of the past 15 years.
Where shall we start?? Continue reading
In Pegasus v Ernst & Young the advice from Mr Justice Mann was that:
“Whatever the metaphysician may say, the law says that the loss flowing can and should still be treated as a loss of the assignor which the assignee can recover. Black holes are to be (as all black holes should be) avoided where possible.”
So what are these black holes we need to avoid? In our universe, this arises because only a party to the contract can make a claim and the party to whom a contract is assigned cannot recover more than the original party. This was considered in detail by the House of Lords in Linden Gardens Trust v Lenesta Sludge Disposals and two exceptions were identified to the general rule, in order to prevent a party avoiding liability on the basis of a no loss argument. Continue reading
We have published episode 20 of The Construction Briefing podcast featuring the Practical Law Construction editorial team.
This month Michelle Rousell and Yassir Mahmood start their discussion with a number of building safety developments, before moving onto items with a numerical theme:
Finally, we end in the 17th century, with a discussion about the judgment in Lendlease Construction (Europe) Ltd v AECOM Ltd and another [2022] EWHC 2855 (TCC).
The Construction Briefing is an alternative way of learning about key developments in construction law, with our editorial team discussing some of the wider issues those developments raise.
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Last year I wrote about the judgment in Nicholas James Care Homes Ltd v Liberty Homes (Kent) Ltd, where O’Farrell J continued an interim freezing injunction that had been granted a month or so earlier. As I said at the time, while I wouldn’t ordinarily be interested in an injunction application, I wrote about it because one of the contractor’s defences to enforcement of the adjudicator’s decision focused on the adjudicator’s request for on account payments for his fees.
Fast forward six months and the case has been back before the TCC judges (also called Nicholas James Care Homes Ltd v Liberty Homes (Kent) Ltd). This time it was in front of Recorder Andrew Singer KC (sitting as a High Court judge), who was asked to look at the payment point as part of the enforcement application. He held that the adjudicator had not exercised a lien before issuing his decision. Consequently, the adjudicator’s decision was enforced and there were no grounds to stay enforcement. (Separately, he declined to discharge the freezing injunction but I’m not going to discuss that aspect of the case.)
Just like last time, I’m interested in what the judge had to say about those on account payment requests. Continue reading
One of the major changes to the regulation of the design and construction of “higher-risk buildings” is the introduction of the gateway regime.
This regime comprises a series of “hard stops” that a construction project will need to pass through in order to proceed to construction, completion and then occupation. The gateways are:
Gateway 1 is already in force and government commentary suggests that gateways 2 and 3 will come into force in October 2023. Continue reading
Can a dormant company enforce an adjudicator’s decision in its favour?
It may take an unusual set of facts to produce such a situation (in both cases where it has happened, there was a dispute as to who was the correct contracting party). However, the answer is yes. So long as it falls on the right side of the well-known principles for a stay of execution in Wimbledon v Vago, a dormant company can enforce an adjudicator’s decision and resist an application for a stay of execution. Continue reading
