Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Feb-27-2008
LORD HOFFMANN My Lords, 1. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the speech of my noble and learned friend Baroness Hale of Richmond. For the reasons she gives, with which I agree, I too would dismiss this appeal. LORD SCOTT OF FOSCOTE My Lords, 2. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the opinion of my noble and learned friend Baroness Hale of Richmond and for the reasons she gives, with which I am in full agreement, I too would dismiss this appeal. LORD WALKER OF GESTINGTHORPE My Lords, 3. I have had the privilege of reading in draft the opinion of my noble and learned friend Baroness Hale of Richmond. I am in full agreement with it, and I too would dismiss this appeal. BARONESS HALE OF RICHMOND My Lords, 4. Any parent of teenagers aged 16 and 17 knows how difficult they can be. But they also know that, however much those teenagers are struggling to discover their own identities and lead independent lives, they also depend upon the love and the support of their parents....
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Jul-30-2008
LORD SCOTT OF FOSCOTE My Lords, 1. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the opinion of my noble and learned friend Lord Brown of Eaton-under Heywood and for the reasons he gives, with which I am in full agreement, I would dismiss this appeal. LORD PHILLIPS OF WORTH MATRAVERS My Lords, 2. I have had the benefit of reading in draft the speech of my noble and learned friend, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood For the reasons that he gives, I too would dismiss this appeal. BARONESS HALE OF RICHMOND My Lords, 3. For the reasons given by my noble and learned friend, Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood, with which I entirely agree, I too would dismiss this appeal. The answer to the certified question is ‘not in this case'. LORD BROWN OF EATON-UNDER-HEYWOOD My Lords, Introduction 4. The appellant is a 42 year old British citizen, an unemployed computer systems administrator. On 7 October 2004 the respondent government requested his extradition to the United States alleging that be...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : May-21-2008
LORD HOFFMANN My Lords, 1. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the speech of my noble and learned friend Lord Hope of Craighead. For the reasons he gives, with which I agree, I too would dismiss these appeals. LORD HOPE OF CRAIGHEAD My Lords, 2. The appellants are former residents of a children’s home called Nazareth House at Cardonald in Glasgow which was run by the religious order known as the Poor Sisters of Nazareth. In May 2000 they raised separate actions of damages against the respondents in the Court of Session for loss, injury and damage in respect of physical abuse which they claim to have suffered during their time there. They maintain that they were regularly assaulted and subjected to cruel punishments, as a result of which they suffered pain and distress and long-standing psychological or psychiatric problems and that these led to their being disadvantaged in the workplace and to financial loss. The respondents deny these allegations. They also say that the...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Jun-11-2008
LORD HOFFMANN My Lords, 1. Council Directive 85/374/EEC (the “product liability directive”) provides in article 1 that “the producer shall be liable for damage caused by a defect in his product". Liability is strict: by article 4, all that the injured person need prove is “the damage, the defect and the causal relationship between defect and damage". The primary meaning of “the producer” is the manufacturer, but there circumstances in which someone else can be deemed to be the producer. For example, a supplier may be treated as the producer “unless he informs the injured person, within a reasonable time, of the identity of the producer": see article 3. 2. Article 10 provides for a limitation period of three years from the date on which the plaintiff became aware, or should reasonably have become aware, of the damage. But article 11 contains an additional, “long-stop” period: “Member States shall provide in their legislation t...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Jun-25-2008
LORD BINGHAM OF CORNHILL My Lords, 1. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the opinion of my noble and learned friend Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood. I am in full agreement with it, and would for the reasons which he gives allow the appeal and make the order which he proposes. LORD HOPE OF CRAIGHEAD My Lords, 2. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the opinion of my noble and leaned friend Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood. I agree with it, and for the reasons he gives I would allow the appeal and make the order that he proposes. LORD SCOTT OF FOSCOTE My Lords, 3. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the opinion on this appeal prepared by my noble and learned friend Lord Brown of Eaton-under-Heywood and am in complete agreement with the reasons he has given for allowing this appeal. My astonishment that the case should have had to come this far for the, as it seems to me, obvious conclusion that the appellant and her four year old child should be permitted to...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Feb-06-2008
LORD BINGHAM OF CORNHILL My Lords, 1. For the reasons given by my noble and learned friend Lord Hope of Craighead, with which I agree, I would dismiss this appeal. LORD HOPE OF CRAIGHEAD My Lords, 2. In April 2007 two European arrest warrants were issued by the Circuit Court of Legnica for the extradition of the appellant to Poland. The decisions on which the warrants were based were orders by Judge Bartlomiej Treter for the appellant to be arrested for the purpose of serving custodial sentences which had been imposed on him by the District Court in Lubin after his conviction for various offences and which had become final. The validity of each warrant falls to be determined under Part 1 of the Extradition Act 2003. This is the measure by which the United Kingdom has transposed into national law the Council Framework Decision of 13 June 2002 on the European arrest warrant and the surrender procedures between Member States (2002/548/JHA; OJ 2002 L 190, p1). Poland was designated as a ca...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Jul-30-2008
LORD BINGHAM OF CORNHILL My Lords, 1. The issue in this appeal is whether a decision made by the appellant, the Director of the Serious Fraud Office, on 14 December 2006, to discontinue a criminal investigation was unlawful. The Queen’s Bench Divisional Court (Moses LJ and Sullivan J) held it to be so: [2008] EWHC 714 (Admin). That court accordingly quashed the Director’s decision and remitted it to him for reconsideration. In this appeal to the House the Director contends, as he contended below, that the decision was not unlawful. Mr Robert Wardle, the Director who made the decision under review, has now been succeeded in his office, but this change of office-holder does not affect the issue to be decided. The respondents are public interest organisations. The House has received written submissions on behalf of JUSTICE. The facts 2. By sections 108-110 of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 it was made an offence triable here for a UK national or company to mak...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Feb-20-2008
LORD BINGHAM OF CORNHILL My Lords, 1. In this action the seller (Scottish and Newcastle International Limited) seeks to recover the price of goods sold from the buyer (Othon Ghalanos Limited). SandN is a company based in Scotland, Ghalanos a company registered in Cyprus. The contract related to 11 consignments of cider shipped from Liverpool to Limassol in June-July 2004. The question before the House is whether the English court has jurisdiction to entertain the action. The answer to that question turns, by virtue of article 5(1)(b) of Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001, on whether, as a matter of English law applied to the particular contract made between the parties, the goods were or should have been delivered by SandN to Ghalanos in England. Both Andrew Smith J ([2006] EWHC 1039 (Comm)) and the Court of Appeal (Waller and Rix LJJ: [2006] EWCA Civ 1750, [2007] 1 All ER (Comm) 1027) held in favour of SandN that the English court does have jurisdiction, but Ghalanos challenges the co...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Jul-09-2008
LORD HOFFMANN My Lords, 1. Angiotech Pharmaceuticals Inc, a Canadian company, and the University of British Columbia are joint proprietors of European patent 0 706 376 which claims, among other things, a stent coated with taxol for “treating or preventing recurrent stenosis". For convenience I shall call the patentees Angiotech. Conor Medsystems Inc (Conor), an American competitor, applied in both the United Kingdom and the Netherlands for revocation of the patent on the ground that the claimed invention was obvious. In the United Kingdom, before Pumfrey J and the Court of Appeal (Mummery, Tuckey and Jacob LJJ), it succeeded. In the Netherlands, before the District Court of The Hague (Robert van Peursem, Edgar Brinkman and Walter van Straalen) it failed. Angiotech appeals to your Lordships’ House and says that the Dutch court was right and that the patent should be declared valid. 2. Since the decision of the Court of Appeal, Angiotech and Conor have reached a settlement. C...
Tag this Judgment!Court : House of Lords
Decided on : Mar-12-2008
LORD HOFFMANN My Lords, 1. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the speech of my noble and learned friend Lord Mance. For the reasons he gives, with which I agree, I too would allow this appeal. LORD SCOTT OF FOSCOTE My Lords, 2. I have had the advantage of reading in advance the opinion of my noble and learned friend Lord Mance. I agree with it and, for the reasons he gives, I too would allow this appeal. LORD WALKER OF GESTINGTHORPE My Lords, 3. I have had the advantage of reading in draft the speech of my noble and learned friend Lord Mance. I agree with it, and for the reasons which Lord Mance gives I would allow this appeal. LORD MANCE Introduction 4. This appeal raises points of construction on a Lloyd’s accountants’ professional indemnity policy which are of some difficulty, though no general importance. They relate to the scope and existence of cover afforded to the appellant, a “not for profit” umbrella corporation based in Illinois called Grant...
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