| ESTOPPEL — Conduct, by — Proprietary estoppel — Landowner’s will leaving farm to claimant — Landowner revoking will to exclude another legatee and dying intestate without making new will — Claimant having spent 30 years working on deceased’s land in expectation that he would inherit land — Whether facts establishing proprietary estoppel
Thorner v Major and others [2008] EWCA Civ 732; [2008] WLR (D) 222
CA: Ward Lloyd and Rimer LJJ: 2 July 2008
A dedicated help and service in reliance upon a statement did not bind his estate by conscience to create a proprietary estoppel to confer the farm to the claimant even if the deceased had given the farm to the claimant by a will which he subsequently revoked to deny an interest to a third person.
The Court of Appeal so stated allowing the appeal of the defendants, Ena Royce Major, Winfried Curtis and Lesley Dawn Heusen, as the personal representatives of the late Peter Thorner (the deceased) from the decision of John Randall QC sitting as a Judge of Chancery Division in Bristol, who had held that the deceased having died intestate without making a new will in place of one which he had made giving his farm and some other legacies to the claimant and revoked it to deny any interest to a third person, the deceased’s estate was bound by conscience as the claimant had spent some 30 years on the farm of the deceased, in reliance upon a statement of the deceased to give the farm to him, the claimant was entitled to the farm by way of proprietary estoppel.
LLOYD LJ said that where the question concerned the landowner's intentions as regards the disposition of his property upon his death, a distinction needed to be drawn between, on the one hand, a statement as to the landowner's current testamentary intentions and, on the other, a promise or assurance by him to the other party as to what he would do by his will. The latter could be intended to be relied on by the other party, and to influence his or her course of action; the former might be no more than a matter of information, not intended to be relied on, and which the other party could not reasonably be expected to take as so intended. Wills and succession were also subjects on which many misconceptions were common. Statements by a particular person on this subject might need to be considered with particular care in order to be able to assess their significance. The claimant's claim in the present case did not satisfy the tests for such a claim, because the statement made implicitly in 1990 by the deceased to the claimant regarding his estate, as recorded by the judge, did not amount to a clear and unequivocal representation, intended to be relied on by the claimant, or which it was reasonable for him to take as intended to be relied on by him. Unfortunately, because the deceased had revoked his 1997 will and did not make another, the claimant's claim depended on making good a proprietary estoppel entitlement. However, the judge failed to give proper effect to the requirement that the representation be clear and unequivocal and intended to be relied on;. He was therefore wrong in law to find the necessary representation, assurance or promise and the claim should not have been upheld.
RIMER LJ and WARD LJ agreed.
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