"… as it turned out (and as ought to have been anticipated) the original assumptions were not sufficient without some additional background matters to provide all the evidential material required to enable all the issues to be decided. Some of the gaps were filled in as we went along by the acceptance of the parties from time to time of some obvious and agreed background facts to provide necessary context. Sometimes it transpired that facts upon which one side or the other (usually the claimants) wished to rely were not evidenced and were not agreed as such, so they could not be deployed."
"Preliminary points of law are too often treacherous short cuts. Their price can be, as here, delay, anxiety, and expense."
"1. Without prejudice to other Community provisions, Member States shall exempt the following under conditions which they shall lay down for the purpose of ensuring the correct and straightforward application of such exemptions and of preventing any possible evasion, avoidance or abuse: (a) the supply by the public postal services of services other than passenger transport and telecommunications services, and the supply of goods incidental thereto…"
"1. The conveyance of postal packets by the Post Office. 2. The supply by the Post Office of any services in connection with the conveyance of postal packets."
"1. The supply of public postal services by a universal service provider. 2. The supply of goods by a universal service provider which is incidental to the supply of public postal services by that provider."
"The common system of VAT should, even if rates and exemptions are not fully harmonised, result in neutrality in competition, such that within the territory of each Member State similar goods and services bear the same tax burden, whatever the length of the production and distribution chain."
"The principle of the common system of VAT entails the application to goods and services of a general tax on consumption exactly proportional to the price of the goods and services, however many transactions take place in the production and distribution process before the stage at which the tax is charged. On each transaction, VAT, calculated on the price of the goods or services at the rate applicable to such goods or services, shall be chargeable after deduction of the amount of VAT borne directly by the various cost components."
"For the purposes of this Directive: (1) 'chargeable event' shall mean the occurrence by virtue of which the legal conditions necessary for VAT to become chargeable are fulfilled; (2) VAT shall become 'chargeable' when the tax authority becomes entitled under the law, at a given moment, to claim the tax from the person liable to pay, even though the time of payment may be deferred."
"The chargeable event shall occur and VAT shall become chargeable when the goods or the services are supplied."
"Member States may provide that VAT is to become chargeable, in respect of certain transactions or certain categories of taxable person at one of the following times: (a) no later than the time the invoice is issued; (b) no later than the time the payment is received; (c) where an invoice is not issued, or is issued late, within a specified period from the date of the chargeable event."
"A right of deduction shall arise at the time the deductible tax becomes chargeable."
"In so far as the goods and services are used for the purposes of the taxed transactions of a taxable person, the taxable person shall be entitled, in the Member State in which he carries out these transactions, to deduct the following from the VAT which he is liable to pay: (a) the VAT due or paid in that Member State in respect of supplies to him of goods or services, carried out or to be carried out by another taxable person…"
"In order to exercise the right of deduction, a taxable person must meet the following conditions: (a) for the purposes of deductions pursuant to Article 168(a), in respect of the supply of goods or services, he must hold an invoice drawn up in accordance with Articles 220 to 236 and Articles 238, 239 and 240…"
"The taxable person shall make the deduction by subtracting from the total amount of VAT due for a given tax period the total amount of VAT in respect of which, during the same period, the right of deduction has arisen and is exercised in accordance with Article 178."
"Member States may authorise a taxable person to make a deduction which he has not made in accordance with Articles 178 and 179."
"(45) The obligations of taxable persons should be harmonised as far as possible so as to ensure the necessary safeguards for the collection of VAT in a uniform manner in all the Member States. (46) The use of electronic invoicing should allow tax authorities to carry out their monitoring activities. It is therefore appropriate, in order to ensure the internal market functions properly, to draw up a list, harmonised at Community level, of the particulars that must appear on invoices and to establish a number of common arrangements governing the use of electronic invoicing and the electronic storage of invoices, as well as for self-billing and the outsourcing of invoicing operations. (47) Subject to conditions which they lay down, Member States should allow certain statements and returns to be made by electronic means, and may require that electronic means be used. (48) The necessary pursuit of a reduction in the administrative and statistical formalities to be completed by businesses, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises, should be reconciled with the implementation of effective control measures and the need, on both economic and tax grounds, to maintain the quality of Community statistical instruments."
"Every taxable person shall ensure that, in respect of the following, an invoice is issued, either by himself or by his customer or, in his name and on his behalf, by a third party: (1) supplies of goods or services which he has made to another taxable person or to a non-taxable legal person…"
"(1) Save as otherwise provided in these Regulations, where a registered person (P)— (a) makes a taxable supply in the United Kingdom to a taxable person, or (b) makes a supply of goods to a person in a member State for the purpose of any business activity carried out by that person…; or (c) receives a payment on account in respect of a supply of goods that P has made or intends to make from a person in a member State… , P must, unless paragraph (1ZA) applies, provide such persons as are mentioned above with a VAT invoice. … (5) With the exception of the supplies referred to in paragraph (6), the documents specified in paragraphs (1), (2), (3) and (4) above shall be provided within 30 days of the time when the supply is treated as taking place under section 6 of the Act, or within such longer period as the Commissioners may allow in general or special directions."
"(1) Subject to paragraph (1A) below, and save as the Commissioners may otherwise allow or direct either generally or specially, a person claiming deduction of input tax under section 25(2) of the Act shall do so on a return made by him for the prescribed accounting period in which the VAT became chargeable save that, where he does not at that time hold the document or invoice required by paragraph (2) below, he shall make his claim on the return for the first prescribed accounting period in which he holds that document or invoice. … (2) At the time of claiming deduction of input tax in accordance with paragraph (1) above, a person shall, if the claim is in respect of— (a) a supply from another taxable person, hold the document which is required to be provided under regulation 13… provided that where the Commissioners so direct, either generally or in relation to particular cases or classes of cases, a claimant shall hold or provide such other … evidence of the charge to VAT as the Commissioners may direct."
"(1) If any person fails to comply with a regulatory requirement, that is to say, a requirement imposed under— … (d) any regulations or rules made under this Act, other than rules made under paragraph 9 of Schedule 12… he shall be liable, subject to subsections (8) and (9) below and section 76(6), to a penalty equal to the prescribed rate multiplied by the number of days on which the failure continues (up to a maximum of 100) or, if it is greater, to a penalty of£50 ."
"(8) A failure by any person to comply with any regulatory requirement or the requirement referred to in subsection (2) above shall not give rise to liability to a penalty under this section if the person concerned satisfies the Commissioners or, on appeal, a tribunal that there is a reasonable excuse for the failure…"
"[the] important principle… that the right to deduct does not depend on showing that the input tax in question has been paid or accounted for by the supplier as output tax to the revenue authorities."
"… this principle cannot be applied in isolation, and in particular does not in my judgment override the requirement for a person exercising the right of deduction to produce a VAT invoice evidencing payment of the relevant VAT by the supplier."
"Exercise of the right to deduct is subject to a mandatory requirement to produce a VAT invoice, which must contain the specified particulars. Zipvit is unable to produce invoices which satisfy the requirements of article 226(9) and (10), and it is also unable to produce any supplementary evidence showing payment of the relevant tax by Royal Mail. A necessary precondition for exercise of the right to deduct therefore remains unsatisfied."
"Provision of an invoice which complies with those requirements is essential to the proper performance by HMRC of their monitoring functions in relation to VAT, and is needed as evidence that the supplier has duly paid or accounted for the tax to HMRC."
"Whether the situation is described as one in which HMRC have no discretion, because the requirements of article 226(9) and (10) cannot be dispensed with, or as one where there is in law a discretion but on the facts of the present case it can only be exercised in one way, does not seem to me to matter. The important point is that the inability of Zipvit to produce a compliant VAT invoice in support of its claim to deduct input tax is in my judgment fatal."
"42 The Court has held that the fundamental principle of the neutrality of VAT requires deduction of input VAT to be allowed if the substantive requirements are satisfied, even if the taxable persons have failed to comply with some formal conditions. Consequently, where the tax authorities have the information necessary to establish that the substantive requirements have been satisfied, they cannot, in relation to the right of the taxable person to deduct that tax, impose additional conditions which may have the effect of rendering that right ineffective for practical purposes…. 43 It follows that the tax authorities cannot refuse the right to deduct VAT on the sole ground that an invoice does not satisfy the conditions required by Article 226(6) and (7) of [the Principal VAT] Directive if they have available all the information to ascertain whether the substantive conditions for that right are satisfied."
"41 The Court has held that the fundamental principle of the neutrality of VAT requires deduction of input VAT to be allowed if the substantive requirements are satisfied, even if the taxable persons have failed to comply with some formal conditions. It follows that the tax authorities cannot refuse the right to deduct VAT on the sole ground that an invoice does not satisfy the conditions required by Article 226(6) and (7) of the VAT Directive if they have available all the information to ascertain whether the substantive conditions for that right are satisfied…. 42 Thus, the strict application of the substantive requirement to produce invoices would conflict with the principles of neutrality and proportionality, inasmuch as it would disproportionately prevent the taxable person from benefiting from fiscal neutrality relating to his transactions. 43 Nevertheless, it is for the taxable person seeking deduction of VAT to establish that he meets the conditions for eligibility…. 44 Accordingly, the taxable person is required to provide objective evidence that goods and services were actually provided as inputs by taxable persons for the purposes of his own transactions subject to VAT, in respect of which he has actually paid VAT. 45 That evidence may include, inter alia, documents held by the suppliers or service providers from whom the taxable person has acquired the goods or services in respect of which he has paid VAT. An assessment based on an expert report commissioned by a national court may, if necessary, supplement that evidence or reinforce its credibility, but may not replace it."
"One of the main purposes of the mandatory requirement for a VAT invoice is to enable the taxing authorities to monitor payment by the supplier of the tax for which a deduction is sought, or as the Advocate General put it at point 32 of her opinion [in Barlis ] "to enable a check on whether the person issuing the invoice has paid the tax"
"That is because the mere supply of the goods or services says nothing about the amount of VAT charged to the recipient of the supply and included in the price. However, this is necessary for the exercise of the right of deduction. This becomes very clear in cases like the present one, where the parties are mutually mistaken about the exemption of the transaction. According to the contractual agreements, Royal Mail and the applicant assumed that the agreed price did not include VAT. If VAT were to be incurred, it was to be additionally borne by the applicant, in accordance with the contractual agreements. This never happened, although the supply was undoubtedly carried out. The supply of the goods or services in itself therefore does not contain any statement as to whether the applicant sustains a charge to VAT."
"It follows from the concept of VAT relief that deduction of input tax is possible only if the recipient of the supply sustains a charge to VAT. However, the recipient does not sustain a charge immediately upon the supply of the goods or services, but ultimately only upon payment of the consideration (see points 52 and 55 above). The rule enacted in Article 178(a) of the VAT Directive is clearly predicated on the concept that payment is generally made promptly once an invoice has been issued. This means that it is possible even at that moment to presume that the recipient of the supply sustains a charge promptly."
"In the final analysis, it is precisely the invoice which must be held in accordance with Article 178(a) of the VAT Directive that is the means provided for by that directive by which the charge to VAT is passed on from the supplier (which is liable for payment of the tax) to the recipient of the supply (as part of the price) in a manner that is verifiable for all parties concerned (including the tax authorities). Only then is the recipient of the supply able to see how much the supplier believes he or she should be charged in VAT. The recipient can claim relief in that amount by means of that invoice – which gives rise to his or her tax burden."
"In both cases, the Court rightly proceeded on the assumption that the recipient of the supply did not sustain a charge to VAT until it was in possession of a corresponding invoice stating its VAT liability. The applicant is not in possession of such a corrected invoice in the present case, however."
"However, if the shortcoming in the invoice concerns – as in the present case – the circumstance of whether VAT is stated separately, which is one of the essential features of an invoice conferring a right of deduction, the possibility to deduct input tax is ruled out for that reason alone. The recipient of the supply cannot claim relief from a charge to VAT by means of an invoice showing an exempt supply. In that respect, the United Kingdom rightly refers to a precondition for a deduction of input tax. This is because such an invoice does not give rise to a charge to VAT. Without such an invoice as the means by which the tax burden is 'passed on', the requirements of Article 178(a) of the VAT Directive are not met."
"Thus, it follows both from the wording of the VAT Directive and from the case-law of the Court that a right of deduction in a given amount requires the recipient of the supply to have held at some point an invoice separately stating the VAT passed on in that amount. Since this was never the case here, a right of deduction on the part of the applicant is ruled out for that reason alone."
"This is because, with regard to his or her input transactions, the recipient of the supply – outside the cases of the reverse charge procedure under Article 194 et seq. of the VAT Directive – is not liable for VAT and also cannot pay VAT. The recipient of the supply is liable – under civil law – for only the price for the supply or service. It is also only that price that he or she can pay. That price may contain an element arithmetically reflecting the VAT liability of the supplier. However, this does nothing to change the fact that, with the payment of the price by the recipient of the supply, only the price and no VAT is due or paid. This is because the tax creditor in respect of VAT is not the supplier, but only the State."
"The Court therefore rightly emphasises in its case-law that when a contract of sale has been concluded without reference to VAT, in a situation where the supplier has no means under national law of recovering from the purchaser the VAT claimed subsequently by the tax authorities, taking the total price, without deducting the VAT, as the taxable amount on which the VAT is to be levied, leads to a situation where it is the supplier which bears the VAT burden. This therefore conflicts, in turn, with the principle that VAT is a tax on consumption to be borne by the end consumer. Taking that amount as the taxable amount also conflicts with the rule that the tax authorities may not charge a VAT amount exceeding the amount paid by the taxable person. The corollary of this is that (all) the consideration actually received already includes the VAT provided for under EU law."
"However, this only becomes practically relevant for the recipient of the supply when he or she receives a corresponding invoice stating the VAT, which demonstrates the passing on of that tax to the recipient of the supply. However, in the case of a mutual error, the supplier will issue such an invoice only if he or she alone must bear the risk of the correct assessment under VAT law or if the recipient of the supply subsequently pays the VAT that has not yet been passed on due to the mutual error, that is to say, the price is adjusted accordingly."
"(1) All such rights, powers, liabilities, obligations and restrictions from time to time created or arising by or under the Treaties, and all such remedies and procedures from time to time provided for by or under the Treaties, as in accordance with the Treaties are without further enactment to be given legal effect or used in the United Kingdom shall be recognised and available in law, and be enforced, allowed and followed accordingly… (4) … any enactment passed or to be passed, other than one contained in this part of this Act, shall be construed and have effect subject to the foregoing provisions of this section…"
"46. It is necessary to recall that, according to a long line of decisions of the court, in particular its judgment in Becker v Finanzamt Münster-Innenstadt (Case 8/81) [1982] ECR 53 , wherever the provisions of a directive appear, as far as their subject matter is concerned, to be unconditional and sufficiently precise, those provisions may be relied upon by an individual against the state where that state fails to implement the directive in national law by the end of the period prescribed or where it fails to implement the directive correctly. … 48. With regard to the argument that a directive may not be relied upon against an individual, it must be emphasised that according to article 189 of the EEC Treaty the binding nature of a directive, which constitutes the basis for the possibility of relying on the directive before a national court, exists only in relation to "each member state to which it is addressed."
"In these circumstances, there is in my view very clear authority of the Court of Justice confirming that the liability of a contracting authority under the Remedies Directive for breach of the PP Directive is assimilated to that of the state or of a public body for which the state is responsible. It is in particular only required to exist where the minimum Francovich conditions are met, although it is open to states in their domestic law to introduce wider liability free of those conditions."
"Where the Court of Appeal in the present case went in my opinion clearly wrong was in its assumption that any claim for damages under the 2006 Regulations was no more than a private law claim for breach of a domestically-based statutory duty, and for that reason subject to ordinary English law rules which include no requirement that a breach must be shown to be "sufficiently serious" before damages are awarded: para 67. The Court of Appeal appears to have assumed that the categorisation in domestic law of a claim based on EU law as being for breach of statutory duty freed it automatically from any conditions which would otherwise apply under EU law. That this is not so is clear if one takes the simple case of a domestic claim against the state for failure correctly to transpose EU law. Such a claim is subject to the Francovich and Brasserie du Pêcheur principles and conditions."
"Although there is no Marleasing imperative to construe the scheme so far as possible consistently with the Francovich conditions, it is I think a natural assumption that the UK legislator will not go further than required by EU law when implementing such a scheme, without considering this and making it clear."
"[Royal Mail], being a registered taxable person making taxable supplies for VAT purposes to another taxable person (i.e., the [traders]), was under a statutory duty to provide the [traders] with an invoice containing particulars specified by regulations in force at the relevant time."
"goods and services were actually provided as inputs by taxable persons for the purposes of his own transactions subject to VAT, in respect of which he has actually paid VAT ." (Emphasis added)
"(A) actions for breach of statutory duty simpliciter (i.e.
"the statement of claim alleges simply (a) the statutory duty, (b) a breach of that duty, causing (c) damage to the plaintiff. The cause of action depends neither on proof of any breach of the plaintiffs' common law rights nor on any allegation of carelessness by the defendant."
"The principles applicable in determining whether such statutory cause of action exists are now well established, although the application of those principles in any particular case remains difficult. The basic proposition is that in the ordinary case a breach of statutory duty does not, by itself, give rise to any private law cause of action. However a private law cause of action will arise if it can be shown, as a matter of construction of the statute, that the statutory duty was imposed for the protection of a limited class of the public and that Parliament intended to confer on members of that class a private right of action for breach of the duty. There is no general rule by reference to which it can be decided whether a statute does create such a right of action but there are a number of indicators. If the statute provides no other remedy for its breach and the Parliamentary intention to protect a limited class is shown, that indicates that there may be a private right of action since otherwise there is no method of securing the protection the statute was intended to confer. If the statute does provide some other means of enforcing the duty that will normally indicate that the statutory right was intended to be enforceable by those means and not by private right of action: Cutler v Wandsworth Stadium Ltd[1949] AC 398 ; Lonrho Ltd v Shell Petroleum Co Ltd (No 2)[1982] AC 173 . However, the mere existence of some other statutory remedy is not necessarily decisive. It is still possible to show that on the true construction of the statute the protected class was intended by Parliament to have a private remedy. Thus the specific duties imposed on employers in relation to factory premises are enforceable by an action for damages, notwithstanding the imposition by the statutes of criminal penalties for any breach: see Groves v Wimborne (Lord)[1898] 2 QB 402 ."
"The cases where a private right of action for breach of statutory duty have been held to arise are all cases in which the statutory duty has been very limited and specific as opposed to general administrative functions imposed on public bodies and involving the exercise of administrative discretions."
"It follows from the above that, in the view of the Community judicature, the Community tax regime in issue is based on two fundamental principles/objectives: first, the levying of tax and the combating of tax evasion and, secondly, safeguarding the right of taxable persons to deduct input tax (the principle of fiscal neutrality). In accordance with the principle of proportionality, the balance must not in any event be tipped excessively in favour of one of the objectives, thereby putting achievement of the other at risk."
"30. The purpose of requiring a specific detail in an invoice depends in turn on the function an invoice has to fulfil in the scheme of VAT. As follows from recital 46 of the VAT Directive, issuing invoices allows the tax authorities of the Member States to carry out their monitoring activities. In order to enable monitoring to take place, Article 244 of the VAT Directive requires taxable persons to keep all the invoices they have received and copies of all the invoices they have issued. 31. In the light of this aim, the purpose of each individual detail in an invoice is directly connected with the question as to what the tax authorities ought to be able to monitor on the basis of an invoice…. 34. So the invoice is a type of insurance for the fiscal authority, in that in a certain sense it links the input tax deduction to payment of the tax. The invoice, without which no input tax deduction may be made, gives the fiscal authority at least the possibility of recovering from the person who issued the invoice the amount of money that goes out by way of input tax deduction, in that the tax authority is able to monitor payment of the corresponding tax by him."
"46. In addition, the invoice and its contents do not merely enable payment of the correct tax by the person who issued it to be monitored. As likewise appears from the legislative history of Article 226 of the VAT Directive, the invoice is intended to fulfil the function of 'proving' its recipient's right of deduction. 47. So the recipient of an invoice can also be the subject of monitoring by the tax authority by reference to the particulars in the invoice, as regards his right to deduct input tax. The question thus arises as to whether this monitoring function gives rise to more extensive requirements as regards the precision of the description of a service in an invoice. 48. The check of entitlement to an input tax deduction begins with an examination of whether the recipient of the invoice holds an invoice at all. This provides some guarantee that the invoiced service actually took place, which is a condition for the existence of the right of deduction. As already explained, under Article 203 of the VAT Directive all VAT in an invoice is payable by the person who issued it. As a result, there is a certain disincentive for a person to issue an invoice in respect of a service which has not been supplied at all. However, for this monitoring function of an invoice the details of the nature of the service are just as unnecessary as they are as regards the check on whether the tax has actually been paid. The disincentive to issuing an invoice for a non-existent supply is based on the tax liability under Article 203 of the VAT Directive, which, as we have seen, does not depend on the description of the service. 49. In addition, the check on whether the person who issued the invoice stated the tax accurately in it, which, as I have already explained, is one of the purposes of an invoice, serves by way of mirror-image the check on the correct amount of the corresponding input tax deduction. But this is no more a reason for more extensive requirements as regards the description of the nature of a service than those set out above."
"That requirement must also be interpreted in the light of the objective pursued by the imposition of required details in the invoice, such as those provided for in Article 226 of [the Principal VAT] Directive, which, as noted in paragraph 27 above, is to enable the tax authorities to monitor payment of the tax due and, if appropriate, the existence of the right to deduct VAT."
"Regulations may provide— (a) for VAT on the supply of goods or services to a taxable person. . . and VAT paid or payable by a taxable person on the importation of goods . . . to be treated as his input tax only if and to the extent that the charge to VAT is evidenced and quantified by reference to such documents or other information as may be specified in the regulations or the Commissioners may direct either generally or in particular cases or classes of cases…"
"(1) Regulations under this paragraph … may require taxable persons supplying goods or services in such cases, or to persons of such descriptions, as may be so specified to provide the persons supplied with invoices (to be known as "
"To give the Secretary of State power in section 47 to confer private law rights on prisoners would therefore be to allow him to extend the general scope of the Act by rules. This could, of course, be done by some such provision as is found insection 76(2) of the Factories Act 1961 whereby the minister is specifically empowered to make regulations which "impose duties on owners, employed persons and other persons ..."
"The question of whether a failure on the part of the defendants, as owners of a vessel covered by the 1975 rules, to comply with any of those rules could give rise to a civil liability on their part is an issue which primarily falls to be determined by reference to the 1995 Act. If the true effect of s 121 of the 1995 Act is that non-compliance with its provisions cannot give rise to a civil liability, then it would be impossible for any rules made thereunder to have the effect of creating such a liability; in so far as they purported to do so, any such rules would simply be ultra vires. On the other hand, if the true effect of s 121 of the 1995 Act was that the legislature intended there to be civil liability for non-compliance with the rules made thereunder, then, while it would, I believe, be possible for some or all of the rules made thereunder to exclude civil liability for their breach, one would expect, if that was the intention of the legislature, to see very clear words expressing that intention in the 1975 rules themselves. There are no such clear words." (Emphasis added)
"If there is no penalty and no other special means of enforcement provided by the statute, it may be presumed that those who have an interest to enforce one of the statutory duties have an individual right of action. Otherwise the duty might never be performed. But if there is a penalty clause the right to a civil action must be established by a consideration of the scope and purpose of the statute as a whole. The inference that there is a concurrent right of civil action is easily drawn when the predominant purpose is manifestly the protection of a class of workmen by imposing on their employers the duty of taking special measures to secure their safety."
"where an Act creates an obligation, and enforces the performance in a specified manner, we take it to be a general rule that performance cannot be enforced in any other manner."
"It was argued that the rule had no application where the statutory remedy was by way of criminal proceedings for a penalty. But I see no ground for this distinction. The implication is, if anything, in the opposite direction. For the sanction of criminal proceedings emphasizes that this statutory obligation, like many others which the Act contains, is imposed for the public benefit and that the breach of it is a public not a private wrong."
"In my opinion, the court will more readily construe a statutory provision so as to provide a civil cause of action where the provision relates to the safety and health of a class of persons rather than where they have merely suffered economic loss."
"… it must, in my opinion, appear upon the true construction of the legislation in question that the intention was to confer on members of the protected class a cause of action sounding in damages occasioned by the breach."
"It is not enough that Parliament shall have imposed the duty for the protection of a limited class of the public. It must also be shown that breach of the duty is calculated to occasion loss of a kind for which the law normally awards damages."
"Let me take the covenant to reinstate. Suppose the premises are damaged by fire. The lessee does not reinstate within a reasonable time. The breach is over once and for all, but its effect continues."
"… if in any given case the relevant obligation is to perform an act by a given date or (as the case may be) within a reasonable time, that is an obligation which can only be broken once; if the act has not been performed by that date or (as the case may be) within a reasonable time, there is a single breach of that covenant, but no continuing breach."
"If a covenantor undertakes that he will do a definite act and omits to do it within the time allowed for the purpose, he has broken his covenant finally and his continued failure to do the act is nothing but a failure to remedy his past breach and not the commission of any further breach of his covenant."
"The question of whether the breach is once and for all or continuing is a question of the construction of the obligation and the nature of the act in question. In my view it is plain that if the failure to provide an invoice was a breach of a statutory obligation it was a breach on the day when it ought to have been provided and not a further breach on the day after that and thereafter day by day. The obligation under Regulation 13 is clear - it provides for the provision of an invoice where a taxable supply is made and paragraph (5) provides for when it is to be done by - within 30 days of the supply. When that is not done in time, there is a breach, and the nature of the breach is a failure to supply an invoice within the 30 days. That remains the breach on the first day after the 30 days, the second day, and thereafter. There is no separate breach on the second and subsequent days. The breach is the same as it always was. If one asks the question on (say) day 5 after the 30 days, "
"The following time limits under this Act, that is to say (a) the time limit under section 2 for actions founded on tort (b) the time limit under section 5 for actions founded on simple contract ... shall not apply to any claim for specific performance of a contract or for an injunction or for other equitable relief, except in so far as any such time limit may be applied by the court by analogy in like manner as the corresponding time limit under any enactment repealed by theLimitation Act 1939 was applied before1 July 1940 ."
"Where there is a remedy at Law, and a corresponding remedy in Equity, supplementing that of the Common Law, and the legal remedy is subject by statute to a limit in point of time, a Court of Equity in affording the correspondent remedy will act by analogy to the statute, and impose on the remedy it affords the same limit in time. Where, therefore, in the matter of enforcement of a legal right, the Court of Common Law would, under the provisions of the Statute of Limitations, refuse the enforcement after the lapse of six years from the accruing of the right of action, a Court of Equity will, where its power to grant relief is asked for under similar circumstances, adopt the principle of the statute, and decline to grant such relief."
"The general principle was laid down as early as the case of Lockey v Lockey (1719) Prec Ch 518, where it was held that where a Court of Equity assumes a concurrent jurisdiction with Courts of Law no account will be given after the legal limit of six years, if the statute be pleaded. If it could be doubted whether the executor of a deceased partner can, at Common Law, have an action of account against the surviving partner, the result will still be the same, because a Court of Equity in affording such a remedy and giving such an account, would act by analogy to the Statute of Limitations. For where the remedy in Equity is correspondent to the remedy at Law, and the latter is subject to a limit in point of time by the Statute of Limitations, a Court of Equity acts by analogy to the statute and imposes on the remedy it affords the same limitation. This is the meaning of the common phrase, that a Court of Equity acts by analogy to the Statute of Limitations, the meaning being, that where the suit in Equity corresponds with an action at Law which is included within the words of the statute, a Court of Equity adopts the enactment of the statute as its own rule of procedure. … Where a Court of Equity frames its remedy upon the basis of the Common Law, and supplements the Common Law by extending the remedy to parties who cannot have an action at Common Law, there the Court of Equity acts in analogy to the statute; that is, it adopts the statute as the rule of procedure regulating the remedy it affords."
"First, where the court of equity was simply exercising a concurrent jurisdiction giving the same relief as was available in a court of law the statute of limitation would be applied. Secondly, even if the relief afforded by the court of equity was wider than that available at law the court of equity would apply the statute by analogy where there was "correspondence" between the remedies available at law or in equity. … Mr Bate argues that the court of equity will apply the statute by analogy only where the equitable remedy is being sought in support of a legal right … I have no doubt that the principles of application by analogy to the statute (or in obedience to the statute, as Lord Redesdale LC preferred to describe it in its application to the facts of [ Hovenden v Lord Annesley (1806) 2 Sch & Lef 607]) are quite apposite in the situations envisaged by Mr Bate. But, in my judgment, they have a much wider scope than that."
" [23] As to the claim for specific performance of the alternative contract, the question arises whether it is of such a kind as falls withinsection 36(1)(b) of the Limitation Act 1980 . The substance of the new claim is that the defendants are under a continuing duty under the alternative contract to take delivery of the containers. That claim necessarily involves that the duty arose when delivery was tendered to the defendants in 1998. The alternative claims for declarations and an indemnity and for damages are all based on the defendants' same refusal to take delivery and all those claims are time-barred because all of them are founded on the same breach of contract which took place more than six years before the application to amend. Against this background, the submission by the claimants that before1 July 1940 a court of equity would not have applied by analogy the six-year limitation period needs examining with great care because, if it were correct, it would give rise to an extremely anomalous remedial regime which could have no intelligent justification in the context of a modern system of commercial law. The remedial dislocation involved could be justified neither in terms of logic nor public policy. Accordingly, unless there were compelling juridical support for this submission, it ought to be rejected."
" [31] Having considered the authorities referred to both in Spry's Equitable Remedies and in Cia de Seguros Imperio v Heath (REBX) Ltd , I have reached the conclusion that a claim alleging breach of contract and claiming specific performance and/or damages and/or an indemnity should be treated as entirely time-barred if brought more than six years after the breach relied upon occurred or commenced. Whereas there is an intrinsic dissimilarity in the remedy in equity from that at law, the underlying facts are identical and there is no question of any equitable right to property or anything in the nature of a trust being involved. The essence of the matter is that a continuing breach of contract is alleged for which damages are claimed and in relation to which the granting of the equitable remedy will simply put an end to the continuing accumulation of loss. In such a case the function of that remedy is to diminish the loss which would otherwise sound in damages. To conclude that the availability of this remedy went on existing (laches apart) beyond the time when the claim for damages or an indemnity or a declaration of right ceased to be available would be to contemplate such an implausible remedial facility as to suggest most strongly that no court of equity would have so proceeded before July 1940."
"Where the ratio of an earlier decision of this court is directly applicable to the circumstances of a case before this court but that decision has been wrongly distinguished in a later decision of this court, in principle it must be open to this court to apply the ratio of the earlier decision and to decline to follow the later decision."