"24.2 The court may give summary judgment against a claimant or defendant on the whole of a claim or on a particular issue if – (a) it considers that – (i) that claimant has no real prospect of succeeding on the claim or issue; or (ii) that defendant has no real prospect of successfully defending the claim or issue; and (b) there is no other compelling reason why the case or issue should be disposed of at a trial."
"The tenant intends to carry out all such works as are necessary to make a self-contained flat on the first floor of the building and also intends to create an additional self-contained flat above the first floor of the building in the area which is currently the airspace of the building (which is included in the premises hereby demised) and to subdivide the premises by way of two or more separate leases or licences."
"To keep in good and substantial repair and condition the whole of the premises and every part thereof and all fixtures and fittings therein and to renew and replace from time to time all the landlord's fixtures, fittings and the pertinences in the premises which may become or be beyond repair at any time during or at the expiration or sooner determination of the term and to keep the premises clean and tidy and to clean all plate glass and other windows in the premises at least once in every month …"
"… provided that the obligations to repair and maintain contained in the lease shall not apply until after the tenant shall have completed all such works as are required to convert the premises to two separate flats or three years have elapsed from the date hereof, whichever is first."
"Following the obtaining of planning consent for residential use, not to use the premises or any part thereof other than for residential purposes."
"Save with regard to the building work referred to in paragraph 2 of the recitals to this lease, not to do anything on the premises which may be or become a nuisance or annoyance or cause damage to the landlord or to the owners, tenants or occupiers of neighbouring property."
"24.1 To comply in all respects with the Planning Acts. 24.2 Immediately after the grant or refusal thereof, to supply to the landlord a copy of any planning permission or refusal relating to the premises or their use."
"To raise no objections to any application within the next three years for planning permission or other consents or any reasonable works which the tenant may carry out to create a flat on the first floor of the building and an additional flat in the area currently forming the airspace above the height of the building."
"Following the obtaining of planning consent for residential use, not to use the premises or any part thereof other than for residential purposes"
"I go back to the notice for a moment to illustrate that. The fault committed is described as the part use for hotel purposes. If it is right that hotel purposes is a vague expression with no clear and consistent meaning, then it may very well be that the enforcement notice is not good enough because it does not detail with sufficient clarity the complaint which is being made. Mr Howard says that if use of a building of this kind for bedsitting accommodation is not equally clearly understood and recognisable, it can be said in this case that the part of the enforcement notice which requires those steps to be taken to restore the situation before the development took place is also too vague and ineffective for present purposes. On the other hand, if, as I believe, the distinction is clear and fully understood by all concerned, then those objections disappear because in the context of this case and with the premise of themselves to look at without studying the enforcement notice, that which is complained of and that which is required becomes clear enough. I have no doubt that this is well understood and is acceptable as an ordinary use of English, namely that the real difference between use as bedsitting rooms and use for the purposes of a hotel turns on the stability or instability of the population in the premises and the extent to which they are making the individual flatlets their homes. The essence of a hotel is that it takes transient passengers. Of course, there may be an individual here and there who stays for a long time if it suits him, and there a buildings which are wrongly described as hotels or residential hotels, but the basic feature of a hotel as the word is used in the English language is that it contains a transient population because it is there to serve people travelling who require short stays only. By contrast, the bedsitting room and the way in which the phrase is used in English is somebody's home. It is where somebody lives. It is where somebody remains for a substantial time. Accordingly, one has in bedsitting room use a far more stable population than one has in a hotel use."
"In my view, the defendant’s user is not residence user at all. It is the business of providing service accommodation, and it seems to me there is no question of the defendant using it as a residence, much less as a private residence. It is true that this was a lease granted to the company in expensive premises and a company (unlike an individual) may have limited use for such premises unless it can exploit it for value. Licencing in the manner which has been adopted in this case is such a method of exploitation, but in my view the judge's decision does not mean that the property is frozen in the defendant's hands. The defendant can exploit it simply by subletting it, and it seems to me that it is reasonable enough to suppose that a landlord would in a lease of this sort stipulate for exploitation by subletting rather than by licencing. The occupancies in the case of subletting are likely to be longer periods with less comings and goings. The subtenants will probably be more carefully chosen than would be the case with licensees, and the creating of subleases requires the consent of the landlord."
"… not to use or permit to be used the property for any purpose other than that of a private dwelling house, and no trade or business or manufacture of any kind shall at any time be permitted to be set up or carried on on any part of the property or in any building now or hereafter within the perpetuity period erected thereon."
"It appears to me that the concept of using a property as a private dwelling-house involves the use of it, at least in some way, as a home. I can understand that a person with two houses, who spends his holidays in one of them, may fairly be regarded as spending them in his second home. However, we are not concerned with that situation here. A person renting a holiday house for, say, one or two weeks is not using it, in any sense, as his home. On the contrary, he leaves his home in order to have his holidays somewhere else."
"A long lease contains a covenant not to use the demised premises or permit them to be used for any illegal or immoral purpose or for any purpose whatsoever other than as a private residence. If the leaseholder advertises on the internet the availability of the premises (a flat) for short term lettings and grants a series of such lettings, do the leaseholder’s actions breach the covenant?"
"The clause does not state that the premises are to be used as the private residence of the lessee or the occupier, but as 'a private residence'. The use of the indefinite article (‘a’) is significant. A person may have more than one residence as any one time a permanent residence that he or she calls home, as well as other temporary residences which are used while he or she is away from home on business or on holiday. It is immaterial that the occupier may have another, more permanent residence elsewhere as there is no requirement that the occupier is using the property as his or her only (or main, or principal) residence. However, it is necessary, in my judgment, that there is a connection between the occupier and the residence such that the occupier would think of it as his or her residence albeit not without limit of time. In short, for the covenant to be observed, the occupier for the time being must be using it as his or her private residence."
"Use as a dwellinghouse (whether or not as a sole or main residence) by - (a) a single person or by people to be regarded as forming a single household; (b) not more than six residents living together as a single household where care is provided for residents; or (c) not more than six residents living together as a single household where no care is provided to residents (other than a use within Class C4)."
"McCullough J said that whether a building is or is not a dwellinghouse is a question of fact. Having considered a number of situations where buildings would still be dwelling-houses even though they were not occupied throughout the year - second homes, houses left empty pending sale, houses unoccupied because they are flooded or undergoing extensive repair - McCullough J said at p.146: 'Suppose that a London-based company requires a succession of employees to be based one at a time for four months in a location far distant from London. Suppose that the company buys a house and makes it available to each employee and his family for his tour of duty. It would still be a dwelling-house. Take a holiday cottage subject to time-share with a number of owners each enjoying the right to occupy it for two particular weeks each year. That would still be a dwelling-house.' What have these examples in common? All are buildings that ordinarily afford the facilities required for day-to-day private domestic existence."
"In Jenkins v Price[1908] 1 Ch 10 it was held that a covenant as to residence impliedly prohibited any assignment to a limited company. As to paying guests, see Thorn v Madden[1925] Ch 847 . In Blanway Investments v Lynch(1993) 25 HLR 378 it was held that where a residential property is let to an individual subject to a covenant that it is to be used as a private residence for the tenant, the natural presumption is that the tenant should be entitled to occupy with his or her family, including anyone de facto a member of the family. Clear words would be necessary to confine occupation to the tenant herself or to exclude those with no legal relationship to the tenant."
"A covenant which limits use of land to that of a private dwelling house or to that of a private residence prohibits such non-residential uses as a shop or a school or a classroom or an office for taking orders for coal, even if no coal is kept on the premises or use of part of the land is as a roadway to other properties. The adjective 'private' makes the domestic nature of the restriction clear, thus excluding, for instance, use for a hospital, or a house where a doctor had patients under her care, or a hotel or a guest house, or for licensing a serviced apartment to tourists, or letting to holidaymakers under short tenancies, or a charitable boarding school, or a boarding house distant from a school, or a home for former medical inpatients. But it can include letting to a small group of students for a year or detached accommodation for domestic staff, even where the overall restriction is to one family."
"When interpreting a written contract, the court is concerned to ascertain the intention of the parties by reference to what a reasonable person, having all the background knowledge which would have been available to the parties, would have understood them to be using the language in the contract. It does so by focussing on the meaning of the relevant words in their documentary, factual and commercial context. That meaning has to be assessed in the light of (i) the natural and ordinary meaning of the clause, (ii) any other relevant provisions of the contract, (iii) the overall purpose of the clause and the contract, (iv) the facts and circumstances known or assumed by the parties at the time that the document was executed, and (v) commercial common sense, but (vi) disregarding subjective evidence of any party's intentions …"