The Gazette 1967/71

Court to set aside a subpoena ad testificandum served on him by Mr. Cyril Pais, of Bowood Rd., S.W., the petitioner in a nullity suit on the ground of the incapacity of the wife, Mrs. Julina Pais, to consummate the marriage. [Pais v Pais; Probate Divorce and Admiralty Division; 28 April 1970; but cf. decision of Gavan Duffy P., 1945, I.R. 515—Cook v Carroll.] FAMILY Their Lordships said that a judge was wrong in his view that if a husband hit his wife over the head with a milk bottle it was cruelty, but that it was not cruelty if the wife did the same to the husband. [Robinson v Robinson; Court of Appeal; The Times, 23 June 1970.] FIRE DAMAGE The Greater London Council were held liable for fire damage caused to buildings, transport and stock of furniture manufacturers when sparks flew from a waste material fire lit nearby by a demo lition contractor who was removing prefabricated temporary bungalows from council land under contract with the Ministry of Public Buildings and Works. [H. and N. Emanuel Ltd. v Greater London Council and another; Q.B.D. (James J.); The Times, 21 July 1970.] LANDLORD AND TENANT Their Lordships held that Section 11 of the Rent Act, 1968, contemplates that any application for the suspension of the execution of an order for possession shall be made by the statutory tenant and no one else. They dismissed an appeal by Mrs. Dunn, who is living apart from her husband, Mr. Stanley Dunn, against the dismissal by Deputy Judge Stucley at Watford County Court of her appli cation under Section 11 for the suspension of an order for possession in respect of a protected dwelling house, Highfield, Pinner. The possession order had been made against Mr. Dunn at the suit of the landlord, Mr. Penn, the respondent. [Penn v Dunn; (1970) 1 A.E.R. 858 C.A.] NEGLIGENCE Tesco Supermarkets Ltd. succeeded in an appli cation for leave to appeal to the House of Lords

There were no special reasons for not disquali fying a man driving with an excessive proportion of alcohol in his blood when going after midnight to help his business partner who was stranded with his aged and ailing mother in a remote part of the country in a car which had run out of petrol. Their Lordships so held when dismissing an application by George Baines, aged thirty-two, mastic contractor, of Rishton, for leave to appeal against disqualification. He was fined £25 and disqualified for twelve months on his conviction at Blackburn Quarter Sessions (assistant recorder : Mr. P. J. Corcoran) of contravening Section 1 (1) of the Road Safety Act, 1967. [Regina v Baines; Court of Appeal; The Times, 29 July 1970.] ESTATE AGENTS Mr. Justice Cooke, in a reserved judgment in the Queen's Bench Division, said that when a person employs estate agents to act for him for acquiring property, the same principle over pay ment of commission applies as when an agent is employed to dispose of property. The rights and liabilities of the parties depend on the exact terms of the contract and their construction, as stated in Luxor (Eastbourne) Ltd. v Cooper (1941, A.C. 108, 124). [Gerrard Smith & Co. v Villiero; Q.B.D.; The Times, 7 July 1970.] EVIDENCE The effect of the Civil Evidence Act, 1968, making a conviction admissible in evidence in subsequent civil proceedings is to shift the legal burden of proof on to the person convicted to show in the civil proceedings that he did not do the acts of which he was convicted. It is not the function of the judge in the civil action to con sider what view he might have taken had he sat either as juryman or judge in the criminal proceedings. [Stupple v Royal Insurance Co. Ltd.; Court of Appeal (1970) 3 WLR 217.] A priest has no privilege in law which enables him to refuse to give evidence of communications between himself and a spouse made at a time when he was acting as a marriage conciliator. Father Handley, of the Catholic Marriage Advisory Council, unsuccessfully applied to the 101