The Gazette 1967/71

the plaintiff's solicitors instructed a costs drawer to draw up their bill of costs. This was done and the bill forwarded to the solicitors in May of 1967. In June 1967 the solicitors lodged the bill of costs for £970 to be taxed. The defendant, acting in person as he had done from the beginning of the action contended that he had been prejudiced by the delay and that there should be an order under RSG Ord 62, r 7 (5) for a nominal sum. The district registrar did not tax the bill but assessed the costs at £750. The defendant appealed to the judge who allowed the appeal, set aside the re gistrar's assessment and referred the taxation of the bill to a London Taxing Master. The defen dant appealed. The appeal was allowed by the Court of Appeal (Lords Denning, Salmon and Davies.) Denning, M. R. stated that there had been pro longed and inexcusable delay in taxing the costs. The defendant was entitled to know the amount of his liability and be in a position to meet it. Davies, L. J. agreeing, said the court was always sympathetic to the difficulties caused by taxation to both branches of the profession but two matters were pertinent to the delay in this case, (a) The plaintiff's solicitors did not attempt to agree their costs with the defendant and (b) The plaintiff's solicitors waited nearly a year after receiving the defendant's letter remind ing them of the need to draw up their bill of costs before seeking the aid of a costs drawer. (Drake and Fletcher Ltd. v. Clark— Solicitors' Journal [Vol. 112] p. 95.) Validity of Contract The plaintiffs outside advertising contractors had a number of agreements with site owners granting them licences to erect and maintain boards or hoardings on which to display advertisements. The defendant company obtained from the site owners fresh agreements in one or other of two types giving the defendant exclusive rights to post advertisements on boards or hoardings on the sites. In the first type the site owners were to take steps immediately to determine any existing licences at the earliest possible date, and the defendant obtained a separate document giving the defen dant authority to determine the existing licences as soon as legally possible. In the other type of agreement the necessity for a separate document was eliminated by including the authority in the same document. On May 7th 1965 the defendant's solicitors wrote to the plaintiffs enclosing a list of 218 sites as to which it claimed to have written

authority from 'the site owner' to terminate the plaintiffs' agreements and purporting to give them notice to 'cease occupation ... at the earliest possible date after the service of this notice that such agreement that you hold can be lawfully ter minated'. The defendants refused the plaintiffs' solicitors' requests for copies of such written authority and on 14th May the plaintiffs wrote to each site owner asking for confirmation. On 18th August 1965 the defendant sent separate notices to each of the plaintiffs in respect of each of the 218 sites as a precaution lest the earlier notices were ineffective. Those notices purported to ter minate the agreements with effect from 'the ear liest possible date after service . . . which is per- missable under the terms of your licence ... or at law', and purported to be on behalf of named site owners and to be without prejudice to the earlier notice. Disputes having arisen concerning removal of certain boards and hoardings by the defendant, the plaintiffs issued a writ claiming an injunction and damages and a preliminary issue as to the validity of the defendant's notices, it was argued, inter alia, that, the defendant being the agent of the site owners the notices of May 7th were invalid in that they were given by the solici tors. Buckley, .J, said that the relation of agent to principal was normally confidential, the maxim 'delegatus non potest delegare' being based on that confidence, but where the principal reposed no confidence in the agent, the maxim did not apply. The original letter must be read as if 218 letters had been written, by compressing the notice into one letter it has not affected their validity. Where an agent gave notice on behalf of a principal it was not necessary to name the principal; it was sufficient if the principal could be identified. Here there was no doubt as to what was meant by 'the site owner'. The notices were therefore valid and effective except where new agreements had been entered into with plaintiffs after the defendant had obtained authority from a site owner to deter mine the agreement. Order accordingly. (Allam & Co. Ltd. and Others v. Europa Poster Services Ltd.— Solidors' Journal [Vol. 112] page 86.) APPROPRIATE NOTICE Periodically the imagination of a preoccupied typist runs riot, a recent notice to creditors in one of the national papers, read as follows :— "Notice is hereby given pursuant to Section 49 of the Dispossession Act, 1965". 77