Hammersmith and Fulham LBC v Monk [1991] UKHL 6; [1992] 1 AC 478
Termination of a joint periodic tenancy by notice from one tenant.
Facts
Mr Monk and Mrs Powell jointly rented a council flat under a weekly tenancy. The agreement allowed termination by four weeks’ notice expiring on a Monday. After their relationship broke down in 1988, Mrs Powell left. The council agreed to rehouse her if she ended the existing tenancy by giving an appropriate notice to quit.
She served the notice without Mr Monk’s knowledge or consent. The council notified him that the tenancy had ended and brought proceedings to recover the flat. The county court held her notice ineffective and dismissed the claim. The Court of Appeal reversed that decision and ordered Mr Monk to give up the flat. He appealed.
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Issue
Could one joint tenant end the whole periodic tenancy by a valid notice to quit without the agreement of the other? Mr Monk also argued that the terms of this tenancy required both tenants to give notice, and that the statutory trust arising under the Law of Property Act 1925 required them to act unanimously.
Decision and reasoning
On 5 December 1991, all five Law Lords dismissed Mr Monk’s appeal. Unless the tenancy agreement provided otherwise, an appropriate notice from one joint tenant was sufficient to end a periodic tenancy for all. The particular agreement did not displace that rule, so the Court of Appeal’s order stood.
Lord Bridge explained the result through the contractual basis of a periodic tenancy. Its continuation from one period to the next depended on the continuing willingness of all the parties. If one tenant could prevent the other from ending it, the departing tenant could remain bound to contractual obligations indefinitely. Such an intention could not ordinarily be attributed to the parties without clear contractual language.
There was a distinction between allowing a periodic tenancy to continue and surrendering rights already granted for a fixed term. Ending future continuation by proper notice did not require all the tenants to join in the way that surrendering jointly held rights ordinarily would. Although serving notice was a positive act, its substance was to withhold the assent necessary for a further period.
The court examined the established authorities, including Doe d Aslin v Summersett and Greenwich LBC v McGrady. It also rejected the argument that describing a tenancy, retrospectively, as one continuous term prevented either tenant from ending its future continuation. The single-term analysis did not make the tenancy an irrevocable commitment for periods that had not yet begun.
The statutory trust for sale under the 1925 Act did not change the answer where the same joint tenants held both the legal and beneficial interests. The trust concerned the periodic tenancy they actually held; it did not enlarge that tenancy into an interest which must continue regardless of a valid notice. Lord Bridge left aside the position where the beneficial owners differed from the legal tenants.
Lord Browne-Wilkinson recognised the competing concerns: protecting a person’s rights in a joint home and allowing the departing tenant to escape continuing contractual liabilities. He agreed with the established contractual approach. He also explained that even a breach of trust would not automatically make the act invalid against the landlord. He doubted that Mrs Powell had committed such a breach, and no case that the council had participated in a breach was advanced.
The decision concerned the effectiveness of a tenant’s notice at common law. It did not hold that all joint tenancies could be ended unilaterally, or that a mere wish to leave was sufficient. In this appeal, no argument was made that Mr Monk retained statutory protection if Mrs Powell’s notice was effective.
