Lingham & Company v Lonnkvist, Court of Appeal - Civil Division, July 12, 2000, [2000] EWCA Civ 215

Extract

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Lingham & Company v Lonnkvist, Court of Appeal - Civil Division, July 12, 2000, [2000] EWCA Civ 215

QBENF 1998/0437/A2

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL (CIVIL DIVISION)

ON APPEAL FROM THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE (AT CARDIFF)

QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION

(THE RECORDER OF CARDIFF)

Royal Courts of Justice

Strand, London WC2A 2LL

Wednesday 12 July 2000

B e f o r e:

LORD JUSTICE THORPE

LORD JUSTICE SEDLEY

and

SIR ANTHONY EVANS

____________

PETER LINGHAM & COMPANY

Appellant

v

KARL LONNKVIST

Respondent

____________

(Transcript of the Handed Down Judgment of

Smith Bernal Reporting Limited, 180 Fleet Street

London EC4A 2HD

Tel No: 0171 421 4040, Fax No: 0171 831 8838

Official Shorthand Writers to the Court)

____________

MISS LINDSAY BOSWELL QC (instructed by Messrs Hugh James of Cardiff CF1 4QB) appeared on behalf of the appellant.

MR NICHOLAS COOKE QC AND MR MILWYN JARMAN (instructed by Messrs Godfrey Evans & Co of Penarth CF64 2AG) appeared on behalf of the respondent.

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Judgment

As Approved by the Court

Crown Copyright ©

Sir Anthony Evans: We heard this appeal in March 1999. It is from a judgment given by the Recorder of Cardiff, Judge Michael Gibbon QC, sitting as a High Court judge in February 1998. He was concerned with a claim by the former owner and vendor of a shop property at 6 High Street, Barry, South Glamorgan, against the purchasers, Mr and Mrs Lonnkvist, and with third party proceedings between them and Peter Lingham Company, a firm of accountants, (whom I shall call Mr Lingham).

The judge tried issues of liability only, that having been ordered by the late Godfrey Evans, District Judge, on 5 December 1996.

The appeal arises in the third party proceedings, where the judge gave judgment in favour of the defendants for damages to be assessed. He held that the third parties were liable for breach of their contract of retainer, though not in tort (the claim in tort was dismissed). He also dealt with issues of causation and remoteness of damage which were raised by Miss Boswell QC, leading counsel for the third party. She submitted in effect that the defendants could not recover substantial, meaning more than nominal, damages. He rejected this submission. The issues which gave rise to it were never formally defined nor were they clearly identified. This was partly because the only breach of contract which the judge held was proved against Mr Lingham was, as Miss Boswell submits, not pleaded or particularised by the defendants as part of the case which Mr Lingham went to court to meet.

We dismissed the appeal against the judge's findings of breach o...

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