The Burlington House Dispute
Coverage of the Case, January - March 2004
The case opened at the High Court (Chancery Division) on Tuesday 20 January, the Judge presiding (click Monday 19 for details) having decided to take the scheduled start date as a reading day. This Site will carry daily reports of proceedings by Site Editor Ted Nield. Currently available:- Read about the Judge Presiding - Monday 19 January
- Read about the Defendants' case - Tuesday 20 January
- Read about the Claimant's case - Wednesday 21 January
- The final day in Court - Friday 30 January
- Read the STATEMENT issued MEDIATION (March 19 2004)
The Societies hope to clarify the terms of their occupancy of the buildings most of them have enjoyed since they were built in the early 1870s. (Chemists have long had a presence on the site, even in Old Burlington House during the 1850s; but the RSC now occupies that part of the East Wing vacated by the Royal Society when it moved to Carlton House Terrace in 1968).
At stake is the nature of their occupancy.
On the result of this case hinges the question of whether the Societies’ landlord (the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister) is entitled to charge rent, so it is much more than an academic legal and constitutional quibble. The commercial rent for such a building in the most expensive part of the most expensive city in the world has been estimated at about £1.3m per year. The Societies argue that to pay such rent would seriously endanger their work, and would run counter to their clear understanding that they were granted occupancy of Burlington House rent-free, for as long as they wished to remain, by government.
The Royal Academy of Arts (which occupies Old Burlington House) is not involved in the dispute. It has a 999 year lease and now pays a peppercorn rent of £1.00 per year, as it has done since Christmas 1866.
At stake is the nature of their occupancy.
On the result of this case hinges the question of whether the Societies’ landlord (the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister) is entitled to charge rent, so it is much more than an academic legal and constitutional quibble. The commercial rent for such a building in the most expensive part of the most expensive city in the world has been estimated at about £1.3m per year. The Societies argue that to pay such rent would seriously endanger their work, and would run counter to their clear understanding that they were granted occupancy of Burlington House rent-free, for as long as they wished to remain, by government.
The Royal Academy of Arts (which occupies Old Burlington House) is not involved in the dispute. It has a 999 year lease and now pays a peppercorn rent of £1.00 per year, as it has done since Christmas 1866.
Background: The where and what of the High Court of Chancery
Mention the word "Chancery" and most people who know their Dickens will think immediately of his 1853 novel Bleak House, his savage indictment of the Chancery Court. By exposing its excesses, and particularly the way its interminable and incomprehensible proceedings could drag on through generations until all disputed estates were used up in legal costs, Dickens speeded its reform. But in bringing about its rebirth, Dickens also cursed Chancery, over whose name the spectre of Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce still seems to hang 150 years later.
Nowadays, the Chancery Division is one of the three Divisions of the High Court (The High Court sits above the Tribunals and Magistrates Courts with which people are most familiar, and also above the intervening layer of County and Crown Courts.) The other two High Court Divisions are the Queen’s Bench and the Family Division.
Chancery deals with equity disputes, difficult probate cases, tax partnerships and bankruptcies, and also encompasses a Companies Court, a Patents Court and an Administrative and Divisional Court dealing with appeals from County Courts on bankruptcy and land issues.
The range of cases heard in the Chancery Division is, therefore, extremely varied. The major part of the Division's caseload today involves business disputes of one kind or another. Often these are complex and involve substantial sums. In many types of case (e.g. claims for professional negligence against professionals) the claimant has a choice of whether to bring the claim in the Chancery Division or elsewhere in the High Court. But there are other types of case which, in the High Court, must be brought in the Chancery Division. The Burlington House Dispute is one of these.
Appeals from the Chancery Division go to the Court of Appeal’s Civil Division, which in due process could end up being appealed to the ultimate Court of Appeal, the House of Lords. Sessions of the High Court Chancery Division are held in the Royal Courts of Justice, in the Strand, just by Temple Bar, opposite the old legal and journalistic club, the Wig and Pen.