The High Court has ruled that the starting gun on a housing negligence claim was fired when the property was sold rather than any earlier.

Judge Victoria McCloud said the claim from litigant in person Anna Christie against the Mary Ward Legal Centre and counsel Andrew Dymond was not statute barred despite it being argued it was brought outside the six-year limitation period.

In Christie v The Mary Ward Legal Centre, the defendants argued that time ran from the earliest date at which damage was caused to Christie, whereas she said the starting point should have been when the consequence of the alleged negligence became irremediable.

At a previous hearing, the judge already held that the claim against the solicitors be struck out on the basis they take the benefit of the defence which solicitors can claim where they have relied entirely on counsel's advice. The issue of limitation still remained (albeit it was moot for the solicitors) and Dymond has been granted permission to appeal the judge's decision on this.

Describing the underlying case as ‘quite a sad one’, the judge explained that Christie sought legal advice when she could not afford to pay service charges owed to the local council on her leasehold property in south London. She had been made subject to forfeiture proceedings and was advised that her best option was to find a way to sell the property, realise the value and pay off the arrears.

Christie was unaware that she could have sought relief for help with the arrears, having not been advised that was an option. By the time she found out, the sale had been agreed, and she claims that the defendants negligently failed to avoid this happening.

The question was when the alleged damage was caused and when it could not be reversed. The sale of the flat was completed in July 2013. But Christie had also been subject to a possession claim prior to this and the council had issued an earlier arrears claim.

The judge said these court hearings prior to sale were ‘rather trivial’ and Christie still had an extended period at that point to seek relief against forfeiture if she wanted to.

‘What Ms Christie is complaining about here is the loss of her right to seek relief by way of loan or charge against the property,’ she said. ‘It is the inability to obtain relief which caused her loss due to the forced sale.’

The ability to obtain relief, the judge said, was impossible once the contracts for the sale were exchanged on 30 or 31 July 2013, so it was at that point when time began to run and the six-year limitation window opened. The claim, issued on 15 July 2019, was not statute-barred, although the limitation issues here were fact sensitive, it was noted.

The judge added that Christie was allowed ‘some latitude in terms of the niceties of pleading’ since she was not a lawyer.

 

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