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Bellefield Computer Services Ltd & Ors v E Turner & Sons Ltd, Court of Appeal - Administrative Court, January 28, 2000, [2000] EWHC Admin 284


21


Case No: QBENI 99/0891 1996 B No 2222

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF JUDICATURE
COURT OF APPEAL (QUEEN'S BENCH DIVISION)
ON APPEAL FROM THE HON. MR. JUSTICE BELL
Royal Courts of Justice
Strand, London, WC2A 2LL

Friday, 28 January 2000
B e f o r e :
LORD JUSTICE SCHIEMANN
LORD JUSTICE TUCKEY
and
MR. JUSTICE WALL
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(Transcript of the Handed Down Judgment of
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JEREMY STUART-SMITH Q.C. & DORE GREEN (instructed by Messrs Berrymans Lace Mawer for the Appellants)
TIMOTHY STOW Q.C. & FREYA NEWBERY (instructed by Messrs Kennedys for the Respondents)

Judgment
As Approved by the Court

Crown Copyright ©
Friday, 28 January 2000

Judgment

LORD JUSTICE SCHIEMANN:
This appeal by the fourth claimant from Bell, J. is in respect of his ruling on preliminary issues of law on assumed facts set out in the papers. All the other claimants had already abandoned their claims before the hearing in front of Bell, J.. The significant assumed facts are these. Between 1981 and 1983 the Defendant Building Contractors ("the builders"), pursuant to a contract with one of the other claimants ("the original owners") constructed a steel portal frame building which was intended to be used as a dairy including a processing and bottling factory, offices, laboratories and a storage area. In 1989 the original owners of the dairy sold it to the appellants ("the subsequent owners"). In 1995 a fire broke out in the storage area. It spread from the storage area to the rest of the dairy and caused much damage. The Builders, had they followed good building practice and the requirements of the Building Regulations, would have constructed, between the storage area and the rest of the building, a compartment wall which would have prevented the spread of the fire from the storage area to the rest of the building. Although a wall was constructed in the right place, along what one of the plans to which the builders were supposed to be working described as Gridline 2, the fire passed over the top of the wall. This it would not have done had the wall been constructed in accordance with good building practice.
The subsequent owners sued the builders in negligence alleging that they had suffered damage under 6 heads (A) Repairs and cleaning to buildings (other than the area in which the fire started); provision of temporary car-park and access ; professional fees...
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