Attorney General V Blake House of Lords

Attorney General v Blake, [2001] 1 A.C. 268 (2000)
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always had a discretion regarding the grant of the
remedy of an account of profits, and this remains
the position. Further, the circumstances in which an
account of profits is available under the statutes vary.
For instance, an account of profits may not be ordered
against a defendant in a patent infringement action who
proves that at the date of the infringement he was not
aware, and had no reasonable grounds for supposing,
that the patent existed: Patents Act 1977, section 62(1).
In these cases the courts of equity appear to have
regarded an injunction and account of profits as more
appropriate remedies than damages because of the
difficulty of assessing the extent of the loss. Thus, in
1803 Lord Eldon LC stated, in Hogg v Kirby, 8 Ves
215 , 223, a passing off case: 
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"what is the consequence in law and in equity? ... a
court of equity in these cases is not content with an
action for damages; for it is nearly impossible to know
the extent of the damage; and therefore the remedy
here, though not compensating the pecuniary damage
except by an account of profits, is the best: the remedy
by an injunction and account."
Whether this justification for ordering an account of
profits holds good factually in every case must be
doubtful. Be that as it may, in these types of case
equity considered that the appropriate response to the
violation of the plaintiff's right was that the defendant
should surrender all his gains, and that he should do
so irrespective of whether the violation had caused
the plaintiff any financially measurable loss. Gains
were to be disgorged even though they could not be
shown to correspond with any disadvantage suffered
by the other party. This lack of correspondence was
openly acknowledged. In Lever v Goodwin (1887)
36 ChD 1 , 7, Cotton LJ stated it was "well known"
that in trade mark and patent cases the plaintiff was
entitled, if he succeeded in getting an injunction, to
take either of two forms of relief: he might claim from
the defendant either the damage he had sustained from
the defendant's wrongful act or the profit made by the
defendant from the defendant's wrongful act.
Considered as a matter of principle, it is difficult to see
why equity required the wrongdoer to account for all
his profits in these cases, whereas the common law's
response was to require a wrongdoer merely to pay a
reasonable fee for use of another's land or goods. In
all these cases rights of property were infringed. This
difference in remedial response appears to have arisen
simply as an accident of history.
In some instances the common law itself afforded
a wronged party a choice of remedies. A notable
example is the wrong of conversion. A person whose
goods were wrongfully converted by another had a
choice of two remedies against the wrongdoer. He
could recover damages, in respect of the loss he had
sustained by the conversion. Or he could recover the
proceeds of the conversion obtained by the defendant:
see United Australia Ltd v Barclays Bank Ltd [1941]
AC 1 , 34, per Lord Romer. Historically, the latter
alternative was achieved by recourse to an element
of legal fiction, whereby the innocent party "waived
the tort". The innocent party could suppose that the
wrongful sale had been made with his consent and
bring an action for money "had and received to his
use": see Lamine v Dorrell (1705) 2 Ld Raym 1216 ,
1217. Holt CJ observed that these actions had "crept in
by degrees".