Attorney General V Blake House of Lords

Attorney General v Blake, [2001] 1 A.C. 268 (2000)
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right of the plaintiff which he is prima facie entitled
to enforce as such. Where the plaintiff has failed
to obtain or failed to apply for an injunction, he
has to be content with a remedy in damages. What
has happened in such cases is that there has either
actually or in effect been a compulsory purchase of the
plaintiff's right of refusal. (The award of damages in
tort for the conversion or detinue of goods is also an
example of compulsory purchase as is demonstrated
by the common law rule that the payment of the
damages vests the title in the goods in the defendant.)
What the plaintiff has lost is the sum which he could
have exacted from the defendant as the price of his
consent to the development. This is an example of
compensatory damages. They are damages for breach.
They do not involve any concept of restitution and so
to describe them is an error. The error comes about
because of the assumption that the only loss which
the plaintiff can have suffered is a reduction in the
value of the dominant tenement. It is for this reason
that I agree with my noble and learned friend, Lord
Nicholls, that the decision in Wrotham Park Estate Co
Ltd v Parkside Homes Ltd [1974] 1 WLR 798 is to be
preferred to that in Surrey County Council v Bredero
Homes Ltd [1993] 1 WLR 1361 : see also Jaggard
v Sawyer [1995] 1 WLR 269 . I would however
add that the order proposed by your Lordships does
not reflect this principle; it goes further. It does not
award to the Crown damages for breach of contract
assessed by reference to what would be the reasonable
price to pay for permission to publish. It awards the
Crown damages which equal the whole amount owed
by 
*299
Jonathan Cape to Blake. That is a remedy
based on proprietary principles when the necessary
proprietary rights are absent.
The principle of compensation is both intellectually
sound as the remedy for breach and provides the
just answer. The examples discussed in my noble and
learned friend's speech do not on the correct analysis
disclose the supposed need to extend the boundaries
of remedies for breach of contract. The reason why
the Crown should not recover damages in the present
case derives from the exceptional public law nature of
the undertaking which Blake gave. If the relationship
had been a commercial one it is probable that by 1989
the undertaking would be regarded as spent or no
longer enforcible, but if still enforcible the breach of it
would have supported compensatory damages on the
"compulsory purchase" basis.
The examples given by my noble and learned friend are
examples of compensatory damages. Lord Halsbury's
dining-room chair is no different unless the error which
I have identified is made. He would have lost the use of
the chair and it, like other such amenity-value assets,
can be assessed by reference to the sum which has
been expended on its acquisition and/or maintenance
or interest upon its capital value during the period of
deprivation. The supposed problem arises from asking
the wrong question not from receiving the wrong
answer.
I must also sound a further note of warning that
if some more extensive principle of awarding non-
compensatory damages for breach of contract is to be
introduced into our commercial law the consequences
will be very far reaching and disruptive. I do not
believe that such is the intention of your Lordships but
if others are tempted to try to extend the decision of
the present exceptional case to commercial situations
so as to introduce restitutionary rights beyond those
presently recognised by the law of restitution, such a
step will require very careful consideration before it is
acceded to.
My Lords, Mr Clayton was right to say that the
exceptional facts of this case have been critical to
its decision. The policy which is being enforced is
that which requires Blake to be punished by depriving
him of any benefit from anything connected with
his past deplorable criminal conduct. Your Lordships
consider that this policy can be given effect to without
a departure from principle. I must venture to disagree.
I would allow the appeal and dismiss the cross-appeal.