N & D (London) Ltd v Gadsdon

Decision of London Rent Assessment Committee — Applicant landlord had requested a rent of £500 per month — Committee determined a rent of £5 per month — Application to set aside decision of committee on the ground that the low rent failed to take into account the obligations of the respondent tenant’s predecessor to redecorate and keep the premises in good repair The applicant is the landlord of a residential dwelling-house — The respondent tenant succeeded to the tenancy of the premises previously held by his late father — His late father had let the premises fall into disrepair — The landlord applied to a London Rent Assessment Committee under section 14 of the Housing Act 1988 for the determination of an open market rent for an assured tenancy — Section 14(2)(c) provides that in determining the rent the committee is to disregard ‘any reduction in the value of the dwelling-house attributable to a failure by the tenant to comply with any terms of the tenancy’113 — The present tenant’s father had been granted a lease in July 1983 and agreed to ‘re-decorate the interior of the premises as often as may reasonably be necessary and to keep in good repair the glass in and locks on all doors and windows and the sanitary apparatus waste water and drain pipes throughout the term and in such repair to yield up the same at the determination of the tenancy’ — A rent was registered for the premises at £30 per week from August 15 1988 — The present tenant’s father died in July 1989 — The landlords had been unable to gain access to the premises or to carry out any repair — Neither party requested a hearing before the committee — The committee visited the premises and concluded that the premises were in a deplorable condition, dangerous to health and were virtually unlettable in the open market — They determined a rent of £5 per month — The committee concluded that the internal disrepair was long standing and could not be attributed, except in a very small measure, to the period of the present tenancy In seeking to set aside the decision of the committee, it was submitted on behalf of the landlord that section 14(2)(c) of the 1988 Act required the committee to disregard any failure by the present tenant’s predecessor to comply with the terms of the tenancy as well as by the present tenant Held: The application was dismissed — Section 14(2)(c) refers to ‘the tenant’ and ‘the tenancy’ and is a clear indication that a rent assessment committee are concerned only with the assured periodic tenancy over which they have jurisdiction — The definitions of those terms in section 45 of the 1988 Act make no reference to a predecessor or statutory tenant or tenancy — The draftsman of the statute could have inserted some formula in section 14(2)(c) if the obligations of a predecessor in title were to be taken into account in applying the disregard — It is quite clear from the provisions of Schedule 1 to the Rent Act 1977 (as amended) and its companion provisions in section 39(5) and (6) of the 1988 Act that there is a new interest created for the successor upon the death of a statutory tenant — It is not simply a continuing interest — It creates a new periodic tenancy as an estate in land which the previous tenant’s statutory entitlement under the Rent Act was not — It is clear that the effect of section 14(2)(c) is that the sins of the predecessor of the tenant whose reference is being considered are not to be visited upon him — There was no principle of construction, whether described as purposiveness or fairness, which could override clear words of the statute The following case is referred to in this report. Jones v Wrotham Park Settled Estates [1980] AC 74; [1978] 3 WLR 585; [1978] 3 All ER 527; (1978) 37 P&CR 289; 246 EG 223, [1978] 1 EGLR 58, CA This was an application by notice of motion by the applicant, N&D (London) Ltd (a subsidiary of the Northumberland & Durham Property Trust Ltd), the landlord of a dwelling-house at 10 Chilham Close, Perivale, Middlesex, to set aside the decision of a London rent assessment committee determining the rent of the property at £5 per month. Guy Fetherstonhaugh (instructed by Church Adams Tatham & Co, of Reigate) appeared on behalf of the applicant; the respondent did not appear and was not represented; David Elvin appeared as amicus curiae. Giving judgment, AULD J said: By a reamended notice of motion dated August 2 1990 the Northumberland & Durham Property Trust Ltd, the landlord of a dwelling-house at 10 Chilham Close, Perivale, Middlesex, seeks to set aside the decision of a London rent assessment committee made on February 20 1990 determining the rent of that property and for an order remitting the matter to the rent assessment committee. The tenant is a man named John Gadsdon. The applicant had requested a rent of £500 a month, but the rent assessment committee considered that £5 a month was appropriate because of the poor condition of the property. John Gadsdon had ‘inherited’ the tenancy from his late father, who had let the property fall into disrepair. There is now only one ground of appeal. It is that the committee in determining that low rent had failed to take into account the obligations of John Gadsdon’s father to redecorate the interior and to keep it in good repair. John Gadsdon has not appeared on this application; nor have the rent assessment committee in any formal sense, not being parties to the application. However, in addition to hearing counsel for the applicant, Mr Fetherstonhaugh, I have also had the advantage of Mr Elvin as counsel instructed on behalf of the committee but acting, for all practical purposes, as amicus. The issue concerns the construction of section 14(2)(c) of the Housing Act 1988. Section 14 provides for the determination of rent by a rent assessment committee on an open market rent for an assured tenancy. The section appears in Part I of the 1988 Act, a part which the editors of the Encyclopedia of Housing Law and Practice, at p 950, describe as introducing what is in substance, if not in name, a new Rent Act, containing assured tenancies in place of protected tenancies, and shortholds, and applicable to private landlords and housing associations. Provision is made in section 13 of the Act for the increase of rent of assured periodic tenancies, subject to the protection given by section 14(4)(a) to refer a proposed increase to a rent assessment committee. Section 14 sets out the basis upon which a rent assessment committee must approach its task in each case. So far as material, section 14 provides: (1)  Where, under subsection (4)(a) of section 13 above, a tenant refers to a rent assessment committee a notice under subsection (2) of that section, the committee shall determine the rent at which, subject to subsections (2) and (4) below, the committee consider that the dwelling-house concerned might reasonably be expected to be let in the open market by a willing landlord under an assured tenancy — (a)    which is a periodic tenancy having the same periods as those of the tenancy to which the notice relates; (b)    which begins at the beginning of the new period specified in the notice; (c)    the terms of which (other than relating to the amount of rent) are the same as those of the tenancy to which the notice relates; (d)    in respect of which the same notices, if any, have been given under any of Grounds 1 to 5 of Schedule 2 to this Act, as have been given (or have effect as if given) in relation to the tenancy to which the notice relates. (2)   In making a determination under this section, there shall be disregarded — (a)    any effect on the rent attributable to the granting of a tenancy to a sitting tenant; (b)    any increase in the value of the dwelling-house attributable to a relevant improvement carried out by a person who at the time it was carried out was the tenant, if the improvement — (i)    was carried out otherwise than in pursuance of an obligation to his immediate landlord, or (ii)   was carried out pursuant to an obligation to his immediate landlord being an obligation which did not relate to the specific improvement concerned but arose by reference to consent given to the carrying out of that improvement; and (c)    any reduction in the value of the dwelling-house attributable to a failure by the tenant to comply with any terms of the tenancy. The 1988 Act is directed to the determination of an open market rent rather than a fair rent, as under the regime of the Rent Acts. However, in the context of section 14(2)(c) of the 1988 Act, the clear Parliamentary intention appears to have been to prevent a tenant under an assured periodic tenancy from securing a lower rent than would otherwise be appropriate by causing or permitting the property to fall into disrepair in breach of such terms of the tenancy as require him to keep it in a good condition. But for that provision, the malign or irresponsible tenant could artificially reduce the appropriate figure for open market rent for the property and thus pay less rent than would otherwise be appropriate having regard to the nature of the property and the terms of his tenancy. The facts here, giving rise to the question whether under section 14(2)(c) John Gadsdon was entitled to have the breaches of obligation by his father disregarded, are as follows. His father, Arthur Gadsdon, was granted a lease of the property on July 29 1983 for five years at a monthly rent of £22.58. The property is a semi-detached house, consisting of five rooms, kitchen, bathroom and lavatory, and a front and back garden, in a cul-de-sac of modest houses near Perivale tube station. Under the lease the father, as tenant, undertook by clause 2(iii) to ‘re-decorate the interior of the premises as often as may reasonably be necessary and to keep in good repair the glass in and locks on all doors and windows and the sanitary apparatus waste water and drain pipes throughout114 the term and in such repair to yield up the same at the determination of the tenancy’. He was also obliged under clause 2(v) ‘to permit the landlord [the applicant] and its servants or agents with or without workmen at all reasonable times to enter and examine the premises and upon notice given by the landlord to repair in accordance therewith’. For its part, the landlord, by clause 3(i) of the lease, undertook to keep the exterior and structure of the premises in good repair. Both of those provisions in the lease must now be read subject to section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 which, together with sections 32 and 33 of the Housing Act 1961, which it replaced, implied into the lease and the statutory and assured tenancies that followed it a covenant by the landlord to keep in repair and in proper working order the installations in the dwelling-house for the supply of water, gas and electricity, for sanitation and for space heating and heating water. In addition, the landlord’s repairing covenant is to be construed as a covenant to repair within a reasonable time of notice of the disrepair being given by the tenant. Clause 4 of the lease recited that, upon the expiration of the five-year term created by it, the landlord would act in relation to the tenant as if the agreement constituted a regulated tenancy as defined in the Rent Act 1977. On April 29 1988, shortly before the expiration of the five-year term, the landlord applied for registration under the Rent Acts of a fair rent. The rent proposed was £30 a week to apply from July 29 1988, the expiry date of the lease. There was an inspection of the house on or about June 22 1988, as a result of which, on August 15 1988, the rent officer notified the landlord’s agents that he had registered the new rent at the rate sought of £30 a week to take effect from August 15 1988. On July 7 1989 Arthur Gadsdon died. His son, John Gadsdon, then became entitled to an assured tenancy by succession under amended provisions of the Rent Act 1977 and under provisions in the 1988 Act to which I shall refer. On November 25 1989 the landlord served a notice under section 13(2) of the Housing Act 1988 proposing an increase in rent from £30 a week to £500 a month. John Gadsdon, in a document which is undated, referred the matter to a London rent assessment committee. Pending the determination of that reference, the landlord’s agent wrote to the rent assessment committee on December 13 1989, informing them of certain matters, which included the following: first, that in the view of the landlord’s agents the landlord was entitled to a market rent for the house and their initial inquiries with a local letting agency indicated a figure of not less than £500 a month; second, that they had not been able to gain access to the premises as the tenant had not kept the gardens and interior in good tenantable order and that, despite several requests and visits to the premises, they had been unable to carry out any repairs that might be required to the structure of the building. No hearing was requested by either party. An inspection by the members of the committee took place on Wednesday January 31 1990. The committee made and delivered their determination of rent under section 14 of the 1988 Act on February 20 1990. They determined a rent of £5 a month. Under the heading ‘Remarks’ in the determination notice the following summary was given: House practically uninhabitable internally; No water to bath, basin or wc; Cold water only to kitchen sink; No electricity to rear of house, on either ground or first floor; WC choked and unusable; Plaster has fallen off ceiling in rear ground-floor room and off wall of kitchen and is defective around almost all windows; Damp penetration around almost all windows; Metal windows rusting and leaking; External condition fair but gardens run wild. In detailed reasons prepared by the committee, dated March 12 1990, those matters were amplified, so far as material, as follows: 3. The Committee found Chilham Close to be in a cul-de-sac very near Perivale Underground railway station and line, one of a group of similar modest 1930s semi-detached houses with good front and rear garden space. The garden of No 10 was so overgrown with brambles that it was difficult to negotiate the path to the front door. The roof and the external structural condition of the house seemed to be fair but paintwork was shabby and windows in need of attention. 4. We set down under ‘Remarks’ in our Decision the principal defects found to the interior of the property. In sum, every room was suffering from serious plaster deterioration and dampness and the functioning utilities comprised electricity to the front of the house and one cold water tap to the kitchen sink. Except in the front ground-floor room there was no sign of normal tenant-like use and care. 5. Under section 14 of the Housing Act 1988 we are bound to determine a rent at which we consider that the dwelling-house concerned might reasonably be expected to be let in the open market by a willing landlord under the assured tenancy. We are to disregard any effect on the rent attributable to the granting of a tenancy to a sitting tenant (section 14(2)(a)) and any reduction in the value of the dwelling-house attributable to a failure by the tenant to comply with any terms of the tenancy (section 14(2)(c)). According to section 39, the ‘successor’ to a previously regulated tenancy becomes entitled to an assured tenancy. That tenancy shall be a periodic tenancy ‘arising by virtue of this section’ (section 39(1)(5) and one: section 39(6)(a) ‘taking effect in possession immediately after the death of the protected or statutory tenancy . . .’ Section 39(6)(b) ‘deemed to have been granted to the successor by . . . the landlord of the predecessor under his tenancy’, and section 39(6)(e) ‘under which, subject to sections 13-15 above, the other terms are the same as those on which, under his tenancy, the predecessor occupied the dwelling-house immediately before his death’. 6. Our interpretation of these provisions was that, unlike the position of a successor under the unamended Rent Act 1977, the successor under the Housing Act 1988 holds a new tenancy, if on the terms of the old. The most important implication in the present case was that the disregard of defects due to failure by ‘the tenant’ applied only to failure by the new successor tenant, not to any default of the predecessor. 7. It was also clear that section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 applied and overrode with statutory landlords’ responsibilities the terms of the agreement between the original parties in relation to repair. 8. In our opinion the internal disrepair of this house was of long standing and could not be attributed, except in very small measure, to the period of the present new tenancy. It would not have been reasonable to expect the present tenant to carry out his decorating responsibilities under the agreement terms still applying, given the decay and dysfunction in the structure (internal) and amenities for which the landlords were liable under the agreement or under section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985. Another of the terms of the 1983 agreement was that the landlord company was permitted at all reasonable times to enter and examine the premises and upon notice given by the company to repair in accordance therewith. It would seem that for many years the company could have enforced inspection and repair, but had not done so. 9. We considered that in its present deplorable condition this house was dangerous to health and virtually unlettable ‘in the open market’, the yardstick required by section 14: a tenant could not reasonably be expected to come forward, except on the basis of an extended ‘rent free’ period, because he would require a considerable amount of time, effort and expenditure to bring the house in reasonably habitable condition and probably also to ensure that the landlords carried through their responsibilities in achieving that outcome. 10. We therefore determined a rent of £5 per month, exclusive of rates, effective from December 1 1989, the beginning of the new period specified in the landlords’ notice. The question is whether, if a person becomes an assured tenant by succession by virtue of section 39(5) and (6) of the 1988 Act, a rent assessment committee are required under section 14(2)(c) to disregard any failure by his predecessor to comply with the terms of the tenancy as well as by him when assessing an open market rent. Here, John Gadsdon, the present tenant, succeeded his father who was protected under the Rent Acts, but John Gadsdon is an assured tenant under the Housing Act 1988. That is achieved by amendment of Schedule 1 to the Rent Act 1977 and by the provisions in section 39(5) and (6) of the 1988 Act. As to the 1977 Act, para 3 of Schedule 1 (as amended by Schedule 4, Part I, to the Housing Act 1988) reads, so far as material, as follows: Where a person who was a member of the original tenant’s family was residing with him at the time of and for the period of 2 years immediately before his death then, after his death, that person or if there is more than one such person such one of them as may be decided by agreement, or in default of agreement by the county court, shall be entitled to an assured tenancy of the dwelling-house by succession. Para 6 (as amended) provides: (1)  Where a person who — (a)    was a member of the original tenant’s family immediately before that tenant’s death, and (b)    was a member of the first successor’s family immediately before the first successor’s death, was residing in the dwelling-house with the first successor at the time of, and for the period of 2 years immediately before, the first successor’s death, that person or, if there is more than one such person, such one of them as may be decided by agreement or, in default of agreement, by the county court shall be entitled to an assured tenancy of the dwelling-house by succession. 115 Those provisions as they now appear are to be compared with their earlier form. The concluding words of para 3 used to read ‘shall be the statutory tenant if and so long as he occupies the dwelling-house as his residence’. Para 6 was in much shorter form: If the first successor was a man who died leaving a widow who was residing with him at his death then, after his death, the widow shall be the statutory tenant if and so long as she occupies the dwelling-house as her residence. Corresponding provisions are to be found in section 39(5) and (6) of the 1988 Act. So far as material they read as follows: (5)  In any case where, by virtue of any provisions of — (a)    Part 1 of Schedule 1 to the Rent Act 1977, as amended in accordance with subsection (2) or subsection (3) above, or (b)    section 4 of the Rent (Agriculture) Act 1976, as amended in accordance with subsection (4) above, a person (in the following provisions of this section referred to as ‘the successor’) becomes entitled to an assured tenancy of a dwelling-house by succession, that tenancy shall be a periodic tenancy arising by virtue of this section. 6. Where, by virtue of subsection (5) above, the successor becomes entitled to an assured periodic tenancy, that tenancy is one — (a)    taking effect in possession immediately after the death of the protected or statutory tenant or protected occupier (in the following provisions of this section referred to as ‘the predecessor’) on whose death the successor became so entitled (b)    deemed to have been granted to the successor by the person who, immediately before the death of the predecessor, was the landlord of the predecessor under his tenancy; (c)    under which the premises which are let are the same dwelling-house as, immediately before his death, the predecessor occupied under his tenancy; (d)    under which the periods of the tenancy are the same as those for which rent was last payable by the predecessor under his tenancy; (e)    under which, subject to sections 13 to 15 above, the other terms are the same as those on which, under this tenancy, the predecessor occupied the dwelling-house immediately before his death; and (f)    which, for the purposes of section 13(2) above, is treated as a statutory periodic tenancy; and in paragraphs (b) to (e) above ‘under his tenancy’ in relation to the predecessor, means under his protected tenancy or protected occupancy or in his capacity as a statutory tenant. Mr Fetherstonhaugh, on behalf of the landlord, argued that section 14(2)(c) of the 1988 Act should be read so as to require the rent assessment committee, in determining an open market rent, not only to disregard any breach of the tenancy agreement by the current tenant but also any breach of the tenancy by his statutory predecessor. He accepted that, for the provision to be so construed, it requires the reading into it after the word ‘tenant’ the words ‘or the tenant from whom he derived his tenancy’. Mr Fetherstonhaugh acknowledged in making that submission that there are formidable obstacles to it, not least of which are the plain words of the provision as it stands. However, he urged that the statute should be construed in a purposive way to give it the effect for which he contended. He said that there was nothing in the language of the Act which required the disregard in section 14(2) to be restricted to the tenant’s current tenancy. He said that to do so would produce a contrary result, in that where a statutory periodic tenancy arises on the coming to an end of the fixed-term tenancy, the same tenant’s failures under the fixed term would be disregarded. He said that if, on the other hand, section 14(2)(c) were to be construed in the way suggested by him, so as to bring within the ambit of the disregard the tenant’s defaults under previous tenancies, it would be logical and fair to consider not only those defaults of the tenant but also those of his predecessors in title. I do not use that expression in any particular technical sense. At the heart of his submission lay the complaint that if the section were not interpreted in the way he suggested, it would result in a landlord’s being penalised for its tenant’s predecessor’s default. He pointed out that that would be contrary to one of the main purposes of the Housing Act, which was to arrest the decline in housing in the private rental sector by encouraging the landlord into the market to enable him to achieve a reasonable market rent for his rented property. Shorn of legal niceties, he said that there is no reason why the landlord here should suffer a lower rent because of the state of the premises which, at least in part, appears to have been attributable to John Gadsdon’s father’s neglect. He said, by way of conclusion, that, in so far as a literal construction of the provisions dictate or might dictate such a result, the court ought to adopt a purposive construction to achieve what Mr Fetherstonhaugh described as a fairer result. Mr Elvin drew my attention, on the subject of a purposive approach to legislation, to the words of Lord Diplock in Jones v Wrotham Park Settled Estates [1980] AC 74* at p 105. Lord Diplock identified three criteria that he considered required fulfilment before one could embark upon a purposive interpretation of a statute. This is what he said: My Lords, I am not reluctant to adopt a purposive construction where to apply the literal meaning of the legislating language used would lead to results which would clearly defeat the purposes of the Act. But in doing so the task on which a court of justice is engaged remains one of construction; even where this involves reading into the Act words which are not expressly included in it. Kammins Ballrooms Co Ltd v Zenith Investments (Torquay) Ltd [1971] AC 850 provides an instance of this; but in that case the three conditions that must be fulfilled in order to justify this course were satisfied. First, it was possible to determine from a consideration of the provisions of the Act read as a whole precisely what the mischief was that it was the purpose of the Act to remedy; secondly, it was apparent that the draftsman and Parliament had by inadvertence overlooked, and so omitted to deal with, an eventuality that required to be dealt with if the purpose of the Act were to be achieved; and thirdly, it was possible to state with certainty what were the additional words that would have been inserted by the draftsman and approved by Parliament had their attention been drawn to the omission before the Bill passed into law. Unless this third condition is fulfilled any attempt by a court of justice to repair the omission in the Act cannot be justified as an exercise of its jurisdiction to determine what is the meaning of a written law which Parliament has passed. Such an attempt crosses the boundary between construction and legislation. It becomes a usurpation of the function which under the constitution of this country is vested in the legislature to the exclusion of the courts. *Editor’s note: Also reported at (1978) 246 EG 223, [1978] 1 EGLR 58. Mr Elvin said — and it is common ground — that the purpose of the Act was to regulate open market rent between landlord and tenant and to revitalise the letting market and to attract landlords to it. He referred me in that connection to the Government White Paper, Housing: The Government’s Proposals, Cmd 214, presented to Parliament in September 1987. As to the second of Lord Diplock’s criteria, Mr Elvin submitted that the Housing Act 1988 had not been carelessly drawn. Mr Fetherstonhaugh agreed with that and so do I. As I shall indicate in a moment, it has clearly been drawn with great care and in such a way as to distinguish it from comparable problems that had arisen under the regime of the Rent Acts. In any event, as Mr Elvin pointed out, there is no harm to a landlord in being limited to a disregard of the defaults of a current tenant because he had his remedy to enforce the identical provisions, subject only to section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985, against that tenant’s predecessor in title. Here, the landlord could have taken steps over a period of years to require John Gadsdon’s father to comply with the tenancy so that the property did not deteriorate into that state, but the landlord did not do so. The same would apply if John Gadsdon himself had, under an earlier tenancy, allowed the property to fall into disrepair. Accordingly, Mr Elvin submitted, there is no justification for reading into the section words which are not there. Mr Elvin went on to construe the provision itself and those related to it. First, section 14(2)(c) refers to ‘the tenant’ and ‘the tenancy’, which, Mr Elvin submitted, is a clear indication that a rent assessment committee are concerned only with the assured periodic tenancy over which they have jurisdiction. He drew attention to the fact that the definitions of ‘tenant’ and ‘tenancy’ in section 45 of the 1988 Act make no reference to a predecessor or statutory tenant or tenancy. He emphasised the contrast in that respect between the 1988 Act and the unamended provisions, to which I have already referred, of Schedule 1, Part I to the Rent Act 1977, paras 3 and 6, in their use of the general term ‘statutory tenant’. Mr Elvin also contrasted the simple words of section 14(2)(c) with the provisions as to the determination of a successor’s rent under section 70(3) of the Rent Act 1977. That provides: There shall be disregarded — (a)    any disrepair or other defect attributable to a failure by the tenant under the regulated tenancy or any predecessor in title of his to comply with any terms thereof; (b)    any improvement carried out, otherwise than in pursuance of the terms of the tenancy, by the tenant under the regulated tenancy or any predecessor in title of his; . . . 116 (c)    If any furniture is provided for use under the regulated tenancy, any improvement to the furniture by the tenant under the regulated tenancy or any predecessor in title of his or, as the case may be, any deterioration in the condition of the furniture due to any ill-treatment by the tenant, any person residing or lodging with him, or any sub-tenant of his. (Emphasis supplied.) Mr Elvin submitted that it is inconceivable that the draftsman would not have inserted some such formula in section 14(2)(c) of the 1988 Act if it had been intended. Finally, Mr Elvin and Mr Fetherstonhaugh drew my attention to a contrasting provision within section 14 itself which militates against the construction for which the latter contended. Section 14(2)(b) expressly provides that, in certain circumstances, any increase in the value of a dwelling-house attributable to an improvement carried out ‘by a person who at the time it was carried out was the tenant’ is to be disregarded. This formula, which is to be contrasted with the simple reference in section 14(2)(c) to ‘the tenant’ was clearly intended to achieve the disregard of a predecessor tenant’s improvements works. A similar formula would have been employed in section 14(2)(c) if it had been intended to disregard any deterioration in tenanted property because of a failure by a current tenant’s predecessor to comply with any of the terms of the tenancy. In my judgment, the submissions made by Mr Elvin on those matters of construction are overwhelming. If more is needed, it is quite clear from the provisions of Schedule 1 to the Rent Act 1977 (as amended) and its companion provisions in section 39(5) and (6) of the 1988 Act carrying them through that there is a new interest here created for the successor. It is not simply a continuing interest. It creates a new periodic tenancy as an estate in land which the father’s statutory entitlement under the Rent Act was not. If one runs down the various subparagraphs of section 39(6), it can be seen that most or all of them would have been unnecessary if what had been created by those provisions was a continuing and not a new tenancy. As a matter of construction, therefore, it is clear that the effect of section 14(2)(c) is that the sins of the predecessor of the tenant whose reference is being considered are not to be visited upon him. Mr Fetherstonhaugh suggested that that is unfair. He submitted that a family successor should not start with a clean slate so as to fix the landlord with what may be years of neglect. However, if the landlord is vigilant in enforcing the rights that are available to him under each tenancy agreement, he should not be faced with years of neglect when a statutory ‘succession’ of the tenancy takes place in this way. As to fairness, Mr Elvin commented first that there is no canon of construction that a statute is to be construed fairly to its plain words. And he asked: how is fairness to be identified and employed as a tool in the construction of a statute such as this?  For instance, why should a tenant be held responsible for breaches by a former tenant even though he may be a member of his or her family?  He points out here that John Gadsdon is not benefiting from his own breach because the breaches have been found by the rent assessment committee to be substantially those of his father. He has an entirely new tenancy and a different status. I should add that, from the reasons given by the committee for their determination, it cannot be said the responsibility for the neglect should have been apportioned in some different way. The committee were amply justified in the conclusion which they reached on the facts, that the internal disrepair was of long standing and could not be attributed, except in very small measure, to John Gadsdon and that he could not reasonably have been expected to do anything about it given the structural defects which it was the landlord’s contractual and statutory duty to remedy. Accordingly, the application is contrary to the plain words of the statute, and there is no principle of construction, whether described as purposiveness or fairness, which could properly override those words. The application is dismissed.