University of Strathclyde

The Law School: Conveyancing

22 February 2011

SERVITUDES

Brian H. Inkster, Solicitor

Inksters Solicitors, Glasgow

Definition

• Real right

• Allows use of neighbouring land

• e.g. Right of Access

• Regulated primarily by common law

• Title Conditions (Scotland) Act 2003

• Roman Law

• English equivalent – the ‘easement’

Two Properties

• ‘benefited property’ (‘dominant tenement’)

• ‘burdened property’ (‘servient tenement’)

• Owner of benefited property is entitled to enforce the servitude and the owner of the burdened property is obliged to accept this

Two Properties

House Site(Benefited Property)

PUBLIC ROAD

Access Road

(Burdened Property)

Two Properties

• benefited and burdened properties normally contiguous (adjacent) but not an absolute requirement

• Same neighbourhood

• ‘praedial requirement’

• Pieces of land or incorporeal separate tenement

Two Properties

• Two properties in separate ownership

• res sua nemini servit

• However, a servitude can be registered by an owner over one piece of property (e.g. by Deed of Conditions) which only takes effect when the land is subdivided

Right to enter or make limited use

• ‘Positive’ servitudes (e.g access)

• ‘Negative’ servitudes (restricted building on the burdened property)

• Compare real burdens – untidy overlap

• No new negative servitudes from 28November 2004. Existing ones = real burdens

• Preservation notice before 28 November 2014

Praedial Benefit

• Servitude must be ‘praedial’

• Must burden the burdened property for the benefit of the benefited property

• Cannot be just for personal benefit

Patrick v Napier (1867) 5 M 683

Harper v Lindsay (1853) 15 D 768

• Only Scots Law personal servitude = Liferent

Repugnancy with ownership

• A right to use must be a limited one

• Cannot be too invasive

• However rule cannot be applied absolutely

e.g. servitude of laying pipes

• Nationwide Building Society v Walter D Allan 2004 GWD 25-539

• Moncrieff v Jamieson 2008 SC (HL) 1

Known to the law

• Policy of the courts to restrict servitudes to those ‘known to the law’

• Fixed list based on Roman Law

Fixed list

• Access

1) iter (pedestrian)

2) actus (right to lead cattle)

3) via (vehicular)

• Parking Vehicles

Only recognised in 2007 (Moncrieff v Jamieson 2008 SC (HL) 1)

• Overhang: jus projiciendi [Pipeline?]

Compugraphics International Limited v Nikolic [2009] CSOH 54

Fixed list

• Service Media

1) Aqueduct (also called ‘watergang’) i.e. to lead water

2) Aquaehaustus (to take water from a river, loch etc.)

3) Sinks (otherwise ‘drainage’ or ‘outfall’) e.g septic tank

• Support

1) Oneris ferendi: right to be supported by an adjacent building – not restricted to cases of one building resting on another (Compugraphics International Ltd v Nikolic [2009] CSOH 54)

2) Tigni immittendi: right to insert a beam into a neighbouring building

Fixed list

• Eavesdrop (otherwise ‘stillicide’)

• Pasturage

• Extracting Materials

1) Fuel, feal and divot: peat for fuel and turf for fencing and roofing

2) Building materials such as stone, sand and gravel

• Bleaching and drying clothes

Clair v Drysart Magistrates (1780) 2 Pat 554

Adding to the list

• Courts reluctant to do so:-

Mendelsshohn v The Wee Pub Co Ltd 1991 GWD 26-1518

Neil v Scobbie 1993 GWD 13-887

Romano v Standard Commercial Property Services Ltd 2008 SLT 859

Adding to the list

• Occasionaly added a ‘new’ servitude:-

Ferguson v Tennant 1978 SC (HL) 19

North British Rly Co v Park Yard Co Ltd (1898) 25 R (HL)

Moncrieff v Jamieson 2008 SC (HL) 1

Compugraphics International Limited v Nikolic [2009] CSOH 54

Breaking the fixed list

• Desire to protect purchasers from unregistered rights

• No longer an issue since 28 November 2004 as a result of dual registration

• Thus expressly created servitudes no longer have to be on the recognised list

• General rules of servitudes must still be obeyed

Creation: Express Grant

• Expressly granted by owner of burdened property

• A real right so it must be in formal writing

• Benefited and burdened properties must both be identified

• No requirement for a detailed description of the content of the right

• Dual registration

Creation: Express Grant

• Deed of Servitude or Disposition

Disposition

House Site(Benefited Property)

PUBLIC ROAD

Access Road

(Burdened Property)

Deed of Servitude

Scott Wortley’s House Site

(Benefited Property)

PUBLIC ROAD

Access Road

(Burdened Property)Alan Eccles’ Land

Brian Inkster’s Land

Express reservation in a Disposition

House Site(Burdened Property)

Service Pipe

(Benefited Property)

Implied grant

• Unlike real burdens, servitudes can be created by implication

• Only in a conveyance

• When the benefited and burdened properties were divided a servitude was implied

• Must be “necessary for the reasonable enjoyment of the property” (Cochrane v Ewart (1861) 4 Macq 117 at 123)

Implied reservation

• Where burdened property is conveyed

• Stricter test: One of ‘utter necessity’

Ferguson v Campbell 1913 1 SLT 241

Murray v Medley 1973 SLT (Sh Ct) 75

• McEwan’s Exrs v Arnot 7 September 2004, Perth Sheriff Court, discussed in Reid & Gretton Conveyancing 2005 pages 89-92

Implied servitudes and landlocked land

House Site

PUBLIC ROAD

Implied servitudes and landlocked land

House Site

PUBLIC ROAD

Servitude right of access

impliedly granted

Implied servitudes and landlocked land

House Site

PUBLIC ROAD

Servitude right of access

inherent part of ownership

Bowers v Kennedy 2000 SC 555

Positive prescription

• Acquired by 20 years of ‘possession’ (i.e. exercise)

• Must be open, peaceable and without judicial interruption

• Must be ‘adverse’ i.e. ‘as of right’ i.e. if the servitude right were actually held

Special statutory provisions

• e.g. those conferring compulsory acquisition powers such as the Communications Act 2003, Sch 4, para 4(3)

Acquiescence

• Personal bar

• Especially where significant expenditure has been incurred

• Where the encroachment is obvious, successors of the landowner may be bound also (Macgregor v Balfour (1899) 2 F 345 at 352 per Lord President Balfour)

Checking for Servitudes

• Dual registration since 28 November 2004

Thus revealed by a search of the register

• Pre 28 November 2004 it might only appear on the title of the benefited property

Implication or prescription

• ‘Overriding interest’ in the Land Register

• Site visit

Rights of the Benefited Proprietor

• Benefited proprietor entitled to enjoy the servitude to its full extent, subject to any conditions that may apply and to the law of nuisance

• Enforceable as a real right against third parties

• Grant v Cameron (1991), reported in Paisley & Cusine Unreported Cases 264

Ancillary Rights of the Benefited Proprietor

• Ancillary rights may be specified in the deed creating the servitude. In the absence of this, these will be implied if:-

a) The right is necessary for the convenient and comfortable enjoyment of the servitude; and

b) It was within the contemplation of the parties at the time the servitude was created

(Moncrieff v Jamieson 2008 SC (HL) 1)

Ancillary Rights of the Benefited Proprietor

• Two common ancillary rights:

In the case of service media to carry out work and leave things (e.g. pipes) on the burdened property

To repair and, to a limited extent, improve the burdened property

• SP Distribution Limited v Rafique 2009 GWD

Express servitude of access to cellars does not include implied right to construct a flight of steps

Obligations of the Benefited Proprietor

• Express servitude conditions

• To exercise the servitude civiliter

Soriani v Cluckie 2001 GWD 28-1138

• To exercise the servitude for the benefit of the benefited property only

Irvine Knitters Ltd v North Ayrshire Co-operative Society Ltd 1978 SC 109

Obligations of the Benefited Proprietor

• Not to increase unwarrantably the burden on the burdened property

Grant v Cameron – ‘for all purposes’

1) Change in type of use not to increase the burden on the burdened property

Carstairs v Spence 1924 SC 380

Obligations of the Benefited Proprietor

2) In passage servitudes (e.g. access or aqueduct) a change in type of thing passing should not increase the burden on the burdened property

Kerr v Brown 1939 SC 140

3) Whether increased use is an increase in the burden is a matter of scale

N.B. Prescription may apply

Obligations of the Benefited Proprietor

• Garson v McLeish 11 December 2009

Kirkwall Sheriff Court

Cannot extend an access road to include the verge as this would alter the nature of the road in a manner that would increase the burden on the burdened property (following Alvis v Harrison 1991 SLT 64, 67)

Rights of the Burdened Proprietor

• To continue to enjoy and make use of the burdened property provided this does not interfere with the servitude

• To enforce any of the express or implied obligations on the benefited proprietor

Obligations of the Burdened Proprietor

• To respect the servitude and not to interfere with its exercise (e.g. by obstructing the benefited proprietor)

Drury v McGarvie 1993 SC 95

Lee v McMurrich Feb 5 1808, Court of Session, Hume Session Papers, vol 97, case 18

Rodgers v Harvie (1829) 7 S 287

Extinction

• Consensual

Registered ‘deed of discharge’

• Acquiescence

Substantial expenditure

Millar v Christie 1961 SC 1

• Negative prescription (20 years)

Walker’s Exrx v Carr 1973 SLT (Sh Ct) 77

Bowers v Kennedy 2000 SC 555

Extinction

• Destruction

• Confusion

Benefited and burdened properties come into the same ownership

• Compulsory purchase

• Application to the Lands Tribunal George Wimpey East Scotland Ltd v Fleming 2006 SLT

(Lands Tr) 2 and 59

Rights which are similar to servitudes

• Public rights of way

No benefited property + Rights for access only

• Statutory rights

Personal servitudes (i.e. No benefited property)

e.g. ‘wayleave’: A cable or pipeline servitude in favour of certain utility companies

Access rights (e.g. Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003)

Reading

• *Gretton & Steven Property, Trusts & Succession ch 12

• Cases decided in 2009 since that book was published:-

Waterman v Boyle [2009] EWCA (Civ) 115

Greig v Middleton 2009 GWD 22-35

Holms v Ashford Estates Ltd 2009 SLT 389

*Compugraphics International Ltd v Nikolic [2009] CSOH 54

*SP Distribution Ltd v Rafique 2009 GWD 40-688

Garson v McLeish 11 December 2009, Kirkwall Sheriff Court

www.inksters.com/strathclyde

Reading

• *Gretton & Steven Property, Trusts & Succession ch 12

• Cases decided in 2010 since that book was published:-

*Parkin v Kennedy 23 March 2010, Lands Tribunal

Henderson v Irvine 2010, Alloa Sheriff Court

Orkney Housing Association Ltd v Atkinson

15 October 2010, Kirkwall Sheriff Court

• And an unreported case from 2004 uncovered in 2010:-

*Pullar v Gauldie 25 August 2004, Arbroath Sheriff Court

www.inksters.com/strathclyde

Reading

• Cusine & Paisley Servitudes and Rights of Way

• Gordon Scottish Land Law paras 24.01-24.104

• McDonald Conveyancing Manual ch 16

• Paisley Land Law ch 8

• Paisley, R R M ‘The New Law of Servitudes’ in R Rennie (ed) The Promised Land: Property Law Reform (2008) 91-123

• Reid Property paras 439-469 (A G M Duncan)

• Rennie Land Tenure ch 11

www.inksters.com/strathclyde

Brian H. Inkster

Inksters Solicitors

Baltic Chambers

50 Wellington Street

Glasgow G2 6HJ

www.inksters.com/strathclyde