Prudential Assurance Co Ltd v London Residuary Body
Prudential Assurance Co Ltd v London Residuary Body [1991] UKHL 10 is an English land law case, confirming and explaining the requirements of certainty of duration of any lease. Facts Mr Nathan owned 263-265 Walworth Rd, Southwark, London before 1930, and the London County Council the road. It planned to widen it, encroaching on a strip of land separating his shop from the road. The LCC bought the freehold of the strip, but agreed he could use it until the project went ahead, and he would pay £30 a year in rent ‘until the strip of land is needed for road-widening’. But by 1988 the road had not been widened and the London Residuary Body (LRB), successor of the LCC held it. Prudential Assurance Ltd now held numbers 263-265. LRB pleaded that it could end Prudential's right to use its strip (whereby Prudential paid £30 a year); arguing either the lease it granted in 1930 was invalid or that if the court were to uphold some novel form of limitless tenancy it should be deemed capable of ending (termination) on a year's notice either way. Prudential plead it had a valid limitless tenancy/lease and strictly (outside of say compulsory purchase