Gladstone v Bower
Gladstone v Bower [1960] 2 QB 384 was a 1959 case in the English Court of Appeal, concerning security of tenure in tenancies of agricultural holdings. It arose from what was then thought to be a lacuna in the Agricultural Holdings Act 1948. Facts Under the AHA 1948, a tenancy for a term certain of less than a year would be converted to a year-on-year tenancy by the operation of s2, and a tenancy for a term certain of two to five years would be converted to a year-on-year tenancy by the operation of s3. In Gladstone v Bower, the term certain was eighteen months. Judgment The Court of Appeal held that because neither s2 nor s3 of the 1948 Act applied, the tenancy expired at the end of the fixed term and the landlord was entitled to recover possession. Significance After the decision, the presiding judge (Diplock J) expected that the law would be changed. As he put it, "If it were permissible to speculate at large as to the intentions of Parliament, I should be tempted to guess that Parliament simply overlooked the case of a lease for a fixed term of between one and two years." He