Case No. IP-2016-000182

86.It was common ground that ‘mutual’ has at least one meaning, a broad meaning recognised by the relevant public. That meaning includes some understanding, to a degree I need not explore, that a mutual has no shareholders and is owned by stakeholders, who may be employees, customers or individuals of other kinds. There are many examples of organisations described as mutuals which are not owned solely or at all by their customers, the John Lewis Partnership being prominent among them.87.MML’s case rested on there also being a second, distinct and narrower meaning of ‘mutual’. This second meaning was invariably understood in the context of financial mutuals. It contained the additional and well understood feature that an organisation so described is owned solely by some or all of its customers.88.Forces Mutual’s principal argument was there was only the one broad meaning of ‘mutual’. If there existed any goodwill it was therefore shared by all mutuals within that broad meaning. Forces Mutual fell within the single definition of a mutual, so there can have been no misrepresentation when they started to trade in April 2016. Besides, at that point they became joint owners of the goodwill.89.Mr Silverleaf and Mr Malynicz both submitted that accordingly the main issue to be resolved was whether in April 2016 ‘mutual’ had the second, context-dependent meaning among a significant proportion of the relevant public.90.There were other arguments on each side which I will come back to after dealing with the main issue.