UTLC LC-2022-533 - [2023] UKUT 167 (LC)

The boundary claimed by Mr Boag is shown on the plan prepared by his surveyors, Survey Solutions, which accompanied his application. The boundary is shown as a straight line running from points marked A and B respectively at its southern and northern ends. Both points are described by Ordnance Survey coordinates and by metric distances to fixed points on adjacent buildings, certified by the surveyor as accurate to the required degree.

The line A-B does not coincide with the concrete block wall at any point. Point A is shown as lying 6cm to the west of the southwestern corner of the wall which then runs north at a slight angle to the claimed boundary line.

The surveyor who prepared the application plan was not called to give evidence, nor did he provide a statement explaining why he had plotted points A and B in the locations shown. I assume he did so on Mr Boag’s instructions. The plan does not show a distance along the combined southern boundary of Mr Farrow’s land and 5 Curtis Lane but the FTT recorded that point A was “said to be 127 feet from Curtis Lane”. I take that to be a reference to Boag’s case and to a second plan which he prepared and submitted in support of his application.

In a letter of 28 October 2019 objecting to the application Mr Farrow’s solicitors asserted that the boundary between the two properties was straight and ran perpendicular to the southern boundary of Mr Farrow’s land along the eastern face of the concrete block wall for its full length before continuing in the same direction until it reached the northern boundary. That position was maintained in Mr Farrow’s statement of case to the FTT dated 25 February 2021. At the hearing before the FTT Mr Farrow argued for a slightly different line which had been plotted by his surveyor, Mr Plumb. That line initially followed the line of the concrete block wall (which Mr Plumb said was “helpful to inform the southern boundary division”), but then turned at a slight angle towards the northeast. Mr Plumb had placed no weight on the 1913 Indenture plan but had relied on a 1959 conveyance of St Austin’s and the 1988 conveyance of Mr Farrow’s land. The FTT rejected Mr Plumb’s suggested boundary because it was not a straight line and so was inconsistent with the line shown on the 1913 Indenture plan.