Gore v Naheed [2017] EWCA Civ 369
Facts
The owner of the Granary had an express right over a neighbouring driveway for access connected with the property. He also used the route to reach an adjacent garage serving the Granary. Delivery vehicles associated with the neighbouring business obstructed the driveway, and proceedings followed. The trial judge permitted limited loading and unloading but restrained obstruction of the claimant’s access, including access to the garage. The defendants appealed, arguing that the garage lay outside the original dominant land and that the order and damages went too far.
Legal Issue
Did using the driveway to reach a garage on adjoining land exceed the express easement, or was that use ancillary to enjoyment of the original dominant property?
Held
The Court of Appeal upheld access to the garage so far as its use was ancillary to occupation of the Granary. The order needed to make that connection explicit: a person occupying the garage independently would not acquire the same entitlement. The court did not accept that the general rule against using an easement for other land necessarily prevented this ancillary use. It also retained the judge’s restriction on obstruction, while removing a general damages award which had not been properly pleaded or advanced. The decision concerns construction and permitted use of the existing grant, not a power to create a new right whenever it would be useful.
⭐ Legal Principle
Use of an easement involving adjacent land may be permissible where genuinely ancillary to enjoyment of the dominant property within the grant. It does not authorise independent use for the additional land or unlimited enlargement of the dominant tenement.
Significance
Gore refines application of the rule associated with Harris v Flower. It is particularly useful where a garage or similar facility serves the original dominant property rather than operating independently. The connection must be maintained in the remedy as well as the reasoning. The question concerns the scope of an existing easement, not the invention of a new ancillary grant. Identifying the destination, purpose and relationship of the use is therefore more helpful than relying only on mapped boundaries.
Common exam questions about this case
Why was access to the garage permitted?
Its use was ancillary to occupation of the Granary, the property benefiting from the grant. The right was not being used to serve an independent undertaking on unrelated land. That connection explained the permitted access and needed to be reflected expressly in the court’s order.
Could a separate tenant of the garage claim the same access?
Not under the right recognised in this case. The court limited access to use connected with the Granary’s occupation. Letting the garage independently would remove that basis, so the decision cannot be treated as adding the garage permanently and unconditionally to the dominant land.
Did the court create a new easement for convenience?
No. It interpreted and applied the existing grant to the ancillary use in question. Convenience alone would not justify enlarging an easement. The scope of the original right, the relationship between the properties and the nature of the additional use all required analysis.