Cinderella Rockerfellas Ltd v Valuation Officer

This is an appeal by Cinderella Rockerfellas Ltd (the appellants) the operators and occupiers of a nightclub situated upon a floating vessel, the Tuxedo Royale (“the vessel”) which at all material times was moored and berthed on the river Tyne at Hillgate Quay, Gateshead. They appeal against the decision of the Lands Tribunal (George Bartlett QC, President) dated 13 June 2002 whereby the Lands Tribunal allowed two consolidated appeals by the Valuation Officer against decisions of the Tyne & Wear Valuation Tribunal. The latter Tribunal had, on appeals by the appellants, directed that two entries:

The appeal thus raises the question of the rateability of floating vessels in the English law of rating and, incidentally, whether it diverges from Scottish law.

The material facts as agreed between the parties before the Lands Tribunal were as follows. I have indicated in square brackets certain additional matters not mentioned in the agreed facts but which were not in dispute on the appeal.

The vessel was built in 1964. It is 350 feet long, 54 feet in the beam and has a gross registered tonnage of 5888. Then known as Sol Express, it operated as a passenger and drive-on vehicle ferry until 1988 when it was modified for its present use and re-named. It was moored at Hillgate Quay from 1989 to 1999 under licence granted to the appellants by the Crown Estate Commissioners. The first licence, dated 26 January 1990, granted for a period of five years from 26 November 1988 the right to place and maintain on and over the foreshore and bed of the river Tyne adjoining Hillgate Quay, in the position indicated on the plan and annexed licence, the vessel or such replacement vessel as might be approved by the licensor. [The plan attached showed the vessel in position in the river beside the quay within a rectangular marked area closely drawn around the vessel indicating the extent of the foreshore and riverbed licensed.] By Clause 2(11) the vessel was not to be used for any purpose “ … save as an entertainment complex comprising restaurants, bars and disco function rooms exhibitions and like users.” Clause 3(4) stipulated:

Thereafter there was no interference by the Licensor with the appellants’ use of the parts of the foreshore or bed of the river to which the licence related and the Commissioners granted no additional rights during the term of the 1990 licence. By licence dated 23 November 1994 the Commissioners granted rights to the respondents in similar terms to those in the 1990 licence save that clause 3(4) was omitted. The vessel was used in compliance with clause 2(11) throughout the period of both licences.

The 1.52 acres of land which contained the Hillgate Quay frontage on its northern boundary was the subject of a lease for 10 years from 26 November 1983 originally made between Gateshead Borough Council and a company called Riverzest Ltd, which became vested in the appellants. The lease included the right to use the frontage for the purpose of berthing a vessel previously known as the SS Caledonian Princess or any other vessel in the appellant’s ownership which the Council might authorise in writing as an alternative to the named vessel. There was a prohibition against using the quay structure for any other purposes and a requirement that the vessel should be used as a restaurant, licensed premises, hotel, disco and conference centre. Clause 3(g) required the lessee to use the surface of the quay area for the parking of customers’ private vehicles in properly marked out parking areas.

By a lease dated 21 November 1994 Gateshead Borough Council granted the appellants a further 12 year term from 26 November 1993 upon terms not materially different from those in the 1984 lease. Again, at all material times, the quay structure, vessel and quay areas were used within the purposes provided by the leases.

The vessel was moved to the quay and held in position over the riverbed by means of ropes and chains secured to capstans on the quayside. It was subject to tidal movement. It remained secured at its berth from 1989 to 1999, only being moved from its position once for the purpose of demonstrating that it could be moved away from its mooring. On that occasion it was moved by being towed by tugs. In 1999 it was moved to the river Tees for similar use, before being replaced at Gateshead by a similar vessel.

The main accommodation on the vessel consisted of bars, offices, a restaurant, a café/diner and adjoining discotheque, a main discotheque holding up to 700 people, a kitchen, toilets, two private function suites, storage areas and a cellar on the lower deck. Access to the vessel was by means of four metal gangways on the quay. [The gangways were strongly constructed of steel, totally enclosed and capable of moving on the quay side as the vessel rose and fell with the tide.] The car park was used as a private car park for the purposes of the appellant’s business use of the vessel. The vessel generated its own electricity and there was no mains connection. It was not connected to a public sewer, but instead had tanks that were emptied and serviced by a private contractor. There was a water supply to the quay and from there to the vessel by means of a hose. There was a telephone connection.

The vessel had a full justices’ on-licence and an entertainment licence granted by the local authority. It was registered in the Registry of British Ships. Permission to moor it at Hillgate Quay was granted by the Port of Tyne Authority, subject to requirements relating to lighting, the need for a competent ship keeper on constant duty and other matters.

The Lands Tribunal resolved the issue whether the vessel was rateable by applying the principle stated by Lord Denning MR in Field Place Caravan Park Ltd v Harding [1966] 2 QB 484 in which, basing himself upon London County Council v Wilkins (Valuation Officer) [1957] AC 362, Lord Denning stated:

Applying that principle, the Lands Tribunal held that the vessel was rateable for the reasons set out at paragraph 21 of its decision:

In coming to its decision, the Lands Tribunal referred to its own previous decision in Felgate (VO) v Lotus Leisure Enterprises Ltd [2000] RA 89 and observed that the vessel was rateable for the same reasons that a vessel called the Lotus was rateable in that case.

The unit of property which is the subject of rating is “the hereditament”. By s.64(1) of the Local Government Finance Act 1988 [“the 1988 Act”]:

S.115(1) of the General Rate Act 1967 provided that:

S.64(4) of the 1988 Act provides that:

“Land” is not defined in the 1988 Act. However, by virtue of s.5 of and the First Schedule to the Interpretation Act 1978, “land” in an Act of Parliament passed after 1978 includes land covered by water.

S.41(1) and (2) of the 1988 Act require the valuation officer for a billing authority, such as the respondent in this case, to compile and maintain local rating lists on 1 April 1990 and on 1 April every fifth year afterwards.

By s.42(1):

From the origins of rating in 1601 as provided for in the Poor Relief Act 1601, the liability to be rated rested upon the occupier of the property concerned: see Sir Anthony Earby’s case (1633) 2 Bulst 354. The position is still the same, save for specific statutory provision first made in 1966 for rates to be chargeable on certain unoccupied properties. A ratepayer’s liability in respect of occupied hereditaments now arises from the express provision contained in s.43(1) of the 1988 Act:

Sir Anthony Earby’s case also decided that assessments under the 1601 Act “ought to be made according to the visible estate of the inhabitants there, both real and personal”. Although largely ignored in practice by rating authorities, the rateability of inhabitants for personal property (i.e. chattels) was only abolished by the Poor Rate Exemption Act 1840. Since that date therefore, the liability of the occupier has been limited to hereditaments in the nature of land, and no chattel is rateable per se.

A ship is a floating chattel. Prior to 1840 ships were rated in the parish which was regarded as their home. Thereafter they ceased to be rated. However, a line of decisions including such cases as Cory v Bristow (1872) 2 App Cas 262 (HL) and Smith’s Dock Co Ltd v Tynemouth Corporation [1908] 1 KB 315 held that the owners of vessels or floating structures used for commercial purposes while fixed in position on a long-term basis over moorings on the riverbed could for rating purposes be treated as the occupiers of those moorings and the part of the riverbed in which they were situated.

In parallel, a line of authority developed in relation to structures and other chattels on or connected with land held in occupation whereby, albeit not part of that land, such chattels were rated with it on the basis that they were enjoyed with the land and enhanced its value. These authorities related to such chattels as telegraph posts and wires (Electric Telegraph Co v Salford Overseers (1855) 11 Exch 181), telephone wires (Lancashire Telephone Co v Manchester Overseers (1884) 13 QBD 700), showcases and kiosks at a railway station (Westminster City Council v Southern Railway Co [1936] AC 511) and a number of cases concerned temporary huts and structures erected by builders upon construction sites. The principle underlying those decisions was examined and made clear in LCC v Wilkins (Valuation Officer) [1957] AC 362. In that case it was claimed that four builders’ moveable huts, erected as temporary structures on a site for 18 months, only one of which was moved from one part of the site to the other during that period, were chattels and therefore not rateable. The House of Lords held that the question whether or not the structures had lost their character as chattels was not decisive as the test of rateability, nor was the conscious intention of the contractors to attach or not to attach them to the soil. These were no more than factors which fell to be considered and the test of rateability was whether there was evidence that the structures, occupied for a period which was not transient, were enjoyed with the land and enhanced its value. Viscount Kilmuir LC stated at 373-374:

Lord Radcliffe said:

Later he stated:

In Field Place Caravan Park Ltd v Harding [1966] 2 QB 484 the Court of Appeal considered the rateability of a residential caravan site. The caravans were on wheels and retained their mobility although they were jacked up to keep them stable. The Court of Appeal upheld the decision of the Lands Tribunal confirming the entries of the caravans in the valuation list. In giving the leading judgment, Lord Denning MR having considered the observations of Lord Kilmuir and Lord Radcliffe in London County Council v Wilkins, stated the proposition applicable to the facts of the case before him as set out at paragraph 11 above.

In the light of certain submissions made for the appellant to which I refer below, it is pertinent to observe that in relation to the Scottish case of Assessor for Glasgow v Gilmartin (1920) SC 488 in which it was held that a small hut which could be moved on wheels was not rateable in Scottish law, Lord Denning observed that the provisions of the relevant Scottish Acts were different from the relevant English provisions. Salmon LJ also observed at 503:

The effect of those authorities was considered by the Lands Tribunal in Woodbury (Valuation Officer) v The Yard Arm Club Ltd [1989] RA 381 (LT) in relation to a vessel, The Hispaniola, moored in the river Thames to two steel piles called dolphins fore and aft, each embedded in the riverbed. The vessel was connected to the dolphins by steel horns which permitted it to rise and fall with the tide but prevented forward, rearward or lateral movement. The vessel was also anchored to the riverbed fore and aft, a subsidiary chain going to the embankment wall. The vessel was used as a restaurant and was permanently connected to all main services for that purpose. Access to the vessel from the embankment was via a metal canopied gangway. The vessel and its moorings were owned by the Club authorised to operate it, whereas the riverbed was owned by the Port of London Authority which had granted the Club a licence to place and retain the vessel with its piles etc in the position which it occupied. By s.178(1) of the Port of London Act 1968, land vested in the Port Authority (which included the bed of the river beneath the vessel) was exempt from rating or inclusion in any valuation list. The decision of the Lands Tribunal turned upon that last point. Giving judgment the President stated:

The President also considered an alternative submission that, by reason of the connection by the horizontal chains and gangways to the river wall, the vessel was rateable together with the part of the river wall in question which was owned by the Greater London Council. Counsel for the Club answered that submission by saying that chattels could only be rateable if they were in, on or over rateable land and that the relation between the land and the chattels must be vertical and not horizontal. The President observed:

On appeal sub nom Westminster City Council v Woodbury (Valuation Officer) and the Yard Arm Club Ltd [1992] RA 1 (CA), Lloyd LJ in upholding the decision of the Lands Tribunal observed at 8-9:

In concurring, Mann LJ said:

The decision in Thomas v Witney Aquatic Co Ltd [1972] RA 31 referred to by Lloyd LJ was a decision of the Lands Tribunal in respect of a clubhouse floating upon a lake over which the ratepayer had rights of use for sporting and boating activities and to maintain a floating clubhouse which was moored to three steel barges in turn moored to the land. The clubhouse was also made fast to the land by two wire hawsers and kept at a fixed distance from the land by two gangways, being moved in winter months to an island in the lake. The disputed hereditament was described as ‘lake, clubhouse and premises’.

In finding that the floating clubhouse was a chattel enjoyed with the land and therefore rateable as part of the hereditament, the Tribunal relied on the words of Lord Russell of Killowen in Westminster City Council v Southern Railway Co [1956] AC 511 at 529:

The Tribunal added:

In Felgate (VO) v Lotus Leisure Enterprises Ltd, to which I have already referred in paragraph 13 above, the valuation officer had entered in the rating list a floating restaurant called The Lotus moored at Millwall Dock as “dock bed, floating restaurant, moorings and premises”. The Lands Tribunal was concerned to decide whether such rateable hereditament had been correctly identified. The vessel was a steel hull without means of propulsion or steering with a superstructure erected to contain the restaurant. It was permanently moored in position connected to the dock wall by three hawsers at the bow and two at the stern, each looped over bollards. There were two further connections to the dock wall by means of steel hawsers and the vessel was connected to all main services. Access was by means of four wooden and steel gangways resting on rollers to allow for the vertical movement of the water in the dock. The vessel was permanently in position save that it was moved on two occasions each year from its mooring by a tug to the other side of the dock for the purpose of undertaking essential maintenance in an operation which lasted no more than a few hours.

It was submitted for the valuation officer that the owners were the occupiers of a hereditament comprising the part of the dock bed over which the vessel was moored and the water beneath the Lotus. Field Place Caravan Park Ltd v Harding was relied on. It was submitted for the owners that there could be no occupation of the bed of a river or a dock by a vessel floating above it without some kind of permanent fixture to the bed concerned. The President of the Lands Tribunal conducted a wide-ranging review of the relevant authorities, including that of the Scottish Lands Valuation Appeal Court in Assessor for Glasgow v R.N.V.R. Club (Scotland) [1974] SLT 291 and that of the Hong Kong Court of Appeal in Commissioner of Rating and Valuation v Yiu Lian Machinery Repairing Works Ltd [1985] 2 HKC 517. In the former case a ship used as a club and moored to a quay in the Clyde in physical circumstances remarkably similar to this case, was held not to be “heritable” in nature and therefore not rateable under Scottish law. In the latter case, floating dry docks in Hong Kong harbour were held to be not sufficiently connected with a piece of land to be rateable under the wording of the relevant Ordinance in Hong Kong.

Applying the principle laid down in Field Place Caravan Park v Harding, the President said as follows:

For the appellants, Mr Widdicombe QC accepts that the principle which fell to be applied by the Lands Tribunal in this case, was that propounded by the House of Lords in London County Council v Wilkins and Lord Denning MR in Field Place Caravan Park v Harding to the effect that chattels may be rateable with land and together form a rateable hereditament if they are enjoyed with the land and enhance its value. However, he points out that the context in which the principle was propounded was one in which the House of Lords and the Court of Appeal were concerned with chattels/structures which were physically placed upon land but insufficiently attached to become fixtures. Mr Widdicombe also accepts that in principle (though only in rare cases), the test propounded may be apt to extend to a floating structure or vessel. However, he submits that that can only be so in a case where such structure or vessel is immovable and physically connected to the land with which it is said to form a rateable hereditament.

Mr Widdicombe submits that a floating ship is a chattel so far conceptually removed from ‘lands’ that, if it is to be treated as part of a rateable hereditament a high degree of connection and/or adaptation should be sought before so regarding it. He submits that in this case no such element is present. He submits that the absence of vertical connection to the riverbed effectively prevents the presence of the floating vessel from being regarded as itself a method of occupation of the land beneath; and the absence of any adaptation of the vessel or its integration and enjoyment with the adjacent land, preserves its separate character as a chattel, enjoyed as such.

In this respect Mr Widdicombe places heavy reliance upon the Scottish and Hong Kong cases to which I have already referred and submits that the Lands Tribunal fell into error in distinguishing them.

Mr Mould for the respondents submits that the Lands Tribunal was right to apply the principle succinctly stated by Lord Denning MR in Field Place Caravan Park v Harding and, by applying that principle, to find that the vessel was rateable property for the reasons which it gave.

Mr Mould submits that the principle that a chattel placed upon a piece of land, enjoyed with that land and enhancing its value, can with that land form a rateable hereditament, while remaining in law a chattel, is apt to apply in a case where the chattel is a floating vessel placed upon land covered with water: see the Interpretation Act (paragraph 17 above), the observation of Lord Russell in Westminster City Council v Southern Railway Co [1956] AC 511 - 529 and the decisions of the Lands Tribunal in Thomas v Witney Aquatic Co (paragraph 32-4 above) Felgate v Lotus Leisure Enterprises Ltd (paragraphs 35-7 above).

Mr Mould accepts that, in relation to the question whether the chattel (a) occupies and/or (b) is enjoyed with land comprised within the hereditament identified, the question whether the land has a direct physical connection to that part of the land which lies vertically beneath it, is highly relevant and will generally be definitive. However, he submits that, in the case of a permanently moored vessel, moored in position over a part of the river bed licensed to the owner for that purpose, even without such a physical connection it is in appropriate circumstances possible to provide an affirmative answer to the question whether the vessel is enjoyed with the riverbed beneath and enhances its value. In this case, by means of horizontal connection to the adjacent quay which together with the riverbed formed part of the same hereditament, the vessel was permanently secured in a position above and within a part of the riverbed which was licensed to the appellants for the very purpose for which it was used and was in fact used for no other purpose. In those circumstances the Lands Tribunal was entitled to find that the four conditions of rateable occupation were in fact satisfied.

The four conditions of rateable occupation as set out in John Laing & Son Ltd v Kingswood Assessment Committee [1949] 1 KB 344 at 357 and approved in LCC v Wilkins [1957] AC 365 are (i) actual occupational possession (which involves actual as opposed to intended user of the land in question); (ii) occupation or possession which is exclusive (i.e. if the occupier can exclude all other persons from using the land in the same way as he does); (iii) occupation or possession which is of some value or benefit to the occupier/possessor; (iv) occupation or possession which has a sufficient quality of permanence: see generally Ryde on Rating and the Council Tax paragraphs [61] to [62].

The cases culminating in LCC v Wilkins and Field Place Caravan Park v Harding which developed the principle that chattels may be rateable if enjoyed with the land and enhancing its value have also made clear that the placing of a valuable chattel in or on land may itself be all that is required by way of occupation of the lands to render the chattel and the land together a rateable hereditament.

Assuming for a moment that condition (i) can be satisfied, in the sense that the Lands Tribunal was entitled to hold that the vessel could properly be regarded as occupying the riverbed beneath (see further below), there seems to me no room for doubt that conditions (ii) – (iv) were satisfied in this case.

So far as condition (ii) is concerned, when a person occupies land in respect of which he has no title to the exclusive occupation or possession but his occupation is exclusive in fact, then he is rateable in respect of that occupation. It seems to me that the question is identical to that enunciated by Lord Russell of Killowen in Westminster City Council v Southern Rail Co [1936] AC 511 at 532, namely whether the person sought to be rated has the enjoyment of the land “to the substantial exclusion of all other persons”. As made clear in that case, the relevant question is: what in fact is the occupation in respect of which the person is said to be rateable and, in that respect, it is immaterial whether the title to occupy is attributable to a lease or a licence: see ibid at 533. The substance of the document granting the right of occupation is highly material; however, what is material is not so much the precise terms of the grant but whether the occupation is in fact greater or lesser than the terms convey. It is also the position that the reservation by the grantor of a right which is never exercised and could not be fully exercised without destroying the grant is to be disregarded: ibid per Lord Wright at 567.

The factual position in this case, as already indicated, was that the vessel between 1990 and 1999, under successive licences from the Crown Estate Commissioners, occupied a fixed position in the river, immediately above the area of the foreshore and riverbed the subject of the licence, which it physically occupied (by resting in the mud) at low tide. While the licence stated that its terms were not to be construed as giving exclusive use of the disputed area to the appellants, the liberty of the Commissioners to grant elsewhere any rights or easements over the relevant land was limited by the proviso that it should not thereby prevent the placing and maintenance of the vessel in accordance with the licence. Nor, as the agreed facts stated, were any other or ‘rival’ rights granted by the Commissioners during the entire period that the vessel was moored in position under the terms of the licence. In these circumstances it is clear that if the vessel could be properly regarded in occupation of the riverbed beneath, it was de facto in exclusive occupation.

So far as condition (iii) is concerned, it is plain that the occupation was of great value and benefit to the appellants as occupiers. Equally, so far as condition (iv) was concerned, there was a period of occupation of some nine years with a single brief interruption on some unspecified date when the vessel was temporarily removed from its mooring by tugs. I therefore return to consider condition (i).

Throughout a period of nine years, the vessel was placed in position over the licensed area of riverbed beneath. While the principle stated in London County Council v Wilkins and Field Place Caravan Park v Harding dealt with structures which were physically placed upon dry land, and there were not in this case any moorings within the riverbed by which the vessel could be said to occupy the riverbed (c.f. Cory v Bristow), it does not seem to me that the interposition of water between the vessel and the riverbed of itself acted in any significant manner to deprive the appellants of occupation of the area of the riverbed the subject of the licence. The ‘permanent’ presence of the vessel was sufficient to constitute de facto exclusive occupation of that part of the riverbed. That view seems to me entirely consistent with the observations of Lloyd LJ and Mann LJ in the case of The Hispaniola quoted at paragraphs 30 and 31 above.

Mr Widdicombe submits that such a conclusion is at odds with the Scottish and Hong Kong cases to which I have already referred. I therefore turn briefly to those authorities.

In the Scottish R.N.V.R. Club case, in which the physical facts were remarkably similar, the Lands Valuation Appeal Court was concerned with the question whether a former naval vessel refitted for use as a club was ‘heritable’ or not in Scottish law. It should at once be observed that the entry in the valuation roll under consideration simply referred to the subject of the valuation as “Description: Club. Situation: Custom House Quay”. Thus there was no reference to, or consideration of, the relationship of the vessel to the riverbed beneath or to any land save the adjoining quay to which it was secured. Indeed it does not appear that there had been any licence granted to the vessels’ owners in respect of the riverbed of the kind with which we are concerned.

In giving the leading judgment, Lord Fraser adopted the approach taken by Lord Fleming in John Menzies & Co v The Assessor for Edinburgh [1937] SC 784 and followed by Lord Kilbrandon in Assessor for Renfrewshire v Mitchell [1965] SC 271, by asking the question first whether the subject structure belonged to a class or genus which was prima facie heritable. He rejected the submission of counsel that there was a genus ‘club’ into which the vessel could be conveniently placed and stated at 293 rhc:

Later in his judgment he observed:

Lord Avonside was of similar opinion, as was Lord Keith. He said:

It is thus apparent that the approach of the Scottish courts places great emphasis upon the general character of the structure for the purpose of its classification as either heritable or moveable: see also Armour’s Valuation for Rating at paragraphs 9-01 to 9-08, where the observation appears that “reference to English authority in this field is inappropriate and could be misleading, since the separate considerations of the heritability of the subject and the rateability of the occupation are not clearly distinguished in the English cases”. Since the RNVR Club case was decided on the basis of Scottish law and turned entirely on whether or not the vessel was ‘moveable’, I do not think it affords Mr Widdicombe any useful support in this appeal.

The same is true of the decision of the Hong Kong Lands Tribunal in Yiu Lian Machinery Repairing Works Ltd v Commissioner of Rating and Valuation (1982) HKC 55 in which the President of the Tribunal, following the decision in the RNVR Club case held that, before the floating dry docks concerned could be rateable as chattels enjoyed with the land, there would have to be a high degree of mutual adaptation between the vessels and the berth at which they were moored. The President observed at paragraph [41]:

On appeal (1985) 2 HKC 517 the Hong Kong Court of Appeal held, in the words of the headnote, that having regard to the history of the legislation in Hong Kong, it could not be said that the English rule that the value of chattels was to be included as part of the land itself was, on a proper construction of the wording of the Ordinance, applicable in Hong Kong, where a stricter course prevailed; only the land itself or any building or part thereof were rateable and the Lands Tribunal’s decision that none of the dry docks was sufficiently connected with a piece of land to be taken into account in estimating its rateable value would not be disturbed.

The particular observation upon which Mr Widdicombe has placed emphasis is the following:

I do not find those observations telling or indeed accurate in relation to the facts of this case. As I have already indicated, it does not seem to me that the mere fact that a vessel floats on water above the land (i.e. the riverbed), per se prevents it from being a chattel enjoyed with the land and which enhances its value. Nor, if it is secured permanently in position by horizontal attachment to adjacent land forming part of the same hereditament, is it vital that the vessel should be directly secured or connected to the land beneath. In such circumstances, the purpose and function of the horizontal attachment is to confine the vessel to the area of the licensed land beneath, thereby enjoying that land (albeit supported by the water above it) as a permanent means of support by which means the riverbed, together with the adjacent quay as part of the same hereditament, is enhanced in value.

The analogy of an advertising balloon connected by a single wire and free to float to and fro, unrelated to or constrained by the area of the land beneath and plainly incapable of amounting to occupation of it, seems to me inapt. This is an area in which analogies are on the whole unhelpful. However, in the example given, a more appropriate analogy would be that of a barrage balloon permanently tethered in a stationary position by guy ropes with a platform suspended from it just above the land beneath and in permanent use as a night club dance floor, approached by a heavy metal ramp or ramps resting on the ground. Be that as it may, as the court went on to observe, whether a chattel is sufficiently connected with a piece of land to be taken into account in estimating its rateable value is essentially a question of fact in every case.

There is no suggestion in this case that the Lands Tribunal misstated or misunderstood any of the primary facts in relation to the position, purpose or function of the Tuxedo Royale or the nature or extent of the hereditament the subject of their decision. Nor is it suggested that they misstated or misunderstood the principles of law applicable to those facts save as to the degree of connection and/or adaptation of the vessel necessary to amount to occupation of the land in question. In that respect, I accept the submissions of Mr Mould set out at paragraphs 41-43 above and the conclusion of the Lands Tribunal as stated in paragraph 12.

I would therefore dismiss this appeal.

I agree.

I also agree.