Chamberlain Carpentry & Joinery Limited -v- Alfred MacAlpine Construction Limited
Case reference:
[2002] EWHC 514 (TCC)
Monday, 25 March 2002
Key terms: Meaning of a "Dispute"
A series of issues in dispute had been set out in Chamberlain's Notice of Adjudication. All of those issues (save for one) related to the value of the sub-contract, raising discrete points for the Adjudicator to consider. A further point referred to in the Notice of Adjudication related to the ascertainment of the fair and reasonable costs incurred by MacAlpine during the course of adjudication. The sub-contractor had included this issue as MacAlpine's bespoke rules of adjudication applied, and one of the provisions in those rules stated that the referring party should be responsible for all the costs incurred on a full indemnity basis. This was unless MacAlpine were the referring party, in which case both parties were to bear their own costs.
HHJ Seymour QC referred to Judge Thornton in Fastrack Contractors v Morrison Construction considering that whilst it was up to a claimant to set out the nature of the dispute in the Notice of Adjudication, the claimant was not the sole judge of whether there was in fact a single "dispute", and a series of discrete matters could be characterised as a single dispute for the purposes of adjudication. Of more interest, HHJ Seymour QC referred to the principles of interpretation recently restated by Lord Hoffman in Investors Compensation Scheme v West Bromwich BS (1998). In that case, Lord Hoffman said that interpretation was the ascertainment of the meaning which the particular document would convey to a reasonable person having the background knowledge that would have been reasonably available to the parties. On this basis HHJ Seymour QC considered that the sub-contractor had clearly referred to adjudication a dispute as to how much the sub-contractor should have been paid. Further, an integral part of that dispute was the ascertainment of MacAlpine's costs as the adjudication rules required Chamberlain to pay MacAlpine's costs.
Finally, MacAlpine argued that documentation submitted with the application was such that the Adjudicator had to "hunt through" those documents in order to identify the payment application referred to in the Notice of Adjudication. They argued that the dispute was therefore not sufficiently identified, and as a result the Adjudicator lacked jurisdiction.
HHJ Seymour QC held that a difficulty locating documents did not mean that the "dispute" had not been identified with sufficient clarity. The Adjudicator had identified the matters in dispute and had correctly understood what he had been asked to do.
HHJ Seymour QC referred to Judge Thornton in Fastrack Contractors v Morrison Construction considering that whilst it was up to a claimant to set out the nature of the dispute in the Notice of Adjudication, the claimant was not the sole judge of whether there was in fact a single "dispute", and a series of discrete matters could be characterised as a single dispute for the purposes of adjudication. Of more interest, HHJ Seymour QC referred to the principles of interpretation recently restated by Lord Hoffman in Investors Compensation Scheme v West Bromwich BS (1998). In that case, Lord Hoffman said that interpretation was the ascertainment of the meaning which the particular document would convey to a reasonable person having the background knowledge that would have been reasonably available to the parties. On this basis HHJ Seymour QC considered that the sub-contractor had clearly referred to adjudication a dispute as to how much the sub-contractor should have been paid. Further, an integral part of that dispute was the ascertainment of MacAlpine's costs as the adjudication rules required Chamberlain to pay MacAlpine's costs.
Finally, MacAlpine argued that documentation submitted with the application was such that the Adjudicator had to "hunt through" those documents in order to identify the payment application referred to in the Notice of Adjudication. They argued that the dispute was therefore not sufficiently identified, and as a result the Adjudicator lacked jurisdiction.
HHJ Seymour QC held that a difficulty locating documents did not mean that the "dispute" had not been identified with sufficient clarity. The Adjudicator had identified the matters in dispute and had correctly understood what he had been asked to do.