Business tenancy - claim for dilapidations - defeated by promissory estoppel

Business Environment Bow Lane Ltd v Deanwater Estates Ltd High Court (Chancery Division), 5 December 2006 (unreported)

This is an unusual case where, before entering into a lease, the prospective tenant sought and obtained from the landlord assurances that repairing covenants would not be enforced against him. The reversion fell into different hands and the new landlord sought adages for disrepair. A preliminary issue was before the Court on the question of the landlord’s ability to enforce a repairing covenant in a lease of business premises.