Supreme Court to hear this week test case over final injunctions and unknown trespassers

The Supreme Court will this week (8-9 February) hear a landmark case on whether a court can grant final injunctions that prevent persons, who are unknown and unidentified as at the date of the order, from occupying and trespassing on land.

The background to the case of Wolverhampton City Council and others v London Gypsies and Travellers and others is that since 2015 a number of local authorities have sought interim and then final injunctions against unidentified and unknown persons who may in the future set up unauthorised encampments on local authority land (so-called “newcomers”).

The persons concerned fall mainly into three categories, who would describe themselves as Romani Gypsies, Irish Travellers and New Travellers, the Supreme Court said.

In the present appeal the appellants challenge an injunction obtained in October 2018 by Wolverhampton County Council against “persons unknown” (“the injunction order”). They do so as a test case as the same issue arises in relation to a number of other local authorities who have obtained similar orders.

In London Borough of Barking and Dagenham & Ors v Persons Unknown & Ors [2021] EWHC 1201 (QB) Mr Justice Nicklin in the High Court determined that final injunctions could not apply against newcomers who were not parties to the proceedings at the date that the injunction was ordered. He therefore discharged the injunction order.

In London Borough of Barking and Dagenham & Anor v Persons Unknown & Ors [2022] EWCA Civ 13  the Court of Appeal allowed the appeal brought by Wolverhampton City Council and other local authorities and reinstated the injunction order.

The appellants before the Supreme Court are London Gypsies and Travellers, Friends, Families and Travellers and Derbyshire Gypsy Liaison Group.

The 13 respondent local authorities include Wolverhampton City Council, Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council, the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham, Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council and Thurrock Council.

Intervening in the case are Friends of the Earth, Liberty, High Speed Two (HS2) Ltd, and the Secretary of State for Transport.

The case will be a heard by a Supreme Court panel comprising Lord Reed, Lord Hodge, Lord Lloyd–Jones, Lord Briggs and Lord Kitchin.