In a recent High Court case the scope of broadly worded rights
of entry reserved to a landlord under a lease were considered.
The Landlord had retained ownership of neighbouring land and in
the process of developing it, wished to install bat monitoring
devices on the land he had leased to his Tenants. The leases had
reserved to the Landlord very broadly worded rights of entry:
"for all reasonable purposes" and "inspecting...
making roads... and any other purposes connected with his
estate". Notwithstanding the reservations, the Tenant's
had refused access. The Landlord obtained a temporary injunction to
gain access which it then applied to make permanent.
The court held that the Landlord did have the right to erect the
bat boxes. Although, ultimately, an extension to the injunction was
refused, being regarded as unnecessary now that the extent of the
Landlord's rights had been clarified. The Judge stressed that
the "irreducible minimum" of rights granted to the
