BARBER v. UNION TRADING CO., LTD

JUDGMENT OF APALOO J.

In this action, the plaintiff claims against the defendant-company (which I shall hereafter call the company) damages for breach of contracts and inducing breaches of various contracts entered into between the plaintiff and various lorry drivers. The company denies that it is liable in any way to the plaintiff and for its part, counter-claims against the plaintiff for the sum of £G4,648 13s. 9d. being hire-purchase instalments due and unpaid to the company by the plaintiff.

The plaintiff who is virtually illiterate and does not strike me as particularly business-like began his association with the company in or about 1942. He was then a trade canvasser for the company and was paid commission for motor vehicles sold through his agency. Whatever his shortcomings, he maintained his association with the defendant-company from that time until about 1958. The evidence shows that the company [p.354] thought then that he could be relied on to do business of a more responsible type. Accordingly, the plaintiff discontinued trade canvassing for the company and instead became its hire-purchase customer on a large scale. The system of business which developed between the plaintiff and the company was this: When a prospective hire-purchaser of vehicle from the company did not feel that for any reason he could enter into direct contract with the company, he saw the plaintiff. The latter then obtains the vehicle on hire-purchase and enters into agreement in his own name with the company. He then sub-hires the vehicle to the purchaser adding to the purchase price a small amount as profit. The plaintiff himself obtains a rebate which was either credited against the hire-purchase price or the gross price of the vehicle before the drawing of the relevant hire-purchase contract. Twenty-three of these agreements were tendered in evidence and were marked as exhibits 2-24. These contain the usual hire-purchase clauses and in my opinion, the controversy between the parties in this case is resolvable on the proper construction of these documents. When the plaintiff sub-hires this vehicle, he, like the company, enters into written agreement with his sub-hirers. The plaintiff tendered nine of such agreements as exhibits El to E9. These are not particularly well drafted documents but their true meaning does not fall for consideration in this case.

By June 1959, the plaintiff fell into arrears on many of the vehicles and it seems the company was far from sati