Scottish Court of Session Decisions

Now, I confess that I am quite unable to agree with the Dean of Guild in his construction of that clause. Cul de sac is a metaphorical phase of the French language, but it has been shown to us that it has been recognised as an English term by English dictionaries, and it is a matter of common knowledge that it is familiar in the ordinary use of language as if it were English. We may therefore construe the words for ourselves, and I suppose that cul de sac in reference to a street means in English exactly what it means in French. It is a street which has only one issue. It is what is called in older English a blind alley. Now, I am of opinion very clearly that, whether it be inconvenient or not, a street 60 feet wide ending in a lane 20 feet wide, which again communicates with a public street, is not a cul de sac or a blind alley. It is a thoroughfare, because it has an issue in Clark Street at one end and in Greenhill Road at the other.

Whether it is convenient or inconvenient for the traffic of that part of Paisley that a street of this kind should be made without its being continued of one uniform width from one end to the other is a totally different question. It is a question with which we have nothing to do, and, so far as I see upon record, it is a question which was not raised in the Dean of Guild Court at all. The only question raised on the record between the parties is whether this is or is not an infringement of the statutory prohibition which the Paisley Police and Public Health Act of 1901 contains against forming a street which ends in a cul de sac. The respondent's plea-in-law is—“As the proposed new street ends in a cul de sac, warrant for lining ought not to be granted and the final interlocutor of the Dean of Guild Court is that “… in respect that the petitioner has failed so to amend his plan as to prevent the proposed new street ending in a cul de sac, sustain the respondent's plea-in-law.” The whole judgment, therefore, proceeds upon what appears upon the face of the plans of the petitioner's proposal, and upon the construction which the Dean of Guild puts upon that particular clause in the Act of Parliament.

I am accordingly of opinion that we ought to recal the interlocutor appealed against, and remit to the Dean of Guild to repel the plea-in-law for the respondent James Lee and to proceed. I think we ought to remit to the Dean of Guild to proceed as shall be just rather than decide for ourselves that the lining should be immediately granted, because we do not know what questions in which either the objector or the public may be interested may or may not arise before the Dean of Guild. We should interfere as little as possible with the procedure of the Dean of Guild Court, and the best way in which we can do that is to pronounce the interlocutor I have suggested.

Lord Dundas—I agree. With all respect to the Dean of Guild, I think he has erred in that he has misapprehended the meaning of the term cul de sac—a rather unfortunate one to find in a Scottish Act—which occurs in section 20 of the Paisley Police and Public Health Act of 1901. I think in popular language the idea of a cul de sac is, as your Lordship has put it, “no thoroughfare”—a place so formed that there is no egress from it except by the way of entrance,—and that certainly cannot be said of the proposed street shown on this plan, because it is to have egress to the west by a proposed lane 20 feet wide. But Mr Brown, and to some extent his learned senior, urged that that lane as shown on the plan is not a lane within the meaning of the definition of the local Act. That argument, upon the merits of which I express no opinion, might have formed an objection to the granting of the lining, at least so far as the lane is concerned, but that, as your Lordship has pointed out, is not raised on this record. The parties have joined issue upon a closed record, the respondent's only plea being that “As the proposed new street ends in a cul de sac, warrant for lining ought not to be granted.” I am quite content to put my opinion on this, that the proposed street shown upon the plan is not a cul de sac, and that therefore the only plea stated for the respondent ought to be repelled.

Lord Johnston—I am of the same opinion, on the very short ground that a street 60 feet wide which ends in a lane 20 feet wide does not end in a cul de sac. That is the only question raised upon the pleadings on which the record was formally closed. Were this case coming from any court of ordinary jurisdiction and not from the Dean of Guild Court, I think our only course would have been to sustain the appeal and direct the lining to be granted; but I agree with your Lordship that in such a court as that of the Dean of Guild it is right to send the case back to the Dean of Guild to proceed therein as may be just, because the public interest is, of course, involved. But in doing so I should like to say that Mr Blackburn has advanced considerations in this matter, and put them into the mouth of the Dean of Guild, which seem to me to be very questionably legitimate considerations for the Dean of Guild to entertain in determining this or any further question between these parties. I refer to the considerations, not of public health in relation to the width of the street which is being built, nor of traffic in the lane in which the proposed street ends, but what I may shortly term of “town planning,” as if the Dean of Guild was entitled to stop a building until others are brought into line. I desire to reserve my opinion upon that, because I think that such questions are of very doubtful legitimacy.

The Lord President and Lord M'Laren were absent.

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