The High Court granted Celestine McNally summary judgment for €109,840.84 against Linda Ann Lannigan and Nicola O’Reilly Fahy, who had guaranteed a company’s rent obligations under a commercial lease.
In a judgment delivered on 27 February 2015, Ms Justice Murphy said the defendants did not dispute the rent due, the amount claimed or their status as guarantors. The court therefore was not satisfied that they had shown a fair and reasonable probability of a real and bona fide defence to the claim.
The claim arose from a lease of ground-floor premises at 19 Maypark, Malahide Road, Dublin 5. The lease, signed on 24 April 2008, covered a term of nine years and nine months from 28 February 2008, at an annual rent of €70,000. The weekly rent was reduced to €600 in March 2009, although the parties disagreed about the terms of that reduction. The premises were handed back on 31 December 2010.
McNally first sought payment from the three guarantors, including James O’Reilly. After earlier proceedings, judgment for the same amount was granted against James O’Reilly in January 2013. A fresh demand was sent to Lannigan and Fahy in December 2013, followed by the current summary summons in January 2014.
The defendants proposed a defence and cross-claim alleging that McNally took possession of a rear passage and part of the garden used for storage, took the business telephone and fax machine, and interfered with the trading reputation and goodwill of Wood’s Flowerpot. McNally disputed that account of the leaflet promotion cited by the defendants, describing it as a joint promotion involving her restaurant and a local flower shop.
The judge said a tenant may, in principle, have an equitable set-off against a landlord for losses arising from breaches of the same lease. But Lannigan and Fahy were sued as guarantors, not as directors of the tenant company, and could not set off the tenant’s alleged contractual claims against their guarantee liability.
The court also said the complaints were first raised in May 2014, years after the premises were returned and after earlier demands and proceedings. It noted that some alleged conduct occurred before the lease was signed, and that the lease map did not include the areas the defendants claimed. The court concluded that the proposed complaints did not indicate a bona fide defence and held that McNally was entitled to summary judgment.