Remedies

Given the limited range of remedies available to tenants mid-term, specific performance is a remedy more likely to be granted to a tenant against a landlord (rather than to a landlord against a tenant as discussed earlier) where that landlord has failed to comply with its repairing obligations and that failure affects the tenant’s ability to occupy the property. Nonetheless, the remedy of specific performance remains discretionary and will only be exercised by the court if it is just and equitable in all the circumstances. Alternatively, the court may simply order the landlord to pay damages.

The principles of specific performance by a landlord of its obligations with regard to the condition of the building are more or less the same as those described in specific performance by tenant in the context of a claim by a landlord against a tenant.

The most likely difficulty for a tenant arises where the tenant does not have full access to the area of the building in respect of which it says that the landlord has failed to meet its obligations. Consequently, while the tenant will need to provide a schedule of the work the landlord should carry out, it may be that the schedule will be less detailed than an equivalent schedule where a landlord is seeking to enforce a tenant’s obligations. However, it may be the case that the landlord can be assumed to be aware of what is required of it.