Wastech, the Court
clarified the content of another doctrine flowing from the
organizing principle: the duty to exercise contractual discretion
in good faith.
Background
Wastech involved a waste transportation company
(Wastech) and a corporation responsible for municipal waste
disposal (Metro). In 1996, Wastech and Metro entered into a
contract for waste disposal services that contemplated disposing
waste in three landfills, one of which was much farther away than
the others. The contract stated Metro had absolute
discretion in allocating the amount of waste to go to this
farther facility.
In 2011, Metro exercised this discretion by directing less waste
to go to the farther facility, causing Wastech to receive a lower
To embed, copy and paste the code into your website or blog:
In the case of (1) Secretariat Consulting Pte Ltd, (2) Secretariat International UK Ltd, (3) Secretariat Advisors LLC v A Company [2021] EWCA Civ 6, the Court of Appeal upheld the decision of the Technology and Construction Court in A Company v (1) X, (2) Y, 3 (Z) [2020] EWHC 809 (TCC) on different grounds. The Court of Appeal found that although an expert may owe fiduciary duties, including a duty to avoid conflicts of interest and a duty of loyalty, there was an express contractual provision on conflicts which was breached.
Facts
In our alert on 17 April 2020, we visited the case of A Company v (1) X, (2) Y, 3 (Z) [2020] EWHC 809 (TCC) wherein we discussed the judgment that Justice O Farrell handed down on 3 April 2020. The case involved a claim by the owner (