Joe Ollech successfully defends a claim for an injunction in Joy v (1) CYMCA (2) Criterion Capital Ltd
Joe Ollech, instructed by Rudi Ramdarshan and Victoria Huxley of Ronald Fletcher Baker LLP, represented Criterion Capital Limited in successfully defending a claim for an injunction brought by Mr Patrick Joy seeking to challenge the sale of the YMCA building at 112 Great Russell Street and the closure of its gym and leisure centre.
The Central Young Men’s Christian Association had determined that the facilities it offered at this iconic location were loss-making and could no longer be sustained. In 2024 it sold the freehold of the building to a company in the Criterion group and took a short leaseback to allow it to wind down its activities and vacate the building. The claimant advanced a number of allegations under the Charities Act 2011 and asserting a novel duty of care in tort against the Central Young Men’s Christian Association and Criterion. The terms of the injunction he sought, whilst presented as prohibitory, were in effect mandatory and would – if granted – have forced the CYMCA to continue operating a loss-making business and seek to renegotiate its rights to occupy.
Trower J heard and dismissed the application, and a further urgent application to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal and appeal by the claimant was dismissed by Arnold LJ.
A note of Trower J’s ex tempore judgment can be found here. It offers an insight into the Court’s treatment of the American Cyanamid test in unusual circumstances, including consideration of the locus of a claimant in charity proceedings and the treatment of an undertaking in damages offered by an impecunious claimant.
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