Alison Oakes

Practice Summary

Alison specialises in all forms of property law, both residential and commercial. Her residential work currently centres around leasehold enfranchisement and she has considerable experience in the leasehold valuation tribunal.

Her main professional client in such work is Bishop & Sewell LLP although she has done work for Rokeby Johnson & Baars and Decherts in the field and is willing to undertake work for others. There is also a growing market in taking points of law in enfranchisement claims in the county court and Alison regularly appears for both tenants and landlords. An interesting example is City & Country Properties v Plowden Investments Limited [2006] PLSCS 150 in which HHJ Reid held that the equivalent of a tenant’s signature where the party claiming a lease extension is a company is the company seal and not the signatures of two investors.

Alison also does a significant number of boundary disputes which, mindful of the costs involved, she generally attempts to mediate. That interest is reflected in her editorship of Atkins:Trespass to Land (although she also edits their Commons and Compulsory Acquistion titles).

Alison undertakes all forms of commercial property work, with an emphasis on dilapidations. Indeed she is currently co-editing the 4th Edition of Dowding & Reynolds on Dilapidations. She is, however, willing to take on anything that is asked of her and finds that her expertise in planning and highways in particular make her advice of great value to developers who require a holistic approach in relation to cases spanning more than one, or even two, areas of the law.

In terms of pure planning Alison has advised on a number of enquiries, the most memorable being Hall Hunter Partnership v Secretary of State and Ors (2006) EWHC 3482 (Admin), the multi million pound “polytunnel” case.

Chamber’s local authority connections have assisted in enabling Alison to undertake a large amount of work on highways, although it is of their nature that such disputes tend to settle. She has however appeared before the Adjudicator to H.M. Land Registry in highway matters (in addition to other matters such as boundary disputes and application to fix the line of boundaries) and is very comfortable advocating in such a forum.

Last but not least Alison has a growing practice in legal assessor work, which she greatly enjoys. She is highly regarded for her incisive mind and efficient handling of such cases and is looking forward to increasing that part of her practice greatly.