On 8 July 2025, the Court of Appeal handed down its decision in Adriatic Land 5 Limited v Long Leaseholders of Hippersley Point – a resounding and principled win for ordinary leaseholders facing extraordinary injustice. My law firm Velitor acted pro bono – without payment – for 32 leaseholders whose landlord had attempted to saddle them with legal costs tied to cladding works. The Court found that these costs were never fair or justified to begin with.
This wasn’t a media stunt. It wasn’t a fee-generating exercise. We didn’t take a cut. We did it because justice demanded it.
And yet, even now, I’m sure some would scoff: Why bother? What’s in it for you?
Let me be clear. There are cases – in the UK and abroad – where litigation has been abused. Where so-called group actions were more about generating fees than fixing harm. But if we let that poison the entire concept, we abandon thousands of people with no power, no platform, and no realistic way to assert their rights.
The law is complicated. Legal action is expensive. Most people, even well-informed ones, don’t have the means or capacity to go it alone. That’s where collective action and group litigation become not just useful but essential.
At Hippersley Point, the case concerned approximately £7,000 in legal costs, already collected by the landlord through the service charge. While this may not be a huge sum in the context of litigation, it’s not an amount most people could – or should – have to absorb without question. Crucially, instructing a solicitor to challenge such charges individually would be very costly and complex; often far beyond what is reasonable for a single leaseholder to take on alone. That’s precisely why coming together through coordinated legal action is often the only practical route to holding powerful landlords to account.
We’re not stopping here. The Leaseholder Action claim is a groundbreaking case challenging secret insurance commissions paid by landlords and managing agents. These deals are invisible, unaccountable, and unlawful.
The claim is legally novel, procedurally complex, and expensive to launch. But it is also just.
We need leaseholders to come together. That’s the only way we can make this work. On our own, very few of us could afford the costs of taking on a well-funded landlord or insurer. But together, in numbers, we have strength, power, leverage and voice.
The fight for building safety and leaseholder rights didn’t start or end with Grenfell. But the horror of that tragedy sparked overdue scrutiny of how flats and leasehold properties are owned, managed, insured, and exploited.
My team and I are on the side of those without a luxury legal budget, who are just trying to live safely in a home they own. We believe in the rule of law, not just as a phrase in textbooks, but as a tool that should work for everyone, not just the rich.
Next time you hear someone dismiss group actions or pro bono lawyers as opportunists, think about what happened at Hippersley Point. Think about what those leaseholders would be facing today if we hadn’t stood up.
If you’re a leaseholder affected by secret commissions, join us at leaseholderaction.com. You’re not alone – and together, we can do something about it.
