ABSTRACT
By a majority of 4:1 (Lord Lowry dissenting), their Lordships reversed the decision of the Court of Appeal, answering yes to branch (a) and no to branch (b). The actual decision in Morris was correct, but the House disapproved Lord Roskill’s dictum and preferred the ratio in Lawrence. Lord Keith could not have been clearer: the observations of Lord Roskill in Morris were unnecessary for the decision in that case, they were in clear conflict with the ratio of Lawrence and they were wrong: ‘The actual decision in R v Morris was correct, but it was erroneous, in addition to being unnecessary for the decision, to indicate that an act expressly or impliedly authorised by the owner could never amount to an appropriation.’86 Lawrence must be accepted as authoritative and correct and ‘there was no question of it now being right to depart from it’. At the same time Lord Keith endorsed the judgment of Parker LJ in Dobson, although he declared unsound Bingham LJ’s attempt at reconciliation. The plain fact of the matter is that, on this point, Lawrence is to be preferred to Morris.
