The High Court has upheld Avison Young adjudication enforcement proceedings, granting summary judgment of £8.73m to Coventry & Warwickshire Development Partnership after the property consultancy’s attempts to block the award failed at every turn. Mr Justice Eyre dismissed Avison Young’s challenges to an adjudicator’s finding that it had significantly over-certified sums owed to collapsed contractor Buckingham Group on a major earthworks scheme in Coventry.
The dispute centres on Buckingham’s work at Gateway South, an industrial and logistics park in Coventry, where the contractor was engaged to excavate, treat and reposition around five million cubic metres of material. Avison Young’s role on the project was as NEC project manager and supervisor, which included assessing and certifying the sums due under Buckingham’s monthly payment applications.
Adjudicator finds £7.69m over-certification by Avison Young
Coventry & Warwickshire Development Partnership claimed Avison Young had materially overvalued Buckingham’s work throughout the contract. Specifically, CWDP argued that Avison Young accepted reduced estimates for the total volume of material to be moved and failed to identify defects adequately, resulting in Buckingham receiving more money than the work merited. When Buckingham subsequently entered insolvency, CWDP found itself unable to recover those overpayments from the contractor directly.
The adjudicator, Franco Mastrandrea, issued his decision on 13 February, finding that Avison Young had overvalued the cumulative price for work done to date by at least £7.69m, with CWDP’s total loss, including interest, assessed at £8.73m. Avison Young informed CWDP three days later that it would not pay the award, prompting the enforcement proceedings before Mr Justice Eyre.
Avison Young denied the criticisms throughout, arguing its certification had been appropriate and that any difference between the amount certified and the correct value of the work was negligible. In the enforcement proceedings, it challenged the adjudication on several grounds: that Mastrandrea had effectively carried out his own valuation exercise rather than deciding CWDP’s professional-negligence claim; that he had failed to give adequate reasons; and that he had breached natural justice by relying on an assessment produced by Gardiner & Theobald without properly inviting submissions.
Mr Justice Eyre rejects natural justice and severance arguments
Mr Justice Eyre rejected each of those arguments in turn. On the question of valuation versus professional negligence, the judge found that Mastrandrea had addressed the dispute properly referred to him and had considered whether Avison Young exercised the required skill and care, rather than simply carrying out a true-value exercise. On the Gardiner & Theobald material, the judge found that the adjudicator had repeatedly alerted both parties to its potential relevance and invited detailed submissions before making use of it. Both parties had in fact provided those representations.
Rejecting the natural justice argument, Mr Justice Eyre said: ‘There was no breach of the requirements of natural justice in those circumstances.’
Avison Young also sought to have parts of the adjudicator’s decision severed if its broader challenge failed, targeting findings relating to retention and defects. The judge rejected that approach as well, finding that the disputed findings formed part of a continuous chain of reasoning leading to the adjudicator’s single damages award. They could not, he held, appropriately be recast through the enforcement proceedings.
The enforcement judgment did not determine afresh whether Mastrandrea’s underlying findings against Avison Young were correct. Its scope was narrower: whether there were grounds on which the award should not be enforced. There were not.
Buckingham Group collapse and the Coventry earthworks connection
The case carries additional weight given the circumstances of Buckingham Group’s collapse. According to Construction News, the £665m-turnover group entered administration in September 2023, citing cashflow pressures caused by losses incurred on three stadium contracts and one earthworks job in Coventry. That earthworks job is the same Gateway South project at the heart of this dispute. At the time of its administration, Buckingham Group was the UK’s 30th biggest contractor.
The administration has since been extended by two years, meaning creditors including CWDP remain caught in a prolonged process. With the insolvency preventing direct recovery from the contractor, the adjudication route against Avison Young represented CWDP’s primary mechanism for recouping the losses it attributes to the over-certification. The High Court’s decision to enforce the award in full now sets the stage for any further proceedings Avison Young may elect to pursue on the substantive merits.
