In seeking to provide an answer to the exam question posed below (Best endeavours = all reasonable endeavours?, it is interesting to read a useful “Scottish” article on best and reasonable endeavours in the Estates Gazette (9 April). The article cites a case EDI Central Limited v. National Car Parks Limited [2010] CSOH 141 from the Court of Session in which Lord Glennie says: “I accept the submission that the obligation to use “all reasonable endeavours” is a more onerous obligation than one simply to use “reasonable endeavours”. I do not have to consider whether or not it is the same as one to use “best endeavours”, though I would have thought that any difference is likely to be metaphysical rather than practical. It is difficult to conceive that an obligation to use “best endeavours” requires a party to take steps which are ex hypothesi unreasonable.”
In Obagi v Stanborough Developments Ltd (1995) P & CR 573, the court said, in relation to a contract conditional upon planning, that best endeavours requires a buyer to “take all such reasonable steps which a prudent and determined man acting in his own interest and anxious to obtain such permission would have taken. Such steps would include pursuing an appeal where it could fairly be said that there was a reasonable chance of success in such appeal”.
So, best endeavours = all reasonable endeavours? Why not…