Taylor Fashions Ltd and Old & Campbell Ltd v Liverpool Victoria Trustees Co Ltd [1979] is a leading case in English land law on proprietary estoppel.

The claimants were two companies, Taylor Fashions Ltd and Old & Campbell Ltd, who held leases on two business premises on Westover Road, Bournemouth.

In response, Liverpool Victoria argued that estoppel was not relevant because they had not acted unconscionably but simply by mistake.

Mr Millett for Liverpool Victoria argued that unconscionability was necessary, following Fry J in the earlier leading case of Willmott v Barber.

The judge noted: in a case of mere passivity, it is readily intelligible that there must be shown a duty to speak, protest or interfere which cannot normally arise in the absence of knowledge or at least a suspicion of the true position [...] Furthermore the more recent cases indicate, in my judgment, that the application of the Ramsden v Dyson LR 1 HL 129 principle – whether you call it proprietary estoppel, estoppel by acquiescence or estoppel by encouragement is really immaterial – requires a very much broader approach which is directed rather at ascertaining whether, in particular individual circumstances, it would be unconscionable for a party to be permitted to deny that which, knowingly, or unknowingly, he has allowed or encouraged another to assume to his detriment than to enquiring whether the circumstances can be fitted within the confines of some preconceived formula serving as a universal yardstick for every form of unconscionable behaviour [...]