BILLS OF QUANTITIES 105 



control over what may be done with those quantities ; he has 

 no knowledge of anybody to whom those quantities will be 

 shown. At the moment he has given details to the architect, 

 the architect and his employer may change their minds as to 

 the plan, may reject those quantities, may never use them, 

 and may never offer to anybody a contract based on them at 

 all. . . . Now, do they make a representation to the architect 

 that they are true in fact ? Certainly not." 



3. Whether bound to disclose his calculations. While it has 

 been decided (in School Board for London v. Northcroft, 1889, 

 2 H. B. C. 142) that a quantity-surveyor need not produce his 

 memoranda and calculations after he has done his work, it 

 seems that he must do so if required before he has completed 

 his work. In that case Mr. Justice A. L. Smith said (at 

 p. 145) : " If the building-owner wanted to measure up the 

 work, and he made a demand from the quantity-surveyor : 

 * Give me those details which you have, because I want to 

 measure up and finish this work which you have initiated by 

 your quantities,' I think it would be the duty there (assuming 

 he had them) of the quantity-surveyor to hand them over to 

 his principal, because, in my judgment, his duty would be to 

 do the best he could for his principal until the whole work 

 had been finished, completed, measured up, and done with." 



4. Liability of quantity-surveyor. The builder or con- 

 tractor who desires to avoid the loss which may be occasioned 

 by errors on the part of a quantity-surveyor, should be careful 

 to have the quantities made part of his contract ; for it has 

 been decided that a quantity-surveyor employed by the archi- 

 tect or employer is not liable to the accepted builder, either 

 by contract or representation, for errors in quantities (Priestley 

 v. Stone, supra, 1888, 4 T. L. B. 730). In that case the 

 defendant was employed by an architect to take out the quan- 

 tities in accordance with certain plans. These plans were 

 altered by the architect, who, without altering the quantities, 

 invited tenders based on the plans and unaltered quantities. 

 The plaintiff, who was accepted as contractor, suffered loss 

 owing to the alleged inaccuracy of the quantities, and sued for 

 damages. It was successfully urged that the action did not 

 lie as there was no priority of contract between the builder 

 and the quantity-surveyor; and that any representation 



