Simon Gibbons v Gravity Franchise: £3.4m trampoline park claim struck out over pleading failures

The Leeds Circuit Commercial Court has struck out a £3.4 million claim brought by a litigant in person against the operators of the Gravity trampoline park franchise, finding that his allegations of fraudulent misrepresentation were inadequately pleaded and, in any event, had no real prospect of success.

Handing down judgement in Simon Gibbons v Gravity Franchise Limited & Others [2026] EWHC 2089 (Comm), His Honour Judge Richard Carter granted applications by Gravity Franchise Limited, Gravity Fitness (Warrington) Limited and their director Paul Harvey Jenkinson to strike out the claim under CPR 3.4 and, alternatively, for reverse summary judgement under CPR 24.2. The court also entered judgement in the defendants' favour on their counterclaim of £849,288.07 arising under the franchise agreement and lease.

Mr Gibbons had entered a franchise agreement in December 2019 to open a Gravity indoor entertainment park in Warrington, later signing a lease in July 2020. He claimed that five pre-contractual representations, concerning the projected build cost, profit forecasts, the competence of the recommended contractor, additional strip-out funding, and a promised finance guarantee, had induced him into the agreements and were false. The venture struggled financially and the operating company entered administration in 2022.

The judgement examined each alleged representation in turn against the contemporaneous documentary record, much of which had been exhibited by Mr Gibbons himself. On the cost representation, correspondence showed Mr Gibbons had been told the investment could be "as much as £1.5 million" and could exceed that figure depending on market conditions, while he himself had referenced a higher £1.6 million budget before signing. The court found no primary facts pleaded that could support an inference of dishonesty, applying the established principle from Three Rivers v Bank of England (No 3) that fraud must be distinctly pleaded and cannot rest on facts equally consistent with innocence.

Similar deficiencies were identified across the remaining representations. The profit forecast allegation lacked detail as to what exactly had been said about the figures, beyond a general assurance that they were accurate. The claim concerning the recommended contractor amounted, in the court's assessment, to no more than a statement of opinion incapable of grounding an actionable misrepresentation absent evidence the opinion was not honestly held. The strip-out funding and finance guarantee allegations were found to be inconsistently pleaded, shifting between contractual and representational bases without clarity, and undermined by the fact that funding discussions had already broken down before the lease was executed.

The judgement also addressed the effect of entire agreement and exclusion clauses in the franchise agreement and letter of intent, which the court held validly excluded liability for negligent or innocent misrepresentation, applying the reasoning in Inntrepreneur Pub Co v East Crown Ltd and AXA Sun Life Services v Campbell Martin. Since fraud could not be sustained on the pleaded facts, and lesser claims were excluded by contract, the misrepresentation case failed in its entirety.

Judge Carter was critical of the claimant's response to a Part 18 request for further information, in which Mr Gibbons had declined to particularise his case further, telling the defendants it would be a "complete and intentional waste" of his time to do so. Citing Barton v Wright Hassall, the judgement confirmed that litigant-in-person status did not excuse compliance with pleading requirements, and that any indulgence could only operate "at the margins".

Having found no proper defence to the counterclaim, which relied on the same misrepresentation allegations, the court entered summary judgement against Mr Gibbons on that claim as well.