Court case[1910] AC 295

The defendants ran a ferry across Sydney harbour from a wharf. Entry to and exit from the wharf were through turnstiles, and a notice board stated that a penny had to be paid on entering or leaving the wharf; the ferry fare was collected in this way. The plaintiff paid a penny to enter the wharf to take the ferry, but having just missed one and finding he would have to wait for the next, he changed his mind and wanted to leave by the turnstile. He refused to pay the penny for going out, and the defendants' servants prevented him from passing until he paid. He sued for false imprisonment, succeeded at trial, and the High Court of Australia reversed; he appealed to the Privy Council.

The Privy Council dismissed the appeal. Lord Loreburn LC held that the charge was a reasonable condition, and that the plaintiff had entered the wharf under a contract to leave it by the ferry on the other side. "There is no law requiring the defendants to make the exit from their premises gratuitous to people who come there upon a definite contract which involves their leaving the wharf by another way." The defendants were entitled to resist his passing out through the turnstile without payment of a penny; he was not imprisoned, because a way out, by the ferry, was open to him on the terms he had accepted.