liquidator | Insolvency Oracle

July 6, 2014
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Mopping Up: courts clarify “apparent bias”, “fair and proper price”, and “unfair harm”, but blur “debenture”

Oh dear, I’m slacking – even the R3 Technical Bulletin has beaten me to it this time! I will try to avoid much of the same ground in this batch of judgment summaries…

• Pathania v Adedeji – lack of evidence as regards an OR becoming trustee calls into question when the bankrupt’s estate vested
• Dryburgh v Scotts Media Tax – if a company does not know it has a claim against a director, does the clock tick?
• Northern Bank v Taylor – where an IP is free of actual bias, how important is apparent bias?
• O’Connell v Rollings – what makes a “fair and proper price” obtained for fixed-charge assets?
• Fons HF v Corporal – court’s definition of “debenture” brings into question unregulated lenders’ and borrowers’ activities
• Registrar of Companies v Swarbrick – under what circumstances can replacement Administrators’ Proposals be filed?
• Top Brands v Sharma – can a former liquidator apply to have an adjudicated creditor’s claim expunged?
• Eastenders v HMRC – can HMRC detain goods pending investigations into their duty status?
• Hockin v Marsden – can an administrator cause “unfair harm” to creditors’ interests and be acting reasonably?

Scanty OR records leave estate-vesting shrouded in mystery

Pathania v Adedeji & Anor (21 May 2014) ([2014] EWCA Civ 681)
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2014/681.html

Mr Pathania obtained judgment against Dr Adedeji at a time when the court did not know that Mr Pathania had been made bankrupt six months earlier. Dr Adedeji appealed on the ground that a bankrupt claimant cannot maintain legal proceedings under his own name, but these should have fallen to his trustee.

Although the bankruptcy order had been made in June 2010 – and the judgment made in December 2010 – it was not until April 2011 that an IP was appointed. The questions arise: what was the status of the OR in December 2010? Was he a trustee or simply the receiver and manager of the estate pending appointment of a trustee? The questions are important, as S306(1) provides that the bankrupt’s estate vests in the trustee on his appointment or when the OR becomes trustee. S293(3) provides that the OR becomes trustee when he gives notice of his decision not to convene a meeting of creditors. So when did the OR give such notice, if he ever did?

Lord Justice Floyd, using “moderate language”, stated that it was “highly unsatisfactory that the question of whether or not Mr Pathania’s assets had vested in a trustee should still be shrouded in any degree of mystery” (paragraph 50). Granted, it seems to have taken three or four years for the importance of the timing of the vesting of the bankrupt’s estate to have been appreciated; this seems to have been time enough for holes to develop in the OR’s records. The OR’s system suggested that he became trustee of 28 August 2010 and the file contained an undated report to creditors (although it seems that it may have been under cover of a letter dated 23 August 2010), which referred to a notice ‘attached’ but there was no attachment, leading the judge to states that “there is, as it seems to me, still no clear evidence that the formalities necessary for the appointment of the official receiver as trustee were complied with in this case” (paragraph 51). He also noted other indications in the case that he was not so appointed, including the document appointing the IP as trustee, which “contains no reference to a previous trustee or his discharge” (- does it ever?).

Although the judge was not persuaded on the evidence that the OR had become trustee around August 2010, he noted that this was not the be-all and end-all: Dr Adedeji “must show that Mr Pathania knew that the official receiver had become trustee, that his estate had become vested in the official receiver and that he knew that was so before judgment on the claim was entered” (paragraph 53). He also observed that, had Mr Pathania’s bankruptcy been disclosed before judgment, the action likely would have been stayed and, given that the (IP) trustee later assigned the action to Mr Pathania, the chances are that he would have been authorised to continue with it sooner or later. Consequently, De Adedeji’s appeal seeking to have the judgment set aside was dismissed.

Error or deliberate contrivance: either way, the clock didn’t tick whilst the director withheld information from his company

Dryburgh v Scotts Media Tax Limited (In Liquidation) (23 May 2104) ([2014] CSIH 45)
http://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotCS/2014/2014CSIH45.html

The liquidator brought proceedings against the company’s two directors for breach of fiduciary duties in depriving the company (“SMT”) of c.£750,000 and breach of the common law duties to exercise reasonable skill, care and diligence in relation to the SMT’s payment of a dividend at a time when it had insufficient distributable assets to justify it.

SMT had ceased trading in late 2001, but it had not been placed into liquidation until September 2005 (as an MVL, which converted into CVL in March 2007). The transactions challenged by the liquidator occurred in September and November 2001. The liquidator had been given leave to bring proceedings in January 2009. At first instance, although the Lord Ordinary had held that the director/respondent had been in breach of his duties, he dismissed the principal action as he had concluded that the claims “had prescribed”, i.e. they were out of time as a consequence of the Prescription and Limitation (Scotland) Act 1973, which provides a time limit of 5 years.

Section 6(4) of the 1973 Act states: “In the computation of a prescriptive period in relation to any obligation for the purposes of this section: (a) any period during which by reason of
(i) fraud on the part of the debtor or any person acting on his behalf, or
(ii) error induced by words or conduct of the debtor or any person acting on his behalf,
the creditor was induced to refrain from making a relevant claim in relation to the obligation… shall not be reckoned as, or as part of, the prescriptive period”.

The Inner House judges concluded that this section applied in this case: SMT had been induced to refrain from making a claim by error induced by the director’s conduct and also by fraud on his part. Therefore, the commencement of proceedings in January 2009 was well within the period of 5 years from the winding-up in 2005. The judges added that it was also possible that the delay during which SMT was induced not to make a claim continued throughout the MVL until it had been converted into CVL.

The court explained it this way: “if the respondent was unaware of SMT’s right to make a claim for breach of fiduciary duty, the result following the rules of attribution is that the company was in error as to its legal rights and section 6(4)(a)(ii) applies. If the respondent was aware of SMT’s right to make a claim against him, his failure to alert to the company to its right was a deliberate contrivance to ensure that his breach of fiduciary duty was not challenged… That in our opinion falls within the concept of fraud, in the sense of a course of acting that is designed to disappoint the legal rights of a creditor, SMT. In our view that falls squarely within the underlying purpose of section 6(4), namely to excuse delay caused by the conduct of the debtor. As a result of the respondent’s failure to draw attention to SMT’s rights, SMT was induced to refrain from making a claim. It follows that either SMT’s inaction was the result of an error induced by the actings of the respondent, or it was the result of the respondent’s failure to inform the company of its rights (“fraud” in the technical sense described above). Either way, the prescriptive period does not run” (paragraph 31).

Apparent bias works against nominee’s appointment as administrator

Northern Bank Limited v Taylor & Donnelly (4 April 2014) ([2014] NICh 9)
http://www.bailii.org/nie/cases/NIHC/Ch/2014/9.html

Two IPs were prepared to act as administrator of a partnership: one was the nominee of the partners’ proposed interlocking IVAs that had been rejected; and the other was the choice of the largest creditor. There are no prizes for guessing which of the two IPs had the court’s favour, but I thought this case serves a useful reminder.

Although it could be argued that the nominee had acquired valuable knowledge of the partnership and its assets, the judge did not feel that the costs of getting the other IP up to speed was going to make a fundamental difference. He considered that “the choice of the only (or main) creditor should carry great weight” (paragraph 16).

The judge wanted to emphasise that there was no suggestion of actual bias on the nominee’s part, but he felt that apparent bias did exist. He described this generally (per Porter v Magill (2002)) as “‘where the fair-minded and informed observer, having considered the facts, would conclude that it was a real possibility of bias’… In some cases the circumstances may be such where the directors’ nominee is in a position where the issue of apparent bias can arise because of his previous dealings with the directors. In such circumstances, even where he has acted blamelessly, he should stand down” (paragraph 15).

Court satisfied that Administrators’ marketing and sales process led to fair and proper price

O’Connell v Rollings & Ors (21 May 2014) ([2014] EWCA Civ 639) (Re Musion Systems Limited (In Administration))
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2014/639.html

Online articles (e.g. http://www.mercerhole.co.uk/blog/article/administration-fixed-charge-creditors-rights) have highlighted the key outcome of this case: the dismissal of the charge-holder’s appeal against the order under Para 71 permitting Administrators to sell assets as if they were not subject to the fixed charge. The judgment is valuable in illustrating how the court measures the fine balance between the prejudice to the charge-holder caused by an order and the interests of those interested in the promotion of the purposes of the administration.

The other points that I found interesting in the judgment are:

• The judge had to be (and was) satisfied that the Administrators were proposing to sell the assets for a “proper price” (paragraph 49). Absence of reference to “best price” is interesting to me, in view of the fact that the Administrators did not pursue a somewhat tentative sale to a party, who on the face of it was offering a larger sum (but which would have involved deferred consideration due from an overseas company). Personally, I have never liked the concept of achieving a “best price” sale; apart from the practical difficulties of measuring against a superlative “best”, it’s not just about the quantum.
• In the circumstances – limited cash, ongoing liabilities to 17 employees, and quarter-day rent looming – the Administrators could not be criticised for deciding to pursue a sale by means of a contract race.
• Although the appellant argued that the company’s intellectual property rights were valued at “very substantially more than the Administrators achieved” (paragraph 62), the judge was “satisfied that the Administrators did ascertain the value of the business and assets of the company, including its intellectual property rights, such as they were, by testing the market, and doing so in a perfectly sensible and adequate way. Faced with rising costs and diminishing assets, they were naturally concerned to secure a sale as soon as reasonably possible. That is precisely what they did and I am satisfied that, in doing so, they obtained a proper price” (paragraph 63).
• Although the judge recognised “that the urgency of the situation and commercial pressures will sometimes require administrators to make a decision before a meeting [of creditors] can be convened. But in any such case it may still be possible for the administrators to consult with the creditors and, so far as circumstances permit and it is reasonable to do so, that is what they should do” (paragraph 80).

Implications of apparent widening of “debentures” definition

Fons HF (In Liquidation) v Corporal Limited & Anor (20 March 2014) ([2014] EWCA Civ 304)
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2014/304.html

Fons made unsecured loans to Corporal Limited under two shareholder loan agreements. The question for the Court of Appeal was: did the loans fall under Fons’ charge-holder’s security, either as “debentures” or “other securities” under the charge’s definition of “shares” (“…also all other stocks, shares, debentures, bonds, warrants, coupons or other securities now or in the future owned by the chargor in Corporal from time to time or any in which it has an interest”)?

Having reviewed the historic use of the word debentures, Patten LJ concluded: “As a matter of language, the term can apply to any document which creates or acknowledges a debt; does not have to include some form of charge; and can be a single instrument rather than one in a series” (paragraph 36). It seems that the previous judge gave “debentures” a narrower meaning because it appeared in a list ending: “other securities”. However, Patten LJ pointed out that other items in that list may be considered a security, if “securities” is synonymous with “investments” and thus he could not see why a reasonable observer should regard “other securities” as limiting “debentures” to a meaning that would exclude the shareholder loan agreements. The appeal judges were unanimous in the decision to allow the appeal.

The implications of this judgment have been summarised in a letter from the City of London Law Society to HM Treasury dated 4 June 2014 (http://goo.gl/2F9tpH). The Society wished to raise its “serious concerns in respect of the significant legal uncertainty” caused by this decision: “In holding that loan agreements are debentures in that, whether or not the relevant loan is drawn, the agreements acknowledge or create indebtedness, the judgment appears to have the effect of regulating loans in a manner not previously adopted.”

The Society’s key concern is that, if loan agreements are debentures, then they could be caught as regulated investments under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (“FSMA”). If this is the case, then unless a party is authorised or exempt under the FSMA, they are at risk of criminal sanctions – this might apply, not only to unregulated lenders, but also borrowers as well as secondary traders of loans.

Consequently, the Society has asked the Treasury to “take action (a) immediately to clarify HM Treasury’s policy intentions on this topic and (b) as soon as practicable act so as to provide clarity in law.”

(UPDATE 25/08/14: The Society has released a copy of the FCA’s response to the Loan Market Association (17/07/14), which states that the FCA has considered the judgment in this case and, in the FCA’s view, it does not impact the regulatory perimeter prescribed by the FSMA: http://goo.gl/vO99NT )

(UPDATE 31/08/14: well, it was there! It seems to have been pulled down again; I don’t know if that means the FCA has had second thoughts…)

(UPDATE 20/11/14: the letter is back at http://goo.gl/ek9Td6 )

Registrar of Companies’ resistance to file replacement Proposals overcome

The Registrar of Companies v Swarbrick & Ors (13 May 2014) ([2014] EWHC 1466 (Ch)) (Re Gardenprime Limited (In Administration))
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2014/1466.html

11 Stone Buildings has produced a good summary of this case: http://www.11sb.com/pdf/insider-rewriting-the-register-gardenprime-sc-may-2014.pdf.

The Registrar of Companies (“RoC”) applied to set aside an order that the administrators’ original Proposals be removed from the register and replaced with another set of Proposals, which omitted certain information in view of a confidentiality clause in a share purchase agreement.

The RoC’s central challenge was whether, and to what extent, the court could intervene in the performance of the RoC’s duties and powers: the RoC had carried out its duty in registering the Proposals that had been delivered to it and the original Proposals had not been found to be non-compliant or containing “unnecessary material” (per S1076 of the CA 2006) and thus in want of removal and replacement. Accordingly, it was argued, the RoC had no statutory power to accept the amended Proposals as a replacement and could not be required to do so.

Does R2.33A, which provides for an administrator to apply for an order of limited disclosure in respect of Proposals, only apply in advance of filing? In other words, once Proposals have been filed, is it too late to apply for a R2.33A order? The judge stated: “in my judgment on the correct construction of Rule 2.33A the jurisdiction of the court to make an order limiting disclosure of the specified part of the statement as otherwise required by Paragraph 49(4) is not exhausted the moment the statement has been sent. On the contrary, an application for such an order may be made even after that event, and an order may be made with retrospective effect” (paragraph 52).

But how does such an order fit in with the RoC’s powers under the CA2006 as regards removing documents containing “unnecessary material” from the register? The judge’s conclusion was that the effect of the R2.33A order was to render the disputed material as “unnecessary material” under the CA2006 and thus the RoC was empowered to remove it.

Technicality blocks IP’s attempts to reverse her decision

Top Brands Limited & Anor v Sharma (8 May 2014) ([2014] EWHC 1454 (Ch)) (Re Mama Milla Limited (In Liquidation))
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2014/1454.html

I have seen other commentaries on this case focus on the repercussions of being slow in dealing with court matters, but I will look at the case’s once-in-a-blue-moon technical intricacy.

A liquidator rejected a creditor’s claim, the creditor appealed to court, and then the two of them submitted to a consent order by which the liquidator reversed her decision to reject and agreed to admit the claim. The liquidator, having been replaced by another IP at a creditors’ meeting, now faces a S212 action. The (now former) liquidator sought to adjourn the trial so that she could pursue a claim to set aside the consent order on the basis that it was procured by fraudulent misrepresentation. If the creditor’s claim were to be rejected, then its standing to pursue the S212 application might be thwarted.

The difficulty for the former liquidator was that R4.85 sets out who can apply to have a claim expunged: the liquidator or (where the liquidator declines to act) the creditor. As the former liquidator was neither, she had no jurisdiction. Simon Barker HHJ accepted that “such a conclusion would be troubling in the light of there being a real prospect that neither [of the two applicants] are creditors” (paragraph 48), but for the facts that the current liquidator, who was still investigating matters, had jurisdiction and the former liquidator had “a reasonable window of opportunity” to take action under R4.85 after the S212 application had commenced but before she had been removed as liquidator. He also stated that, even in the event that the current liquidator did not intend to investigate the matter (although, of course, the liquidator will be duty-bound to satisfy himself that any distributions made by him are made to genuine creditors), “the court simply does not have jurisdiction to act in disregard of R4.85”.

Lack of hindsight does not hamper HMRC’s powers of detention

Eastenders Cash and Carry Plc & Ors v The Commissioners for HM Revenue & Customs; First Stop Wholesale Limited v The Commissioners for HM Revenue & Customs (11 June 2014) ([2014] UKSC 34)
http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKSC/2014/34.html

HMRC detained the companies’ goods, citing S139(1) of the Customs & Excise Management Act 1979 as their authority for doing so, but they later returned some of the goods when the officers’ enquiries as regards the goods’ duty status proved inconclusive. In the Eastenders case, the court had previously found that the officers had had reasonable grounds to suspect that duty had not been paid on the goods, but in First Stop’s case, the goods were detained pending investigations into whether duty had been paid. The question arising was: could only goods that were actually liable to forfeiture be detained, i.e. was it unlawful for HMRC to detain goods that turned out not to be (or not proven to be) liable to forfeiture?

The Supreme Court judges all agreed that S139(1) of the 1979 Act should be interpreted so that “detention of goods is unlawful whenever the goods are not in fact liable to forfeiture” (paragraph 24). The difficulty flowing from this is that, of course, at the time of detention, officers may well suspect that the goods are liable to forfeiture, but further enquiries sometimes will establish that this is not the case. Hindsight is a wonderful thing!

But does this mean that the officers had no statutory power at all to detain the goods? In creating the S139(1) power of detention, was the power to detain, which had previously been held to arise by necessary implication from statutory powers of examination, abolished? The judges could not see “why Parliament should have conferred upon the Commissioners and their officers a wider range of intrusive investigatory powers than any other public body, but should at the same time have chosen to deprive them of a means of preventing goods from being disposed of until they have completed their examination and decided whether the goods should be seized” (paragraph 45).

Consequently, the Supreme Court judges concluded that the limited circumstances in which goods could be detained under S139(1) was not the only source of the officers’ powers of detention. In the Eastenders case, “since the officers were carrying out a lawful inspection of the goods for the purpose of determining whether the appropriate duties had been paid, and had reasonable grounds to suspect that duty had not been paid, they were in our view entitled by virtue of section 118C(2) to detain the goods for a reasonable period in order to complete the enquiries necessary to make their determination” (paragraph 49). Even in the First Stop case, the judges considered that “the examination was not completed until the necessary enquiries had been made, and that the power of examination impliedly included an ancillary power of detention for a reasonable time while those enquiries were made” (paragraph 49).

Administrators compelled to assign mis-selling claim

Hockin & Ors v Marsden & Anor (19 March 2014) ([2014] EWHC 763 (Ch)) (Re London and Westcountry Estates Limited (In Administration))
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2014/763.html

The R3 Technical Bulletin 107 has covered this case, which resulted in a direction that administrators assign potential mis-selling claims to the shareholders (one of which was also a creditor). As the Bulletin pointed out, the judge did not criticise the administrators for declining to pursue the claims themselves, but he felt that, as the terms of the proposed assignment included that the estate would share the benefit from any success, it would unfairly harm the creditors if the claims were simply lost and thus he felt that there was a basis to the creditor’s Para 74 claim.

A further point that I found interesting in this case was the judge’s reaction to the administrators’ criticism of the consideration offered under the proposed assignment. The judge could see no practical alternative to effecting the assignment in the terms proposed: once the court had expressed itself in favour of an assignment, faced with no other potential assignees the administrators had no real negotiating position, and the court could not compel the shareholders/creditor to fix the consideration at a higher figure.

January 19, 2014
by insolvencyoracle Leave a comment

Just Scottish Coal Company: Scottish Liquidators’ Powers to Disclaim – back to square one

Re The Scottish Coal Company Limited (In Liquidation) (12 December 2013) ([2013] CSIH 108)

http://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotCS/2013/2013CSIH108.html

In an earlier blog post – http://wp.me/p2FU2Z-3I – I covered the judgment in the Outer House of the Court of Session, which decided that the joint liquidators were entitled to disclaim onerous land and abandon water use licences.

The Scottish Environment Protection Agency and others appealed to the Inner House with the outcome that the previous decision was recalled and the court directed that the liquidators do not have the power to abandon or disclaim the sites or the statutory licences. The consequences seem to go further than that, however, as this decision indicates that the post-appointment liabilities arising under these statutory regimes will fall as liquidation expenses.

To summarise the issue facing the liquidators: the Scottish Coal Company Limited (“SCC”) carried out open cast coal operations on some of its sites under licences granted under the Water Environment (Controlled Activities) Regulations 2005 and 2011 (“the CARs”) and permits issued under the Pollution Prevention and Control (Scotland) Regulations 2000 and 2012. The costs of continuing to meet the terms of these licences and permits were running at c.£500,000 per month. If the liquidators’ only option in escaping these were to comply with the terms of surrender, the cost would be several million pounds.

The judgment runs to 162 paragraphs and is challenging in many respects. To do it justice, I thought I’d give this its own post. I think the key bases for the court’s decision can be summarised as follows.

If a trustee can abandon property, why can’t a Scottish liquidator?

The original decision arose in part from consideration of S169(2) of the Insolvency Act 1986, which states that “in a winding up by the court in Scotland, the liquidator has (subject to the rules) the same powers as a trustee on a bankruptcy estate”: as a Scottish trustee has power to abandon heritable property (S32(9A) of the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 1985), so too, it was thought, should a Scottish liquidator. On appeal, the Inner House examined whether this trustee power does not translate into a liquidator’s power to rid himself of onerous property. Strictly speaking, a trustee does not abandon the property, but only “any claim to the debtor’s share and interest … in the property. No transfer of ownership is envisaged. Rather, the trustee gives up what… is a personal right to acquire ownership of (that is, a real right in) the property” (paragraph 117). When the trustee abandons this right, the property remains in the ownership of the bankrupt.

Now try applying that power to a liquidator: “Unlike the situation of a trustee, who obtains a personal right to acquire ownership of the bankrupt’s heritage upon vesting of the sequestrated estate, a liquidator acquires no such right. The company’s property, whether moveable or heritable, does not vest in him at all” (paragraph 121), thus the liquidator cannot “abandon” property in the same way as a trustee can, as he does not hold the “personal right to acquire ownership” of the property. The company remains the owner throughout. “From a practical point of view, the liquidator may elect, in certain circumstances and with appropriate sanctions, not to realise certain property, whether moveable or heritable; or he may be unable to realise it. If that remains the position as at dissolution, then so be it… The property, however, does not become separated in any legal sense from the company’s general assets in advance of that dissolution” (paragraph 123).

So, if a liquidator cannot abandon the sites, what about the licences?

The judges looked at the provisions contained in the CARs as an example of a statutory regime governing some of the many licences that the liquidators were seeking to abandon. Under the CARs, “simply by assuming the role of, for example, liquidator, the insolvency practitioner concerned becomes ‘the person who is responsible for securing compliance with the terms of [any CARs] licence’ granted to the company” (paragraph 129). “By virtue of it having applied for and been granted a CARs licence, SCC incurred onerous obligations to avoid the risk of adverse impact on the water environment and to leave it in such a state that it complies with the relevant environmental legislation. These obligations subsist notwithstanding the cessation of any or all activity on the part of SCC and, in particular, any controlled activity. Moreover, by virtue of the very clear terms of regulation 2(1) of the CARs, which as already noted include a liquidator within the definition of ‘responsible person’, those obligations are incumbent upon the liquidators” (paragraph 133).

As a Scottish liquidator has no express power to disclaim onerous property, “whether a Scottish liquidator has power specifically to abandon a CARs licence, and thereby bring an end to its onerous conditions, must depend on the terms of the CARs and the relevant licences” (paragraph 136). The CARs contain no such provision for abandonment, but instead they provide specific mechanisms for releasing a licensee, including surrender. Therefore, either the liquidator pursues a surrender – accepting the expensive conditions attached to it by SEPA – or the licences continue until the liquidators vacate office and the company is dissolved.

Ok, if the liquidators cannot disclaim the licences, can they at least avoid the obligations arising from them falling as liquidation expenses?

The judges considered the intended purpose of the CARs: “Where, as here, the relevant legislation was enacted to implement an EU Directive, it is taken to be the legislative intention to achieve the purpose of the Directive… As already noted, the CARs were made under section 20 of the 2003 Act, which was enacted in order to transpose the Water Framework Directive into domestic law. The Water Framework Directive is extensive in its scope and ambitious in its objectives. Its purposes include, for example, the establishment of ‘a framework for the protection of inland surface waters, transitional waters, coastal waters and groundwater which: …ensures the progressive reduction of pollution of groundwater and prevents its further pollution’ (art 1(a)). Where an insolvent company will in due course be dissolved, enforcing a statutory licence against a liquidator affords at best only temporary and imperfect environmental protection. Nevertheless it would seem to be beyond argument that the broad interpretation of the CARs will better achieve the desired result. As a consequence, SCC’s environmental obligations will be treated as liquidation expenses, thereby giving them priority over other obligations” (paragraphs 142 and 143).

They also pointed to other “persuasive factors in favour of giving pre-eminence to the policy of maximising environmental protection over the policy of the expeditious and equal distribution of available assets among the unsecured creditors of an insolvent company”, such as the decision in Re Mineral Resources, which included that “the interest in the protection of the environment should prevail over the interest in fair and orderly winding up of companies” (paragraph 144).

But, bearing in mind that an English liquidator may seek to disclaim a Scottish site or licence, doesn’t this overstep the mark of matters reserved to Westminster?

The judges thought not. “The purpose of the CARs as a whole, and the provisions relating to a liquidator in particular, is an environmental one. Neither the CARs as a whole, nor the provisions relating to liquidators, have as their purpose an insolvency objective. The effect on liquidators of companies possessing a CARs licence is no more than a loose or consequential connection. In all the circumstances, those provisions of the CARs which are said to restrict the power of a liquidator cannot be said to relate to reserved matters. They are, accordingly, not outwith the competence of the Scottish Parliament by reason of section 29(2)(b) of the [Scotland] 1998 Act” (paragraph 156). True, “the CARs have an effect on the practicalities of insolvency. However, more than that is required in order to place them beyond the devolved competence of the Scottish Parliament. If, contrary to the views expressed above, the CARs have modified the law on reserved matters (and in particular any of those aspects of the law of corporate insolvency which are listed under head C2 of schedule 5 to the 1998 Act), it remains the case that any such modifications are incidental to, and consequential on, provisions in the CARs relating to environmental matters, which are not reserved, and only to an extent that is necessary to give effect to the environmental purpose of the CARs” (paragraph 160).

So can an English liquidator disclaim a Scottish site or licence?

“An English liquidation may involve disclaimer of property held anywhere in the world and the liquidation process, and any final dividend upon dissolution, may proceed accordingly. However, the manner in which heritable property is actually disposed of is a matter to be determined by the lex situs (the law where the property is situated). Whatever the powers of a liquidator may be in terms of the law under which the liquidation is processed, the property will not transmit from the company unless that is achieved in accordance with the law applying where the land is located” (paragraph 126).

The Outcome

Therefore, the Inner House reversed the earlier decision and directed that the liquidators do not have the power to abandon (otherwise disclaim) the sites or the statutory licences.

Some commentators have hinted at the prospect of a Supreme Court appeal.

Personally, this outcome leaves me with the following questions:

• If the costs of meeting the ongoing obligations under such statutory licences rank as a liquidation expense, could companies involved in potentially environmentally-damaging, licensed, activities in Scotland find that their access to credit dries up?

• Although English liquidators have specific power to disclaim onerous property – and I don’t know how the English equivalent of the CARs are worded – how does this stack up against legislation implementing an EU Directive, which presumably is felt by all of the UK, with the overriding objective of environmental protection?

September 8, 2013
by insolvencyoracle Leave a comment

Hats Off

Having recently spent a week or so in Somerset enjoying the unseasonal blue skies (but yes, you’re right, the photo is not Somerset!), I’ve managed to accumulate quite a pile of BAILII reports. I don’t want to skip them entirely, as one day I do want to create a searchable index of my posts, so I’ve tried to give credit where I can to other write-ups of the judgments. Much is old news, therefore, but if you missed them the first time around…

• Olympic Airlines – failure to meet “establishment” test of European Insolvency Regulation rules out secondary insolvency proceedings.
• Jetivia v Bilta – argument that the company, by its liquidators, could not pursue claims based on a fraud to which it was party failed.
• Tchenguiz v SFO – liquidators’ reports not subject to litigation privilege, as litigation was not the dominant purpose for their production.
• Southern Pacific Personal Loans – liquidators were not data controllers for data processed by company pre-liquidation and, subject to certain conditions, they could destroy the data.
• JSC BTA Bank v Usarel Investments – useful comments regarding the absence of inevitable bias of court-appointed receivers when faced with prospect of taking action against party that sought their appointment.
• Bestrustees v Kaupthing Singer – reversal of administrators’ part-rejection of pension scheme claim, as changes in assets and liabilities after the actuary’s certificate “irrelevant”.
• Wood & Hellard v Gorbunova – receivers’ indemnity out of assets restricted, as respondent’s costs increased due to receivers’ “inappropriate conduct of the application”.
• JSC BTA Bank v Ablyazov – subject’s drawing down of £40m loans not “assets” for the purposes of a freezing order.

The Trustees of the Olympic Airlines SA Pension & Life Insurance Scheme v Olympic Airlines SA (6 June 2013) ([2013] EWCA Civ 643)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2013/643.html

A successful appeal against a secondary winding-up in England provides clarification of the meaning of “establishment” of the European Insolvency Regulation, but makes it difficult to call on the PPF where a scheme is exposed to an insolvency with main proceedings in another EU/EEA state.

A couple of good summaries (although with differing views on how things may change on the revision of the EIR) are provided by Malti Shah of Taylor Wessing (http://goo.gl/0m0aDZ), and Justin Briggs & Charles Crowne of Burges Salmon (http://goo.gl/P0I3G4).

(UPDATE 07/08/14: The enactment of the Pension Protection Fund (Entry Rules) (Amendment) Regulations 2014 have opened the way for this scheme to access the PPF. The Regulations cease to have effect on 21 July 2017 and set down such specific criteria that it seems unlikely that it will help many more schemes access the PPF. For a more detailed analysis, see Mayer Brown’s article at: http://goo.gl/Xzyx5q)

(UPDATE 21/05/15: the Supreme Court considered an appeal and swiftly dismissed it, endorsing the Court of Appeal’s earlier decision that having three employees in the country involved only in winding up the company’s affairs did not amount to “economic activity”. The judgment, given on 29 April 2015, can be found at: http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKSC/2015/27.html)

Jetivia SA & Anor v Bilta UK Limited (in liquidation) & Ors (31 July 2013) ([2013] EWCA Civ 968)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2013/968.html

Bilta, by its liquidators, brought claims for conspiracy and dishonest assistance against the appellants, who sought to defeat the claims on the basis that, as Bilta was party to the illegal act, it could not bring the claims (the ex turpi causa principle). The appeals were dismissed.

Tom Henderson of Herbert Smith Freehills LLP has produced a good summary of the case, I think: http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=ead603c4-454c-4d19-ae54-4ed2196ec771

Tchenguiz & Ors v Director of the Serious Fraud Office & Ors (26 July 2013) ([2013] EWHC 2297 (QB))

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/QB/2013/2297.html

The court found that the joint liquidators’ reports were not subject to litigation privilege, as the judge was not convinced that the dominant purpose for which the reports were originally produced was for obtaining information or advice in connection with pending or contemplated litigation, or for conducting or aiding in the conduct of such litigation.

Timothy Wright and Nicholas Greenwood of Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP – http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=c1be8860-2d7d-466b-a1b7-3d3be7b93431 – have produced a pretty good summary of the case.

(UPDATE 15/10/13: this decision is subject to an appeal by the liquidators.)
(UPDATE 16/03/14: the liquidators’ appeal, heard on 20/02/14, was dismissed: http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2014/136.html. As in the first instance, the judge emphasised “the need to establish which of dual or even multiple purposes was dominant if a plausible claim to privilege was to be made out” (paragraph 22), and felt that the appellants had not demonstrated that the dominant purpose of the communications was for use in actual or anticipated litigation. He agreed with Counsel for the respondents that, even with liquidations of this nature, it cannot be right to assume that everything that a liquidator does is in contemplation of litigation.)

Re. Southern Pacific Personal Loans Limited (8 August 2013) ([2013] EWHC 2485 (Ch))

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/2485.html

Liquidators estimated that the costs of responding to data subject access requests (“DSARs”) on a case amounted to £40,000 per month. Thus, they sought directions on whether there was a way of avoiding this ongoing expense.

Mr Justice David Richards concluded that the rights to control the data remained vested in the company and the company remained under a statutory obligation to deal with the DSARs. He stated that, as the liquidators acted as agents of the company, they were not data controllers in respect of the data processed by the company prior to liquidation.

In considering application of the fifth data protection principle – that personal data should not be kept for longer than is necessary for the purposes for which it was processed – David Richards J directed that the liquidators might dispose of all personal data in respect of which the company is the data controller subject to two qualifications: (i) that the company retained sufficient data to enable it to respond to DSARs made before the disposal of data; and (ii) that the liquidators retained sufficient data to enable them to deal with any claims that might be made in the liquidation.

JSC BTA Bank v Usarel Investments Limited (24 June 2013) ([2013] EWHC 1780 (Ch))

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/1780.html

The circumstances of this case – involving a litigation receiver seeking a ruling that his appointment to defend an action gave him power to conduct an appeal (which was not granted) – are unlikely to arise often, if at all, but I thought that Mr Justice Warren’s comments on the integrity of court-appointed receivers were worth repeating.

Warren J felt that the receivers and managers (who were appointed after the litigation receiver) were just as competent to decide on whether an appeal should be pursued as the litigation receiver. He stated: “I do not consider that it can be said that, whenever the Court appoints a receiver and manager nominated by an applicant for such an appointment, there is inevitably a justified perception of bias if the appointed nominee needs to consider whether to pursue litigation against the person who applied for his appointment. His position, as an officer of the Court, is different from that of a receiver or manager appointed for instance by the holder of a charge over the company’s assets. A perhaps justified perception of bias in relation to a receiver or manager appointed out of Court should not be allowed to infect the perception of an officer of the court” (paragraph 37).

Bestrustees Plc v Kaupthing Singer & Friedlander Limited (in Administration) (31 July 2013) ([2013] EWHC 2407 (Ch))

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/2407.html

Bestrustees appealed against the Administrators’ decision to reduce its proof of debt by £2 million. The Administrators’ reason for reducing the proof was because the actuary had certified that the deficit of the occupational pension scheme (“the section 75 debt”) was £74,652,000, but they had attributed no value to the £2 million deposited by the scheme with the company in a trust account, which at that time was subject to legal proceedings but the funds were paid to the scheme later.

The Administrators were ordered to reverse the £2 million reduction to the proof, primarily because they had not challenged the amount of the section 75 debt, as certified by the actuary, and they had not challenged the nil value attributed to the deposit subject to pending litigation at that time. The Chancellor of the High Court, Sir Terence Etherton, observed: “the Employer Debt Regulations require the assets and liabilities of a pension scheme to be valued, for the purposes of ascertaining the section 75 debt, in a notional exercise immediately before the trigger event, here KSF entering into administration on 8 October 2008. Changes in the value of assets or the extent of liabilities after that time are irrelevant. In the present case, just as the value of the £2 million deposit increased after 8 October 2008 as litigation progressively clarified the rights of those, including the Trustee, entitled to the money in the trust account, so the evidence also shows that the scheme’s ‘buy out’ liabilities, that is to say the notional cost of going into the market to purchase the annuities which would match the scheme’s liabilities to its pensioners and members, also increased substantially after that date” (paragraph 35).

Wood & Hellard v Gorbunova & Ors (5 July 2013) ([2013] EWHC 1935 (Ch))

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/1935.html

Receivers were indemnified out of the assets only to the extent of two thirds of the costs of one respondent (and 85% of another’s) on the basis that the respondent’s costs “increased by reason of the inappropriate conduct of the application by the receivers” (paragraph 66).

Mr Justice Morgan acknowledged the “difficulties the receivers found themselves in and their proper desire to get the receivership moving” (paragraph 68), but he felt that the receivers had been unwise in seeking wide-ranging orders, some elements of which were dropped later by the receivers, and that they had persuaded themselves that the respondent was being recalcitrant when the judge felt that the respondent had behaved properly throughout and simply had been subject to legitimate constraints in delivering up papers.

JSC BTA Bank v Ablyazov (25 July 2013) ([2013] EWCA Civ 928)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2013/928.html

A freezing order was drafted in a standard form to prohibit Mr Ablyazov from in any way disposing of, dealing with, or diminishing the value of his assets. The bank sought to persuade the court that the loan facility agreements entered into by Mr Ablyazov, which enabled him to instruct the lenders to pay £40 million direct to third parties, were “assets” for the purposes of the freezing order.

The court at first instance agreed that they were choses in action, but its decision that not all choses in action were assets was appealed by the bank. Lord Justice Beatson agreed with the earlier judgment: “a man who is entitled to borrow and does so ‘is not ordinarily to be described as disposing of or dealing with an asset’. As Sir Roy Goode has stated, albeit in the context of section 127 of the Insolvency Act 1986, ‘[i]f there is one thing that is still clear in the increasingly complex financial scene … it is that a liability is not an asset and that an increase in a liability is not by itself a disposition of an asset’” (paragraph 72).

August 9, 2013
by insolvencyoracle Leave a comment

SIP2 – No Spin

A couple of months ago, I presented a webinar for R3 on SIP2. I thought I’d make the most of my efforts and post here some key points of that presentation. There’s nothing critical or new here; it’s just offered as a reminder of the contents and application of SIP2.

For ease of reference, SIP2 (or at least the E&W copy) can be found at http://www.r3.org.uk/index.cfm?page=1746 along with R3’s Practical Guidance Note, to which I also refer below.

The Purpose of SIP2

I think there’s a risk that SIP2 is viewed sometimes as setting the standards of investigation for D-reporting purposes. That seems to be how the Insolvency Service presents it in its Guidance Notes for Completion of CDDA Reports/Returns (http://www.bis.gov.uk/insolvency/Publications/publications-by-theme/insolvency-practitioners-publications). However, that’s clearly not the emphasis of SIP2 itself. The only reference to CDDA work is way down at paragraph 18: “an office holder should be mindful of the impact of the outcome of investigations on reports on the conduct of directors”.

The key purposes behind SIP2 are set out in the introduction. One purpose is to help office holders “to carry out appropriate investigations in order to address the specific duties of the office holder” (paragraph 2), which are described as investigating “what assets there are (including potential claims against third parties including the directors) and what recoveries can be made” (paragraph 1).

The introduction also describes the need for an office holder to carry out appropriate investigations “to allay if possible the legitimate concerns of creditors and other interested parties”. In the webinar, I described what those legitimate concerns might be and how office holders could allay them, although, to be honest, I found it a difficult topic to cover: unless the office holder goes to great lengths to investigate and explain the circumstances of a company’s demise, would creditors’ concerns ever truly be allayed? And is there a risk that an office holder could spend too much time (and money) exploring creditors’ concerns, which hold out no hope of enhancing any dividend prospect? Is that really what SIP2 is endorsing?

Therefore, in the webinar I majored on what I believe is the key purpose of SIP2: to identify what assets there are, including potential recoveries from challenges to antecedent transactions. As this objective is quite different from identifying what might be appropriate for a D-report (albeit that it might reveal matters relevant to a D-report), personally I feel SIP2 should have a different place in the case administration process. I do not believe that any SIP2 review/checklist should be nestled within a CDDA review. I also believe that it should be carried out – at least informally – much earlier than the traditional timing of CDDA reviews, which pretty-much seems to happen in month 5. Identifying the potential of hidden assets is often what being an office holder is all about and it is where office holders can really demonstrate their skills and add value to the insolvency process.

The R3 Practical Guidance Note

I suspect that there are many SIP2 checklists out there that pre-date the revised SIP2, which was released in May 2011, and I can see that, apart from the extension of SIP2 to Administrations, the current SIP2 plus R3 Guidance Note do not differ much from the old SIP2. However, there was a purpose in stripping out much of the prescription that was in the old SIP2. One of the two overriding principles of the current SIP2 is that investigations should be “proportionate to the circumstances of the case”. The JIC recognised that not every checklist item in the old SIP2 was a proportionate measure on every case. I know how IPs love to create step-by-step recipes for most aspects of case administration, but I think that the motive behind the 2011 SIP2 revision included an attempt to encourage IPs to be more intelligent about investigations.

However, the downside of less prescription is a nervousness on the part of some IPs as to how the regulatory bodies would measure concepts such as proportionality. How is an IP to know whether the extent of investigations he feels are proportionate meets the RPB’s expectations? Although I have some sympathy with this, I would suggest that IPs who keep in touch with their RPBs via newsletters, roadshows, and monitoring visits, with developing case law, and with what their peers are doing, by means of a healthy exchange of competent staff and by having a friendly IP or two (or a consultant, of course) to chat things over with, should be able to make a reasonable judgment of what is acceptable and appropriate. And IPs who document their thought-processes adequately should be in a position to set out a reasonable defence of their actions, if challenged.

But, once upon a time, when SIPs were “best”, rather than required practice, the old SIP2’s prescriptive steps-to-take-for-a-successful-investigation had been useful to IPs. As a consequence, this information was reproduced in the R3 Practical Guidance Note so that it was not lost forever. But it is worth remembering that this note is only guidance – it would be wrong to follow it slavishly for every case without having regard for the specific circumstances.

The Structure

The SIP identifies a two-stage process:

• Steps expected on all cases, culminating in an “initial assessment”
• Deciding on and proposing further investigation, seeking appropriate sanction and communicating with creditors

Steps expected on all administrations and insolvent liquidations

Locate, secure and list books and records

Helpful resources (if you need/want any such material!) include:

• Insolvency Guidance Paper: “Systems for Control of Accounting and other Business Records” (March 2006): http://www.icaew.com/~/media/Files/Technical/Insolvency/insolvency-guidance-papers/tech-03-06-insolvency-guidance-paper-systems-for-control-of-accounting-and-other-business-records.pdf (strangely not publicly available on the R3, IPA or Insolvency Service websites)
• R3 Technical Bulletin 104, section 5 (June 2013)
• Dear IP 57, page 10.54 (March 2013): http://www.insolvencydirect.bis.gov.uk/insolvencyprofessionandlegislation/dearip/dearipmill/hardcopy.htm. Whilst this relates to disqualification cases, it does help, I think, to convey the difficulties the Service has encountered when an IP’s record-securing process is less than robust.
• Insolvency Service’s CDDA guidance notes – again, this is not strictly SIP2 territory, but it is worth noting that, in disqualification proceedings, “the courts will expect the office holder to have made every reasonable effort to secure accounting records which inevitably means requesting them on more than one occasion” (page 19).

Invite parties to provide information

Invitations are to be sent to creditors (at the first communication/meeting – don’t forget that this applies to Administrations too), committee members, and predecessors in office. The SIP states that you’re asking them “whether prior transactions by the company, or the conduct of any person involved with the company, could give rise to action for recovery” (paragraph 6), so again the purpose is to unearth hidden assets, not to gather information for a D-report.

Make enquiries of directors and senior employees

It is pretty standard procedure for IPs to send questionnaires to the directors… but do you think about senior employees? Also, whilst standard questionnaires do the job adequately, I have seen forms tailored to the specific circumstances of a case. After all, often IPs quickly develop suspicions of where potential recoveries might be hiding – why not slip in the odd question to get right to the point?

The “Initial Assessment”

This should be done “notwithstanding any shortage of funds”, but how much work do you put into this? It might help to focus on what you’re trying to achieve. The SIP states that you should get to a position of being able to decide “whether there could be any matters that might lead to recoveries for the estate and what further investigations may be appropriate” (paragraph 10), so you’re not expected to have positively identified causes of action, but you are expected to have identified possibilities and to have an idea of what you might do to get to that stage.

The R3 Guidance Note recommends (i) comparing the SoA with the last filed/management accounts and (ii) carrying out a preliminary review of the books, records and minutes over the last 6 months. I also think it is a good idea simply to list the possible rights of action – the list of sections of the IA86 and CA06 that appears in the Guidance Note – and ask yourself: have I any suspicion that any of these might have occurred?

Over and above this, the extent of your investigations should be determined by taking account of:

• The public interest
• Potential recoveries
• The funds likely to be available to fund an investigation; and
• The costs involved (paragraph 11).

What exactly is the office holder’s public interest role and how much of an influence will this have over the extent of your investigations? Good question, particularly considering that I’m sure we all know of CDDA cases that were not taken forward on the basis that it was not in the public’s interest. I thought the comments of Mr Justice Newey in Wood & Anor v Mistry [2012] (http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2012/1899.html) were helpful in noting the liquidator’s public interest role – the case involved liquidators making their own application for a disqualification under the CDDA. Newey J describes the circumstances that might prevail for such an application (paragraph 30).

Seeking Sanction

The statutory requirements for a Liquidator seeking sanction are contained in Schedule 4 of the IA86 and Rules 4.218A to E (for litigation expenses to be paid from floating charge realisations). The statutory requirements for an Administrator are..? Given that Administrators can challenge many antecedent transactions – S213 and 214 being the obvious exceptions – I’m surprised that there seems to be a perception that a Liquidator is better-placed to pursue these matters (although, of course, the duration of likely actions is a consideration). In particular, I understand that HMRC is still in the habit of modifying Administrators’ Proposals to seek the swift move into liquidation on the apparent basis that more will be done about antecedent goings-on… maybe HMRC wants the control over the office holder provided by the statutory requirements to seek sanction (yes I know, it’s highly unlikely that the HMRC appreciates this subtlety). If so, it might be disappointed to note that the recent Red Tape Challenge consultation includes the proposal that the sanction requirements on liquidators of Schedule 4 be dropped.

Although SIP2 does not add further requirements to seek sanction, it does recommend that IPs consider consulting or seeking sanction where they “conclude that the outcome is uncertain and the costs that would be incurred would materially affect the funds available for distribution” (paragraph 13). This makes sense: sometimes creditors are happy for you to spend the estate funds in pursuit of a potential recovery, especially if they think it may mean some pain for the directors, but in some cases they may prefer to cut their losses and run.

Disclosure

In order to obtain sanction, it will be necessary to provide some information on what you’re planning to do. The SIP recognises that it may be more discrete to consult with select creditors, either the major ones or committee members (subject to the statutory requirements mentioned above).

However, the SIP also sets out expectations of communicating with the entire body of creditors “regarding investigations, any action taken, and whether funding is being provided by third parties” (paragraph 17). It does acknowledge the issues of privilege and confidentiality. R3’s recent Technical Bulletin 103 provides some useful information on legal professional privilege and, in relation to confidentiality, you could do worse than consider the Insolvency Ethics Code’s description of the principle.

It may be a difficult balance to achieve, but SIP2 does require “as a minimum” that the office holder includes within the first progress report “a statement dealing with the office holder’s initial assessment, whether any further investigations or action were considered, and the outcome; and include within subsequent reports a statement dealing with investigations and actions concluded during the period and those that are continuing” (paragraph 17). It should be remembered that usually in effect creditors’ money is being used to further investigations and the Ethics Code’s principle of transparency requires office holders to observe their professional duty to report openly to those with an interest in the outcome of the insolvency. In addition, keeping in mind that SIP2 investigations are primarily concerned with identifying hidden assets, it is clear that a bland statement in progress reports such as “the office holders have complied with their requirements to report to the Insolvency Service in relation to CDDA matters but the contents of such a report are confidential” does not meet the SIP2 disclosure requirement.

Further Investigations

The R3 Practical Guidance Note suggests some areas that, “where it is agreed to conduct further investigations.., may be usefully borne in mind, depending on the circumstances of the case and the nature of the investigations”. The suggested areas are pretty-much the old SIP2 points, but my personal opinion is that, if IPs have got to this stage, they should be in an position to decide for themselves how best to conduct further investigations. Surely this is the point at which an IP’s professional judgment comes into play.

July 28, 2013
by insolvencyoracle Leave a comment

Not the Nortel/Lehman Decision

I am not going to comment on the Supreme Court’s decision in Nortel and Lehman, because, as with Eurosail, it has had plenty of coverage already. Instead, I’ll cover a few lesser-known cases, with a couple of Scotland ones taking the top-billing:

• Scotland: Re The Scottish Coal Company Ltd – Liquidator entitled to disclaim land and onerous licences (UPDATE: this was overturned on 12 December 2013 ([2013]CSIH 108). A summary of that reclaiming motion is at http://wp.me/p2FU2Z-5v.)
• Scotland: Re Station Properties Ltd – judge not convinced case made out for para 80 exit from administration and administrators directed to issue revised proposals to cover change of administration objective
• Re GP Aviation Group International Ltd – appeals against tax assessments are not property capable of assignment by a liquidator
• USDAW v WW Realisations 1 Ltd – reversal of Woolworths/Ethel Austin decisions on redundancy consultation legislation: number of redundancies at each location not as relevant as total number
• Evans & Evans v Finance-U-Limited – creditor who proved in full in bankruptcy did not renounce security
• Scotland: Re William Rose – Trustee’s late application to extend 3-year period could not reverse property re-vesting
• Northern Ireland: Tipping v BDG Group Ltd – late application for protective award allowed, as ignorance of the law considered reasonable

However, if you do want to read a summary of Nortel/Lehman, I think that 11 Stone Buildings’ briefing note covers the subject well: http://www.11sb.com/news/24-july-2013—nortel—lehman-supreme-court-decision–guidance-on-insolvency-expenses-and-provable-claims.asp. I’m sure most IPs are breathing a sigh of relief and waiting, a little more comfortably now, for the Game appeal…

Finally, a Scottish precedent for a liquidator’s power to disclaim (UPDATE: … not so fast!)

Scotland: Re. The Scottish Coal Company Limited (11 July 2013) ([2013] CSOH 124)

http://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotCS/2013/2013CSOH124.html

Liquidators sought directions on whether they could abandon or disclaim land and/or onerous water use licences, in order to avoid the substantial costs involved in maintaining and restoring the sites, which the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (“SEPA”) would require before it would accept a surrender of its licences. SEPA and other bodies made representations, conscious that, if the liquidators succeeded, significant costs might fall to the taxpayer.

Scottish readers will be aware that there is no express statutory provision available to liquidators of Scottish companies to disclaim onerous property, in contrast to the position of liquidators of English and Welsh companies who may disclaim under S178 of the Insolvency Act 1986. Counsel in this case were also unable to find any case law or textbook showing a liquidator of a Scottish company exercising such a power.

Lord Hodge drew a comparison with the position of a Trustee in a sequestration, which has power to abandon land, and contemplated its effect in relation to S169(2) of the Act, which provides that “in a winding up by the court in Scotland, the liquidator has (subject to the rules) the same powers as a trustee on a bankruptcy estate”. The judge felt that it was not an exact comparison, as the effect of a trustee’s abandonment was to reverse the vesting so that the bankrupt owns the property. However, there is no vesting of property in a liquidator, so if he were somehow to bring to an end the company’s ownership of the property, it would become ownerless. Although the judge saw the potential for abuse as a means of avoiding obligations, he saw no reason in principle why land could not be made ownerless, given that the Crown has a right to waive ownership of bona vacantia, which would render such property ownerless.

The judge then considered whether the liquidators could avoid the obligations imposed under the Water Environment (Controlled Activities) (Scotland) Regulations 2005 (“CAR”) in seeking to surrender the licences. The judge described powerful considerations that might have persuaded him to hold that the liquidators could not disclaim the licences, one reason being that he thought “that there is a strong public interest in the maintenance of a healthy environment, the remediation of pollution and the protection of biodiversity. There is a conflict between the results sought by the directive and the insolvency regime. I do not think that the insolvency regime has any primacy which means that CAR can exclude a liquidator’s power to disclaim only if, like section 36 of the Coal Industry Act 1994, it says so expressly” (paragraph 51). However, the judge recognised that “if the relevant provisions of CAR have the effect of (a) removing a liquidator’s right to disclaim the property of a company and refuse to perform an obligation in relation to that property and (b) creating a new liquidation expense which would have to be met before the claims of preferential creditors, it seems to me that it would modify the law on reserved matters… It would also be altering the order of priority on liquidation expenses in rule 4.67 of the Insolvency (Scotland) Rules 1986 if… the remuneration of the liquidator were to rank equally with the obligation to spend money to comply with CAR” (paragraph 64).

Consequently, the judge concluded that the liquidators could disclaim the sites and abandon the water use licences along with the obligations under CAR. He also endorsed the liquidators’ proposed mechanism for effecting the abandonment, which involved giving notice to all interested parties, advertising the fact so that locals were made aware of the abandoned sites, and sending a notice to the Keeper of the Registers in Scotland.

(UPDATE 09/01/14: this decision was overturned in a reclaiming motion ([2013] CSIH 108) on 12/12/13 – see http://wp.me/p2FU2Z-5v.)

Scotland: More work required of administrators to exit via Para 80 and administrators directed to submit revised proposals to address change in objective

Re. Station Properties Limited (In Administration) (12 July 2013) ([2013] CSOH 120)

http://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotCS/2013/2013CSOH120.html

The administrators’ proposals, which included that they thought that the objective set out in Paragraph 3(1)(c) of Schedule B1 would be achieved, were approved at a creditors’ meeting. Subsequently, it appeared to the administrators that all creditors should receive full repayment of their debts, as the directors had secured funding, and therefore they planned to exit the administration and hand control of the company back to the directors. The quantum of the claim of one creditor, Dunedin Building Company Limited (“DB”), was subject to a legal action. DB objected to the administrators’ plan arguing that they should adjudicate on its claim before ending the administration.

The administrators sought directions as to whether in the circumstances they could end the administration under Paragraph 80 of Schedule B1 on the basis that the purpose had been sufficiently achieved notwithstanding DB’s objection.

Lord Hodge felt that an administrator could not come to this conclusion “without obtaining a clear understanding of the directors’ business plan and cash flow forecasts and forming an independent view, in the light of the best evidence reasonably available, whether that plan and those forecasts are realistic” (paragraph 20). He also felt that “It would be consistent with current accountancy practice to require the directors to produce a business plan and forecasts for at least 12 months and to attempt to look into the future beyond that time to identify whether there was anything which was likely to undermine the company’s viability” (paragraph 22). The ultimate value of DB’s claim was a factor in assessing the company’s future cash flow solvency, so the judge felt either that the administrators should await the outcome of the legal action or they “should take steps to enable themselves to reach an informed and up to date view on the likely value of that claim” (paragraph 23) before they could decide whether the company had been rescued as a going concern.

Lord Hodge also felt that the administrators had to deal with the change in administration objective – from Para 3(1)(c), as set out in their proposals, to Para 3(1)(a) – by issuing revised proposals under Para 54. “I am not persuaded that the obligation on an administrator under para 4 of Schedule B1 to ‘perform his functions as quickly and efficiently as is reasonably practicable’ provides any justification for bypassing para 54 even if an administrator were of the view that a dissenting creditor would be outvoted at the creditors’ meeting” (paragraph 30).

Although personally, I see this as a significant conclusion, particularly as I don’t think I’ve seen any administrator issue revised proposals, it should be remembered that the judge felt that, in the circumstances of this case, the change in administration objective was a substantial change, particularly because DB had been in dispute with the directors regarding its claim and the change in objective could see the company reverting to the directors’ control before the claim was determined.

Right to appeal a tax assessment is not property capable of being assigned

Re. GP Aviation Group International Limited (In Liquidation): Williams v Glover & Pearson (4 June 2013) ([2013] EWHC 1447 (Ch))

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/1447.html

Former directors asked the liquidator to appeal against HMRC’s corporation tax assessments, but the liquidator did not have the finance to fund the appeals, so the former directors asked the liquidator to assign the appeals to them. The liquidator sought directions on whether he had the power to assign the appeals.

HH Judge Pelling QC concluded that the right of appeal was not property within the meaning of the Insolvency Act and so was no capable of being assigned. He noted that the liability, to which the right of appeal related, could not be assigned and the right of appeal could not be assigned separately. He stated that, even if it had been capable of assignment, he would not have sanctioned it, as: “the assignment of the right to appeal without being able to assign or novate the liability would place the office holder in a potentially invidious position – an unreasonable and intransigent position might be adopted in relation to the appeal that might expose the Company to penalties, interest and costs that could otherwise have been avoided. This risk is not one that the court should sanction given the potential implications for creditors as a whole” (paragraph 32). The judge made it clear that his judgment applied strictly to the bare right to appeal in this case. “Different considerations may apply where the liability can be novated or where the appeal right is one that is incidental to a property right that can be assigned (for example a right to appeal a planning decision in relation to land that is sold by an office holder)” (paragraph 33).

Less than 20 redundancies at any one site did not avoid consultation requirements where more than 20 were made redundant over all sites

USDAW & Anor v WW Realisation 1 Limited & Ors (30 May 2013) ([2013] UKEAT 0547 and 0548/12)

http://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKEAT/2013/0547_12_3005.html

I appreciate I’m behind the times on this one, which has been widely publicised in the past couple of months.

Earlier Tribunals had decided that there was no duty to consult under TULRCA with staff who worked at different sites where less than 20 redundancies were planned at those sites even though the total number of dismissals across the company was over 20. The Tribunals dealt with two separate cases involving such redundancies of staff who had worked in Ethel Austin and Woolworths stores. The consequence had been that 4,400 workers had been excluded from awards for the companies’ failures to consult, which had been granted to c.24,000 of their former colleagues who had worked at larger stores and head offices.

These decisions were overturned on appeals, although the judge expressed some disappointment that the respondents did not attend or comment, feeling that it put the Tribunal at a disadvantage. In particular, the judge noted that, as a consequence of the appeals, the Secretary of State for BIS would be faced with the prospect of paying out 60 or 90 days’ pay for 4,400 people.

The key issue was discerning the purpose behind S188(1) of TULRCA, which refers to “20 or more employees at one establishment”, which the Appeal Tribunal decided was more restrictive than the EC Directive, which was intended to be implemented into domestic legislation by means of S188. The judge concluded that “the clear Parliamentary intention was to implement the Directive correctly” (paragraph 50). Therefore, “the only way to deliver the core objective of protection of the dismissed workers in the two cases on appeal is to construe ‘establishment’ as meaning the retail business of each employer. This is a fact-sensitive approach which may not be the same in every case but it is consistent with the core objective as applied to the facts in these two cases” (paragraph 52). However, the Tribunal preferred a solution that made “the point more clearly and simply so that it can be applied without detailed consideration of the added fact sensitive dimension. We hold that the words ‘at one establishment’ should be deleted from section 188 as a matter of construction pursuant to our obligations to apply the Directive’s purpose” (paragraph 53), although they acknowledged that this might be a step too far.

(UPDATE 08/03/15: the European Advocate General’s opinion suggests that ‘at one establishment’ does have a purpose and is compatible with EU law. Although it is likely, it remains to be seen whether the ECJ will follow the Advocate General’s opinion. For a summary of the position as it stands at present, take a look at http://goo.gl/HhjHPN or http://goo.gl/MsfGFZ.)

Creditor who proved in full in a bankruptcy did not renounce its security

Evans & Evans v Finance-U-Limited (18 July 2013) ([2013] EWCA Civ 869)

http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2013/869.html

In 2007, Mr and Mrs Evans purchased a car financed by a loan from Finance-U-Limited (“FUL”) and a bill of sale granting FUL security over the car. Mr Evans went bankrupt later in 2007 and Mrs Evans went bankrupt in 2008. FUL proved in Mr Evans’ bankruptcy for the full sum due under the loan agreement; the existence of security was disclosed on the proof, but no value was put on it. The claim was admitted in full and FUL later received a small dividend. After Mrs Evans’ discharge from bankruptcy, she continued to pay monthly instalments to FUL until mid-2010. In 2012, the Evans were successful in seeking a declaration that the car was their property free from any claim by FUL on the basis that, because FUL had proved in full in Mr Evans’ bankruptcy, it no longer had a right to enforce its security over the car. FUL appealed the declaration.

Lord Justice Patten referred to the case of Whitehead v Household Mortgage Corporation Plc in which it was decided that the acceptance of a dividend from an IVA “did not amount to an agreement or election by the creditor to treat as unsecured that part of the debt in respect of which the dividend had been paid” (paragraph 20). He felt that “FUL was not therefore required to renounce its security as the price of being able to prove for the balance of the debt nor was that the effect of it proving for the entire amount due. It therefore retained its right to enforce the security following Mr Evans’ bankruptcy but did not exercise that right whilst Mrs Evans continued to meet the instalments” (paragraph 21). He therefore reversed the decision at first instance and, as the term of the loan had expired, he decided that FUL was entitled to possess the car free from any statutory requirement to give notice.

Scotland: impossible to undo the reinvesting of a family home in the debtor

Re. Sequestrated Estate of William Rose (4 June 2013) ([2013] ScotSC 42)

http://www.bailii.org/scot/cases/ScotSC/2013/42.html

The Trustee sought a warrant to serve an application under S39A(7) of the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 1985 on the debtor and his spouse. The debtor was sequestrated on 20 May 2008, so the Trustee sought to extend the 3-year time period after which the family home is reinvested in the debtor, albeit that the 3 years had expired before the Trustee made his application. The Trustee explained that he had failed to act sooner as a consequence of an “administrative error” (paragraph 4.3).

Sheriff Philip Mann was “unmoved” by the submissions on behalf of the Trustee: “The plain fact of the matter is that, on the Trustee’s averments, the property has already reverted to the ownership of the debtor and it is now too late to prevent that from happening. The Trustee is not trying to prevent that from happening. He is, in effect, trying to reverse that which has already happened in consequence of section 39A(2). Section 39A(7) says nothing about reversing the effect of section 39A(2)” (paragraph 5.4). The Sheriff therefore concluded that the Trustee’s application was incompetent and he refused to grant the warrant.

Northern Ireland: ignorance of remedy for company’s failure to consult was “reasonable”, thus five months’ late claim allowed

Tipping v BDG Group Limited (In Liquidation) ([2013] NIIT 2351/12) (19 April 2013)

http://www.bailii.org/nie/cases/NIIT/2013/2351_12IT.html

Whilst it is a Northern Ireland case, so of limited application, I thought it was worth mentioning briefly that the former employee succeeded in claiming compensation for the company’s failure to consult, despite his claim being lodged five months after the “primary limitation period” for lodging a complaint with the Tribunal.

The reason for the delay was that the claimant had not been aware of the protective award. “Courts and tribunals have consistently held that ignorance as to one’s entitlement to make a complaint of unfair dismissal is not reasonable ignorance. (This is on the basis that the general public now are well aware of entitlements to make unfair dismissal complaints). However, the situation is different in respect of protective award complaints. The availability of remedies in respect of collective redundancy consultation failures, the threshold (of 20 redundancies), and the circumstances in which an individual, as distinct from a trade union or employee forum representative, can seek such remedies, are all matters which are not generally well known” (paragraphs 16 and 17) and therefore the Tribunal held that it could allow the complaint, albeit that, in the judge’s view, the further period of five months was “close to the boundaries of what I consider to be ‘reasonable’” (paragraph 21).

March 7, 2013
by insolvencyoracle Leave a comment

Three cases: (1) What is the relevant date for IVAs suspended on a S262 challenge? (2) When is an alleged transaction at an undervalue not a “transaction”? (3) Vesting of causes of action in Trustee foils attempts to pursue misfeasance claim

• Davis & Davis v Price & Price – what is the relevant date for IVAs suspended on a S262 challenge?
• Hunt v Hosking & Ors – when is an alleged transaction at an undervalue not a “transaction”?
• Fabb & Ors v Peters & Ors – vesting of causes of action in Trustee foils attempts to pursue misfeasance claim

What exactly is a “suspended” IVA?

Davis & Davis v Price & Price ([2013] EWHC 323 (Ch)) (21 February 2013)
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/323.html

Summary: As a consequence of a successful S262 challenge, two debtors’ IVAs were suspended and further creditors’ meetings were convened to consider their revised Proposals. After these were approved, the S262 challengers issued statutory demands in pursuit of their costs for bringing the challenge. The appeals judge agreed that the statutory demands should be set aside on the basis that the costs were caught in the IVAs, for which the relevant date was the second meetings’ date. Contrary to the wording of the S262 order, the judge felt that the effect of suspending the original IVAs was not to continue to bind the original creditors.

The Detail: The Prices challenged the Davises’ IVAs under S262 in relation to the values of £1 attributed to their claims for the purposes of voting at creditors’ meetings held in June 2010. The challenge was successful and the District Judge ordered the suspension of the Davises’ IVAs – which would not have been approved had the Prices’ claims been admitted for voting in the sum of £35,389, the value placed on the claims for voting purposes by DJ Gamba – and required the Davises to decide whether to re-present the original Proposals or to present varied Proposals for consideration at further creditors’ meetings to be convened by the Nominee. The Davises were also ordered to pay the Prices’ costs of £7,011.

At creditors’ meetings held on 13 January 2011, the Prices again voted to reject the Proposals, which had been revised by the Davises, but the Prices only proved in the sum of £35,389. However, the requisite majorities were achieved and the revised Proposals were approved. The Prices then pursued payment of their costs of £7,011 on the argument that they were not claims in the IVAs, because they did not exist at the time of the original interim orders in April 2010.

The question at the heart of this matter was: what was the effect of the suspension of the Davises’ IVAs? In this appeal, counsel for the Prices sought to distinguish between an order revoking an IVA and one suspending it, both options available to the court under S262(4). Mr Justice David Richards noted that there was only one rule relating to entitlements to vote at a creditors’ meeting convened to consider an IVA Proposal – R5.21; the rules make no distinction as to whether this is the first time such a meeting is convened or whether it is convened on the back of a revoked IVA or a suspended IVA under S262(4). The judge considered that in this circumstance the reference in R5.21(2)(b) to the “amount of the debt owed to him at the date of the meeting” was the amount owed at the date of the January 2011 meeting convened to consider the revised Proposals and therefore the Prices had been entitled to prove also in respect of their costs in bringing the S262 challenge.

So what is the status of a suspended IVA? The wording of DJ Gamba’s order resulting from the S262 challenge had stated that, if the proposed variation was put to the vote and rejected, the approval of the IVAs on 8 June 2010 would be revoked with immediate effect “and the IVA Creditors shall ceased to be bound by the IVAs”; it further provided that, if the IVAs were reconsidered and approved, the suspension of the approval of the IVAs would be lifted with immediate effect and “the IVA Creditors shall continue to be bound by the IVAs in accordance with section 260”. However, David Richards J stated: “I do not think it is right that if the approval of an IVA is suspended, it nonetheless continues to bind creditors. Once approval is suspended, it does not seem to me possible to say that there is an ‘approved arrangement’ within the meaning of section 260(2)” (paragraph 29). He acknowledged that S262(7) grants the court power to give supplemental directions, but he did not believe that this enabled the court to substitute a different rule for R5.21 in relation to creditors’ voting rights.

12/02/2014 UPDATE: Although the appeal heard on 21/01/2014 was dismissed (http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2014/26.html), it did highlight a(nother!) problem with the Act: S260, which binds creditors into an approved IVA, expressly has effect “where the meeting summoned under S257 approves the proposed” IVA. However, in this case, the meetings that led to approved IVAs were consequent to a S262 challenge and, as Lady Justice Arden put it, “if the IVAs were varied and the creditors approved those varied IVAs, those were the IVAs to come into force, not the original IVAs. In reality what happened in that event is that the varied IVAs replaced the original IVAs. The original IVAs ceased to have any legal existence after that” (paragraph 33).

Thus, were the creditors bound by S260? “The court must of course give effect to the intention of Parliament… However, where the effect of a literal interpretation of a statute is to create significant anomalies which the court is satisfied Parliament could not have intended, the court should seek to find an interpretation which avoids those anomalies” (paragraphs 38 and 39). In order to achieve this end, Lady Justice Arden interpreted the reference to a “further meeting” in S262(4)(b) to be a reference to a “further meeting under S257” so that S260 has effect.

The Company must be party to the transaction for it to be challenged at an undervalue

Hunt v Hosking & Ors ([2013] EWHC311 (Ch)) (22 February 2013)
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/311.html

Summary: A liquidator sought to challenge as transactions at an undervalue payments made to Mr Hosking from the Company’s client monies held by its accountants – the monies were paid to Mr Hosking in settlement of his private loan to the accountant, who appeared to be entitled to the monies by reason of two fee agreements with the Company. However, the liquidator’s S238 application failed on the basis that the payments to Mr Hosking were not “transactions” to which the Company was party. The judge pointed out that either the accountants were not authorised to pass the monies over, in which case it would be an issue of misappropriation of assets, or the challenge should be levelled at the fee agreements between the accountants and the Company.

The Detail: A firm of accountants, of which Mr Temple was the sole proprietor, held monies on behalf of its client, Ovenden Colbert Printers Limited (“the Company”), from which the accountants appeared to be entitled to draw fees pursuant to two fee agreements. A number of payments were made from the accountants’ client account to Mr Hosking, which he claims related to repayments of his private loan to Mr Temple (who later became bankrupt).

Mr Hunt, the Company’s liquidator, applied under S238 claiming that the payments made from the client account to Mr Hosking were transactions at an undervalue. The liquidator made other allegations regarding the strength of the fee agreements with a suggestion that they may have been induced under misrepresentation. However, the fee agreements were not the subject of the S238 application.

Mr Justice Peter Smith identified a fundamental difficulty with Mr Hunt’s argument that the payments to Mr Hosking were transactions at an undervalue: the Company was not a party to the payments. He illustrated it this way: “If Mr Temple held a bag of sovereigns for the Company and they were held to the Company’s order, and if he gave them away to Mr Hosking, I suggested that that would not be a transaction. It would simply be a case of misappropriation of assets. Of course, the Company through the liquidator would have any number of remedies to recover those sovereigns. Such a claim could be made not only against Mr Temple but also against Mr Hosking if he receives the sovereigns. That is not the present claim… The fundamental difficulty facing Mr Hunt is that however much he investigates; however much mud he wishes to throw at Mr Hosking; none of it is relevant to his application under section 238. This is because on the undisputed facts set out above, the Company has not entered into a transaction which the liquidator can review. The only transactions it entered into in my opinion were the two fee agreements and those are not under challenge and indeed one of them cannot be under challenge due to the passage of time. If the payments were authorised they cannot be challenged unless the two fee agreements are challenged and they are not in these proceedings. If the payments were unauthorised, there is no transaction by the Company” (paragraphs 50 and 55).

[UPDATE 26/11/2013: Hunt’s appeal against the summary judgment/strike out application was dismissed on 15/11/2013 (http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWCA/Civ/2013/1408.html). It seems to me that the fundamental difficulty remained: there was no indication that the Company had been party to any relevant transaction. Thus, the Court of Appeal decided that the judge had been right to strike out the application, as the claims under S238 and S241 had no prospect of success.]

Vesting of causes of action in Trustee foils attempts to pursue misfeasance claim

Fabb & Ors v Peters & Ors ([2013] EWHC 296 (Ch)) (18 January 2013)
http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2013/296.html

Summary: A claim against administrators under Paragraph 75 of Schedule B1 was struck out as an abuse of process on the basis that the claimant knew his causes of action had vested in his Trustee in Bankruptcy at the time. In addition, the fact that 96% of the administrators’ claims against Fabb had been abandoned was not sufficient to support a misfeasance claim, as judgment had been achieved in relation to the remainder.

The Detail: Fabb was made bankrupt after administrators of “Holdings” obtained judgment against him of c.£88,000 in relation to a loan account and on a conversion claim, although over 96% of the administrators’ original claim was, effectively abandoned.

Fabb asserted two causes of action against the administrators: misfeasance and, in effect, malicious prosecution of the earlier proceedings as regards the 96% of the claims that were abandoned. After the proceedings commenced, the court ordered Fabb’s Trustee to assign to Fabb the various claims, conditionally on payment of £10,000; the assignment had not yet been completed.

His Honour Judge Purle QC noted a fundamental objection to the misfeasance proceedings: “Proceedings under paragraph 75 can only (so far as presently relevant) be brought by a shareholder or creditor. Mr Fabb is neither of those things, and nor will he be either of those things even if the assignment takes place. Any interest he may have had in the shares of Holdings is now vested in his trustee. Likewise, any indebtedness formerly due to him is now vested in his trustee… There is a still further objection. These proceedings were brought at a time when Mr Fabb knew that the causes of action he wishes to assert were vested in his trustee in bankruptcy, and that he needed an assignment” (paragraphs 13 and 16). On this basis, the judge felt bound to strike out Fabb’s claim as an abuse of process.

In any event, the judge identified difficulties in relation to the merits of Fabb’s claims that the 96% claim was brought abusively, for an improper motive or an improper purpose: “What to my mind makes the claim impossible is that the proceedings in which the 96 percent claim was included were pursued to judgment. True it is that the 96 percent claim was abandoned, but the rest of the claim was pursued over an eight day hearing, I think it was, and the claim succeeded in substantial amounts, despite a fully argued defence. It is difficult to see in those circumstances how the proceedings can be characterised as malicious or an abuse, as they had to be, and were successfully, pursued to judgment, albeit in a much smaller sum than originally claimed” (paragraph 23).

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