The claimant had failed in an action for damages against the respondent, and had failed to pay the costs award. The respondent issued a statutory demand. He claimed that it was invalid because the chief constable had changed in the interim, and there had been no assignment of the benefit of the order.
Held: The office of chief constable was not a corporation, but an office. Some assignment was required. There was no statutory assignment, but there had been an equitable one. An equitable assignment need take no particular form: ‘All that is needed is a sufficient expression of an intention to assign’. Equity would treat as done that which ought to have been done.
Citations:
Times 24-Dec-2003, [2003] EWHC 3391, [2004] 1 WLR 1425
Statutes:
Insolvency Rules 1986 (1986 No 1925) 6.1
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Attorney-General for New South Wales v Perpetual Trustee Co Ltd PC 14-Mar-1955
(Australia) The Crown could not recover damages for the loss of the services of a police constable as the result of injuries caused by the negligence of a third person. A chief constable was an office held under the Crown, and the usual relationship . .
Cited by:
Appeal from – Coulter v Chief Constable of Dorset Police CA 8-Oct-2004
The appellant had failed in his action against the police and been ordered to pay the costs. A statutory demand was issued in the name of the respondent, but as the new chief constable had no deed of assignment, he was only equitable assignee.
See Also – Coulter v Chief Constable of Dorset Police CA 13-Jul-2005
An appeal was made against an order refusing to set aside a second statutory demand. The demand was to enforce payment of an order for costs made in proceedings between the parties. The first statutory demand had been upheld, and the judge found . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Police, Insolvency, Equity
Updated: 12 May 2022; Ref: scu.189946