Hindle v John Cotton Ltd: HL 3 Jul 1919

Viscount Finlay said: ‘Where the question is one of abuse of powers, the state of mind of those who acted, and the motive on which they acted, are all important, and you may go into the question of what their intention was, collecting from the surrounding circumstances all the materials which genuinely throw light upon that question of the state of mind of the directors so as to show whether they were honestly acting in discharge of their powers in the interests of the company or were acting from some bye-motive, possibly of personal advantage, or for any other reason.’

Judges:

Viscount Finlay, Viscount Cave, and Lords Dunedin, Shaw, and Wrenbury

Citations:

(1919) 56 Sc LR 625, [1919] UKHL 625

Links:

Bailii

Jurisdiction:

Scotland

Cited by:

CitedEclairs Group Ltd and Glengary Overseas Ltd v JKX Oil and Gas Plc SC 2-Dec-2015
Company Director not Trustee but is Fiduciary
The Court was asked about an alleged ‘corporate raid’, an attempt to exploit a minority shareholding in a company to obtain effective management or voting control without paying what other shareholders would regard as a proper price.
Held: The . .
CitedMills v Mills 1938
(High Court of Australia) Where the main purpose of the directors’ resolution (in this case to increase the share base) is to benefit the company it matters not that it incidentally also benefits a director.
Dixon J pointed out the difficulties . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

Company

Updated: 30 March 2022; Ref: scu.595473