Mr K asserted beneficial ownership under a resulting trust over land in Scotland bought by an English company to which he had advanced the purchase price. Scots law, the lex situs of the land, did not recognise any equitable interest. The company having gone into receivership.
Held: A declaration was granted in these English proceedings that the property or its proceeds of sale were held on trust for him: ‘No event governed by Scottish law [had] occurred whereby any equity arising under English law was destroyed.’
Miller LJ said: ‘If A provides money to B, both being resident in England, to purchase landed property in his own name but for and on A’s behalf, and B does so, the consequences of that transaction are governed by English law. It would be absurd if they were governed by the law of the place where the property in question happened to be located.
Such a rule would lead to bizarre results if, for example, A’s instructions were to buy properties in more than one jurisdiction, for the consequences of the same arrangement might then be different in relation to the different properties acquired. It would also lead to bizarre results if A left it to B’s discretion to choose the property to be acquired, since that would give B the unilateral power to decide on the legal consequences of the transaction which he had entered into with A.’
Judges:
Peter Gibson, Henry and Millett LJJ
Citations:
(1998) 23(1) Tru LI 35
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Dictum approved – Deschamps v Miller 1908
The parties disputed land in India. A French couple, had married in France in community of property. So according to the French marriage contract the wife was supposed to be entitled to one half of the husband’s after-acquired property. The husband . .
Cited by:
Cited – Akers and Others v Samba Financial Group SC 1-Feb-2017
Saad Investments was a Cayman Islands company in liquidation. The liquidator brought an action here, but the defendant sought a stay saying that another forum was clearly more appropriate. Shares in Saudi banks were said to be held in trust for the . .
Cited – Luxe Holding Ltd v Midland Resources Holding Ltd ChD 23-Jul-2010
Midland agreed to sell to Luxe shares in 20 companies, 17 of which were incorporated in Russia or the Ukraine, with the lex situs of the shares in them being also there. Midland defaulted, sold the shares in the Russian and Ukrainian companies . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Trusts
Updated: 18 July 2022; Ref: scu.640391