WIFE TO REPAY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIII, Issue 209, 3 September 1932, Page 9

WIFE TO REPAY.

NAPIER BANKRUPTCY SEQUEL MONEY EXPENDED ON LAND. An order that the wife of a bankrupt should pay to the Official Assignee a sum of £629 2/8, the amount expended by her husband on her lande during the two years before he was adjudged bankrupt, was made by Mr. Justice Ostler in the Supreme Court at Napier this week. The assignee sought, under section 76 of the Bankruptcy Act, to recover moneys expended by the bankrupt, Percy Boyland. In his judgment his Honor said it was an uncontested fact : that, within a year of his bankruptcy, Boyland had incurred the expenditure of £731 in erecting buildings on land that was the property of his wife, who owned two adjoining freehold sections at Greenmeadowa and a leasehold section in Dickens Street, Napier. A temporary shop and dwelling had been erected on the leasehold property and a small cottage on one of the freehold sections. The summons was opposed on the ground that section 76 of the Bankruptcy Act did not apply to leasehold lands, and also that it was apparent that the buildings on the leasehold were temporary. His Honor held that the word 'land" as used in the section meant every interest in land, and included leasehold. If that were not so, a husband could expend money on his wife's 999 years' leasehold interest and laugh at his creditors. He directed that there should be a direction to the assignee that if there was a failure to comply with the order of the Court the lands, or part thereof, should be sold.