SAVINGS BANK DEPOSITS

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 77, 13 March 1933, Page 10

SAVINGS BANK DEPOSITS

GARNISHEE ORDER MADB. FIRST DECISION IN VICTORIA. Money in the names of depositors in the State Savings Bank in Victoria may be garnisheed, according to a judgment delivered by Mr. Justice ' Lowe recently. This is the first time that a decision on the point has been given in the Victorian Courts. The judgment followed argument on a garnishee order nisi obtained by Roland Mather Alccde Chubb and Victor Joseph Aunaud, as trustees of the will of Louise Chubb, of Toorak, to satisfy portion of a judgment for £61(5 which they had obtained against Selby Ernest Emery. The garuishee order nisi attached money which Emery had iu the State Savings Bank. Counsel for Emery argued that the money could not be garnisheed, as money held by the commissioners of the State Savings Bank for depositors was a Crown debt between them aud their customers, and that a debt did not arise uutil the passbook and withdrawal form had been presented. Against the argument that it was a Crown debt, opposing counsel for t lotrustees submitted that the oblige i to pay was ou the commissioners. Crown came into the picture, only in a secondary manner as the guarantor of the bank. The primary obligation to pay was on the bank. The production of the passbook and the withdrawal form was not a condition precedent to liability, because the regulation requiring that to be done merely governed the payment of money for the protection of the commissioners. The wellestablished principle ‘that the Crown could not be garnisheed did not apply, because the deposit was not a Crown debt. Mr. Justice Lowe made the order absolute, with £6 fl/- costs. He held that the money in the bank was not a Crown debt. He was not satisfied that the production of the pass book and the withdrawal form was a condition precedent to liability.