COURT OF REVIEW

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23223, 22 June 1937, Page 11

COURT OF REVIEW

QUESTION OF JURISDICTION

AN IMPORTANT JUDGMENT

(Per United Press Association)

WELLINGTON, June 21.

An important judgment affecting bankruptcy cases where the Mortgagors and Lessees Rehabilitation Act is also involved was delivered by the Full Court this morning. The case was that of Richards v. Pike, heard before the Full Court on April 13. It concerned a petition issued by David James Richards, of Wellington, against a debtor, Norman Heaton Pike, and was founded upon non-payment of unsecured costs due by Pike to Richards.

After the issue of the petition, Pike filed several applications for relief under the Mortgagors and Lessees Rehabilitation Act, which have not yet been heard. At the hearing of the petition in bankruptcy, counsel for Pike contended that the pendency of debtor’s application for relief prevented the Supreme Court from adjudicating debtor a bankrupt, while Richards’s counsel held that unless the debtor established himself as a farmer applicant, the Bankruptcy Court had power to adjudicate him a bankrupt. The trial judge, with the consent of counsel, thereupon addressed the following questions to the Full Court:—

A: Has this court jurisdiction to determine whether or not the debtor is a farmer applicant? B: If the answer is in the affirmative and the court determines that lie is not a farmer applicant, has the court jurisdiction to adjudicate him a bankrupt during the pendency of his application for relief? In the judgment delivered this morning the Chief Justice (Sir Michael Myers) stated that debtor’s application under the Mortgagors and Lessees Rehabilitation Act could be decided only under that Act. and this necessarily involved the suspension of proceedings under the Bankruptcy Act. Mr Justice Smith, Mr Justice Fair and Mr Justice Ostler, in a joint judgment, held that the peculiar legislation of the Mortgagors and Lessees Rehabilitation Act conferred exclusive jurisdiction upon the Court of Review to determine who was a farmer applicant. No other court had this power, and the present petition must stand adjourned sine die until the order of the Court of Review had been made determining the debtor’s application. The court’s judgment was that the answer to the first question was No, and that it was unnecessary to answer the second.