FIRST APPLICATION

Taranaki Daily News, 16 August 1935, Page 7

FIRST APPLICATION

FORMATION OF COMPANY BONDHOLDERS’ COMMISSION. CONGRATULATIONS TO PARTIES. NEW LEGISLATION INVOKED. By Telegraph—Press Association. Wellington, Last Night. Apart from the financial interests of those immediately concerned considerable importance is attached to an application made to-day to the Bondholders Incorporation Commission by the trustees for the bondholders of Forestry Development Ltd. for their incorporation as a company. The application, made under the Companies (Bondholders) Incorporation Act, 1934-35, was the first to come before the commission, which also sat formally for the first time. An order was made in the terms of the scheme submitted by the trustees, subject to a slight amendment in one case and an application in another of the clauses in the articles.

Mr. J. S. Barton, S.M., chairman of the commission, with whom were associated Messrs. J. B. Henry and N. Duthie, referred to the interest in proceedings. There was tremendous interest in them in Australia, he said. He had received a letter from Sydney asking if it would be possible to forward a copy of the papers filed in the case, also a copy of the odder made. He was very pleased to have an application such as this one first.

The members of the commission felt gratified that they had had a share in a work that had been so beneficial to the company. He appreciated the spirit in which the two principal bodies of men connected with the company had got together and had come to the commission for what practically amounted to a consent order. OBJECTS OF COMPANY. Mr. H. Taylor, counsel for the trustees of the bondholders, said the authorities he represented were indebted for personal consideration received from Mr. Barton prior to the hearing, also for the manner in which the hearing had taken place, as well as the facilities- afforded the company known as Forestry Development Ltd. He said it had been incorporated on May 1, 1926. It was what had come to be known as a bond issuing company. It acquired areas of land in the Nelson district, part planted with forest and part intended to be planted in forest. The principal object of the company was that the land acquired should be sold to the bondholders in accordance with the bond issue.

There was complete unanimity between the bond issuing company, the bondholders and their trustees, continued Mr. Taylor. The bond issuing company had afforded every facility and had assisted in every way possible the transfer of assets to the trustees for the bondholders, and had seen that the bondholders had got all they were entitled to under the bonds. When the Companies (Bondholders) Incorporation Act, 1934-35, was passed it was decided that instead of continuing with the special legislation idea an application should be made to the Bondholders Incorporation Commission.

For that purpose it was necessary to formulate a scheme for the incorporation of the bondholders as a public limited liability That had been done and the scheme now before the commission'had been submitted to a recent meeting of the bondholders and met with unanimous approval. They hqd also the full approval of the bond issuing company of what had been done.