THE EUROPEAN ASSURANCE SOCIETY.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1790, 15 November 1879, Page 2

THE EUROPEAN ASSURANCE SOCIETY.

The formal award of Mr P. S. Reilly, the arbitrator in the matter of the European and its forty-four subsidiary Assurance Societies, has been published. It is dated September 2nd, 1879, and sets forth the history of the arbitration from the passing of the first Arbitration Act in 1872 down to the date of this final award. Pour arbitrators have acted in succession under these statutes. Lord Wostbury was appointed under the original Act. On his death he was succeeded by Lord Bonnily, and after him Lord J ustico James filled the same office till the appointment of Mr Reilly in 1875. The dividend paid in the European Society was 5a 6id in the pound on the valuation or amount of the claim, and this dividend was paid to every annuitant and policy-holder who established a claim in the arbitration, by whatever company his annuity or policy was originally granted or issued. Additional dividends were paid in other companies subject to the arbitration out of the separate assets of those other companies. The table of receipts and payments shows the following results : —Calls realised, £523,895 ; other assets and interest, £511,981, making a total of £1,035,876. Of this sum £673,205 was distributed in dividends or payments in f ulljand interest, and £14,375 in the return of renewal premiums. ‘The beneficiares therefore received £687,580, while the expenses in Chancery and in Parliament and the costs of arbitration amounted to £214,124, and the returns to contributories absorbed £109,912. Thus, the total payments amounted to £1,011,617, leaving a balance of unexpended assets of £24,258. The sum actually left as the European Surplus Pund, however, amounted to no more than £7471, out of which £7432 was returned to “ those ordinary contributories in the European Society, who, in addition to their payments for the calls for the full amount of and beyond the nominal share capital, had made payments in consideration of their receiving in the arbitration a discharge from all further liability. The balance, £39 11s 2d, “ constituted an undivisible balance of the assets of the European Society, and the same was applied in payment of expenses connected with the closing of J the arbitration.