COMBINED SITTINGS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26637, 6 December 1947, Page 8

COMBINED SITTINGS

COURT OF APPEAL COMPETENT TO OVER-RULE « DECISIONS P.A. WELLINGTON, Dec. 5. A judgment given to-day by both divisions of the Court of Appeal sitting together unanimously held that the court so constituted was competent to over-rule the previous decision of only one division of the court. The case was one concerning the payment of estate and succession duties in respect of gifts which were subject to such duties because of their having been made within three years of the legatee’s death. In June both divisions of the Court of appeal, sitting together, heard an argument on the appeal of Harold John Rayner, farmer, of Master ton, against the judgment of the Chief Justice, Sir Humphrey O’Leary, who held that estate and succession duties payable on gifts made during lifetime by William Evanson Rayner, deceased, should be borne by donees of those gifts and not paid out of the residue of the estate. Harold John Rayner was a donee.

It was contended that Justice O’Leary’s judgment could not be upheld in view of the previous decision of the Court of Appeal in re Haughton. The court decided 'that as it was two divisions sitting together it was competent to over-rule the decision in re Haughton, which was the decision of only one division. The court then, by five judges to two, held that the Haughton case was wrongly decided and should be over-ruled, and that the judgment of Justice O'Leary should be upheld.