The High Court in Allied Empire Plantations Sdn Bhd v Chip Lam Seng Berhad [2014] 6 CLJ 81 (“Allied Empire”) touched on some of the principles on the substitution of a Petitioner in a winding up Petition and where two parties were allowed to be substituted in as co-Petitioners.

The law governing the substitution of a party as Petitioner in a winding up Petition is contained in rule 33 of the Companies (Winding-up) Rules 1972 (“Rules”). Rule 33 provides that:

“… the Court may upon such terms as it thinks just substitute as petitioner any person who, in the opinion of the Court, would have a right to present the petition and who is desirous of proceeding with the petition.”

The case of Allied Empire involved two parties applying to be substituted as a petitioner. The first was Jadeline and the second was AmBank.

Jadeline

After the presentation of the Petition in August 2012, Jadeline had entered into an assignment with the Petitioner for the absolute assignment of the chose in action to claim the underlying debt giving rise to the Petition. The question of law that then arose was whether Jadeline could be deemed to be a creditor at the time of the presentation of the petition (and therefore “would have a right to present the petition) or whether Jadeline’s status as the creditor only crystallised after the entering of the assignment. In essence, the Court found that with the debt having been absolutely assigned to Jadeline by the Petitioner, the effect under the law is that all rights to present the Petition would also now be with Jadeline.

Procedurally though, here are cases that have found that not only must the intended substituting party be a creditor, that party must have also had issued the statutory notice (under section 218(2)(a) of the Companies Act 1965) (“218 Notice”) in order to fall within the definition of “would have a right to present the petition” (see for example, the High Court decision of Teoh Vin Sen v True Creation Sdn Bhd [2008] 4 CLJ 393). Presumably, the High Court in Allied Empire would have considered that the effect of the absolute assignment was that the complete chose in action of presenting the Petition had been absolutely assigned by the Petitioner over to Jadeline. Therefore, even the procedural issuance of the statutory notice would have been deemed to have been “assigned” to Jadeline.

AmBank

Where AmBank was applying for it to be substituted as a petitioner as well, AmBank had issued its statutory notice in December 2012 and applied for the substitution in September 2013. While AmBank had issued its 218 Notice, Jadeline had raised the objection that AmBank had not issued the 218 Notice prior to August 2012 (i.e. the time of the presentation of the Petition). Therefore, in short, AmBank did not fall within the definition of “would have a right to present the petition.” The Judge made short shrift of this argument by finding that the debt owing to AmBank was not seriously disputed. Section 218(2)(c) would also allow for a presumption of insolvency and there i snothing to prevent a creditor from presenting a petition to wind up a debtor without relying on the presumption in the statutory notice if the evidence is so clear that the debtor is in any event insolvent.

Substitution of Both Parties as Co-Petitioners

The Court then had to consider whether to allow only one of the parties to be substituted in as a Petitioner. Jadeline had made its application first while AmBank had the larger debt. The Court ordered that both parties be made Petitioners while AmBank was allowed to be the first Petitioner and which had the responsibility to ensure the necessary advertisement, gazetting and other getting up were complied with (but with costs to be born equally by the two Petitioners).

While it is true that there is nothing to prevent there being two or more Petitioners, there appears to be a general rule that Plaintiffs (or in this case, the two Petitioners) must be represented by the same set of solicitors. Allowing AmBank and Jadeline to be substituted in as Petitioners and yet, being represented by two different solicitors, may not have been possible.

The rationale of having plaintiffs, claimants or petitioners  to have a common set of solicitors appears to be in order to ensure consistency in the prosecution of a claim. The rule can be seen as far back as in Wedderburn v Wedderburn (1853) 17 Beav 158, where Sir John Romilly M.R. held that:

“Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins may, in concurrence with the other four co-plaintiffs, remove their solicitor, and the other four may allow him to conduct the proceedings for all. But if the plaintiffs do not all concur, Mr. Hawkins cannot take a course of proceeding different and apart from the other plaintiffs, for the consequence would be, that their proceedings might be totally inconsistent. When persons undertake the prosecution of a suit, they must make up their minds whether they will become co-plaintiffs; for if they do, they must act together. I cannot allow one of several plaintiffs to act separately from and inconsistently with the others.”

In the English Court of Appeal case of Lewis And Another v Daily Telegraph Ltd. (No. 2) [1964] 2 QB 601, it was held that:

“In my view, it was not regular, and not in accordance with the proper practice, that two firms of solicitors should be placed on the record as representing the plaintiff Lewis and the plaintiff company separately.”

Similarly, in the Supreme Court of Victoria decision of Goold and Porter Proprietary Limited v Housing Commission [1974] VR 102, it was held that:

“There seems to be a long line of authority to the effect that plaintiffs, where there is more than one plaintiff in an action, must appear by the same counsel. The cases seem very largely to be equity cases but the matter is stated categorically in the authorities Wedderburn v Wedderburn (1853) 17 Beav 158; Davey v Watt (1902) 28 VLR 24; Lewis v Daily Telegraph [1964] 2 QB 622 [*4]; [1964] 1 All ER 705; Odgers on Pleading and Practice, 18th ed., p. 16; Halsbury, 3rd ed., vol. 3, p. 72; Newton v Ricketts (1848) 2 Phil 624; Ballard v White (1843) 2 Hare 158 at p. 159; Swift v Glazebrook (1842) 13 Sim 185; Re Norwoods Patents (1895) 11 RPC 214, at p. 221; Re Wright, [1895] 2 Ch 747 at p. 748) to which I have been referred, including one in this Court which was decided by Holroyd, J, Davey v Watt (1902) 28 VLR 24; 8 ALR 90.

In Lewis v Daily Telegraph (No. 2) [1964] 2 QB 601 at p. 623, [1964] 1 All ER 705, there is a dictum of Russell, LJ, which does indicate his Lordship’s view that where there are a number of plaintiffs in an action, whether that action is a consolidated action or not, there is a discretion to allow separate representation to the plaintiffs. But that appears, on a review of the authorities by counsel, to be the only reference to the possibility in an action of this kind which is not a consolidated action, of plaintiffs appearing by separate counsel. The condition of the plaintiffs so doing is stated to be to avoid injustice, and his Lordship indicates that it must be rare.

In the absence of any other authority suggesting that there is a discretion, I am disposed to the view that there is no discretion in the case of an action which is not a consolidated action, and that, therefore, I should refuse the application which has been made by Mr. Marks and by Mr. Eames, for the plaintiffs, in this action, or some of them, to appear by separate counsel. I say ‘or some of them’ because some of the plaintiffs are not here at this moment, either in person or by solicitor or counsel, so I am told. However that may be, and assuming that I have a discretion, I am of the opinion that no injustice would be done to the plaintiffs by requiring them all to appear by the same counsel. I am satisfied that the only conflict that might arise between them is not related in any way to the relief sought in the action; it might well be that different considerations would actuate different plaintiffs in certain eventualities but those eventualities, which I do not more particularly refer to, seem to me to have nothing to do with the actual conduct of the action as it appears on the pleadings. And I think that the interests of the plaintiffs to the extent that they may differ, could be well looked after by solicitors or solicitors and counsel who are not appearing in the action, and they do not have anything to do with the conduct of the action.”

Therefore, allowing both AmBank and Jadeline to be co-Petitioners may not have been possible since both parties would have wanted their own solicitors. The Court would then have had to make the difficult choice on who to select from the two competing parties. I am not aware of what are the guiding principles on how to select between these two competing parties.