The Gazette 1952-1955

the firm had expended £539 in entertaining clients to lunch or dinner on occasions when professional advice was given and was charged for in the ordinary way. The Commissioners had found that the expenses claimed were incurred primarily and principally, but not purely, for business purposes and that the sum claimed was not money wholly and exclusively laid out or expended for the purposes o f the profession, and dismissed the appeal. Mr. Justice Roxburgh allowed the appeal o f the firm from the decision as stated, and the Crown now appealed to the Court of Appeal consisting of the Master of the Rolls, Lord Justice Birkett and Lord Justice Romer. The Court o f Appeal held that the expenditure in question was wholly and exclusively laid out for the professional purposes of the appellant firm within Rule 3 (a) o f the rules applicable to cases I and II o f Schedule D to the Income Tax Act, 1918, and dismissed the appeal o f the Crown. Leave to appeal to the house of Lords was granted. COVERING AN UNQUALIFIED PERSON O n 24th June, the Divisional Court in England dismissed an appeal by Mr. L. T. C. Halliday of New Court, Lincolns Inn, London, from the fin d in g s o f the Disciplinary Committee under the Solicitors’ Act, 1932-41, and ordered that the appellant’s name be struck off the Roll. The offence charged was that the solicitor had agreed to share with an unqualified person his profit costs in respect o f contentious business and failed to state that he had a place or places o f business at Shoreham-by-Sea. It was also alleged that he had wilfully and know­ ingly permitted his name to be used in an action in the County Court for the profit o f an unqualified person contrary to section 51 of the Solicitors’ Act, 1932. The facts found by the Committee were that there had been an agreement between the appellant and the unqualified person by which the latter was given a free hand to deal with legal business in the solicitor’s name and to keep for himself the profit costs in relation thereto. (In re a Solicitor, the Times Newspaper, 25th June, 1952). EJECTMENT—STAY OF EXECUTION I t is understood that the President o f the Circuit Court recently held that a stay o f execution having been granted on an order for possession o f a house, the Court cannot grant a further stay if one o f the conditions o f the earlier order has been broken. In the case before the Court a decree for possession had been obtained with a stay o f execution, con- j

would be the lack o f any precise principle or basis on which to ascertain the proper amount o f each apportioned rent. In the present case there will be and now is a profit rent. But this is not a sufficient distinction from Webb’s case in which the figures are not clear because the rents reserved on other parts of the property are not given in the report. Nor is it right to say that the vendor retained no interest there. He had a reversion and was obliged to pay a head rent and retained the collection o f the ground rents from the sub-leases. In all o f those respects the present case is similar. The only possible distinction is that the rent reserved here is such that, having regard to the other property, there is a profit rent. The only other case with a possible bearing on the question I have to decide is Hellard v. Bewes (1896) 2 Ch. 229. On referring to it, it will be found to be a decision as to the amount o f costs payable in the particular circumstances and as to what was the proper scale o f costs. There was no question whether the transaction should be regarded as a lease or as a sale. One other case which was referred to was an unreported decision on the construction o f the Finance Act, 1947. I doubt if that case could or does affect what I have to decide. It was a decision on a particular contract. I come, then, to the conclusion that in all the circumstances o f the case, looking at the realities o f the transaction between the parties this was really a sale carried out by way* o f an underlease. So no question of the existence o f any custom as to the payment o f costs arises except the negative one that neither party is liable to pay the costs of the other.” (The Gazette of the Incorporated Taw Society of Northern Ireland). INCOME TAX SOLICITORS’ ENTERTAINMENT EXPENSES In Bentley, Stokes and Lowless v. Beeson (Inspector of Taxes), reported in the Times news­ paper o f May 22nd, the Court o f Appeal in England dismissed an appeal by the Crown from a decision of Mr. Justice Roxburgh allowing an appeal by Messrs. Bentley, Stokes and Lowless, solicitors, from a decision o f the Commissioners for the special purposes o f the Income Tax Acts. The Commissioners held that the firm were not entitled to deduct certain expenses in computing their profits for income tax purposes. The partners of