Vicars v Commissioner of Stamp Duties (NSW) [1945] HCA 24

Disap le

Taxatic eee

71 C.L.R.] OF AUSTRALIA.

[HIGH COURT OF AUSTRALIA.]

VICARS AND OTHERS . . z - 5 APPELLANTS ;

THE COMMISSIONER OF STAMP DUTIES

AND

(NEW SOUTH WALES) jp eae

ON APPEAL FROM THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW SOUTH WALES.

Stamp Duties—Probate duty—Gift within three years before death—Setilement on

trustee—Payment outside New South Wales—Transfer of shares in New South Wales company—Situs of shares and money—Stamp Duties Act 1920-1940 (N.S.W.) (No. 47 of 1920—No. 18 of 1931—No. 50 of 1940), ss. 100, 102 (2a), (2) (6), (2) (ba)—Interpretation Act of 1897 (N.S.W.) (No. 4 of 1897), s. 17.

In May 1939, V., at Canberra, executed a deed of settlement under which he paid to a New South Wales trustee company at Canberra to be held upon certain trusts for specified beneficiaries the sum of £40,100. The payment was by a cheque drawn upon a new bank account opened at Canberra by the transfer of that amount from a Sydney bank for the purpose of enabling the trust to be created at Canberra, The trustee was empowered by the trust deed to invest, inter alia, in the purchase of shares in any company. The trustee, although under no legal obligation to do so but as intended by V., applied the trust moneys to the purchase from V. of shares in a New South Wales proprietary company in which V. was largely interested, £100 being paid for stamp duty and £40,000 to V., which he deposited in the Canberra bank. V. thereupon closed his Canberra bank account by transferring the amount standing to his credit there to the Sydney bank from which the moneys had originally been drawn, Y. died in October 1940,

Held, by the whole Court, that the sum of £40,000 did not form part of V.'s dutiable estate under the Stamp Duties Act 1920-1939 (N.S. W.).

Held, by Rich, Starke, Dixon and Williams JJ. (Latham C.J, dissenting), that the value of the shares purchased by the trustee did, by the operation of s. 102 (2) (b) of that Act, form part of V.'s dutiable estate.