Insolvency

The respondents served a statutory demand on the appellant. The appellant’s application to set aside the statutory demand was dismissed (the order). The order failed to specify a date on or after which the respondents could present a petition for a bankruptcy order to be made against the appellant. The respondents presented their petition the following day. A district judge adjudged the appellant to be bankrupt upon the petition presented by the respondents. The appellant appealed against the judge’s bankruptcy order.

The appellant submitted among other things that there had been an absence of any order by the judge under r 6.5(6) of the Insolvency Rules 1986 in that the order failed to specify a date on or after which the respondents could present a petition, and that, once an application was made to set aside a statutory demand, the creditor could not then present a petition. Second, that the district judge had been wrong to proceed to a substantive determination of the