Weekly law digests

Company

Tonstate Group Ltd and others v Wojakovski and others [2019] EWHC 3363 (Ch), [2019] All ER (D) 34 (Dec)

Part of the first defendant’s defence that had relied on the Duomatic principle, that the informal approval of all the members of a company was sufficient to ratify a breach of fiduciary duty, would be struck out. The Chancery Division so held in a claim that alleged that the first claimant had extracted funds from a group of companies improperly, and held that the Duomatic principle could not apply to conduct which the company could not lawfully have carried out itself, nor could it apply to ratify payments which it was accepted the company could not lawfully have made.

Contract

Mulville v Sandelson [2019] EWHC 3287 (Ch), [2019] All ER (D) 32 (Dec)

The judge had been correct to find that a settlement agreement between the appellant and the respondent had created an independent obligation on the appellant to pay a sum. The Chancery Division accordingly found that the judge had been correct