HC Deb 01 December 1911 vol 32 cc944-6

  1. (1) There shall be included among the debts which, under Section one of the Preferential Payments in Bankruptcy Act, 1888, and Section two hundred and nine of the Companies (Consolidation) Act, 1908, are, in the distribution of the property of a bankrupt and in the distribution of the assets of a company being wound up, to be paid in priority to all other debts, all contributions payable under this Act by the bankrupt or the company in respect of employed contributors or workmen in an insured trade during the four months before the date of the receiving order, or as the case may be, the commencement or the winding up or the Winding-up Order, and those Acts shall have effect accordingly, and formal proof of the debts to which priority is given under this Section shall 945 not be required except in cases where it may otherwise be provided by rules made under the Bankruptcy Act, 1883, or the Companies (Consolidation) Act, 1908.
  2. (2) In the case of the winding up of a company within the meaning of the Stannaries Act, 1887, such contributions as aforesaid shall, if payable in respect of a miner, have the like priority as is conferred on wages of miners by Section nine of that Act, and that Section shall have effect accordingly.
  3. (3) This Section shall not apply where a company is wound up voluntarily merely for the purposes of reconstruction or of amalgamation with another company.
  4. (4) In the application of this Section to Scotland a reference to Section three of the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act, 1875, shall be substituted for the reference to Section one of the Preferential Payments in Bankruptcy Act, 1888.
  5. (5) In the application of this Section to Ireland a reference to Section four of the Preferential Payments in Bankruptcy (Ireland) Act, 1889, shall be substituted for the reference to Section one of the Preferential Payments in Bankruptcy Act, 1888; and any reference to a bankrupt shall include a reference to an arranging debtor; and the reference to the receiving order shall be construed as a reference to the order of adjudication in the case of a bankrupt, or to the filing of the petition for arrangement in the case of an arranging debtor.

Amendment made: In Sub-section (5), after "1888," insert the words "and a reference to general orders made under the first-mentioned Act shall be substituted for the reference to rules made under the Bankruptcy Act, 1883."—[Mr. Buxton.]