§ [No. 22]
§ Clause 19, page 16, line 26, after "not" insert "unless the court otherwise orders".
§ THE LORD CHANCELLORMy Lords, I beg to move that this House doth agree with the Commons in Amendment No. 22. Clause 19(3) provides that where the employer applies to the court for a determination whether payments of a particular kind constitute "earnings" for the purposes of an attachment of earnings order he shall not incur any liability for non-compliance with the order while the application or any appeal from the determination is pending. This provision does not apply if the employer subsequently withdraws the application or abandons the appeal. The effect of the Amendment would be to enable the court to waive this restriction. The employer's application or appeal may have been perfectly bona fide when it was made or entered, but may subsequently be abandoned because there is no longer any doubt whether the payments in question constitute earnings. In such a case the court ought to be able to absolve the employer from liability for not having 1008 made the deductions required by the order while the application or appeal was pending. I beg to move.
VISCOUNT COLVILLE OF CULROSSMy Lords, I suppose the kind of case in which this would arise is where the meaning of the Bill is being tested, and a test case is being fought which, having been resolved, all the other cases fall perfectly plainly to be decided one way or the other. There are no doubt other examples and new law to be made in the course of the decisions by the courts under the definitions in the Bill. If so, I would certainly agree that the employer ought not to be penalised if he has, as it turns out, made the wrong decision in accordance with what the court finally decides.
§ Moved, That this House doth agree with the Commons in the said Amendment.—(The Lord Chancellor.)
§ On Question, Motion agreed to.