Judgment debt expressed in US dollars — Subsequent charging order failing to give sterling equivalent — Master refusing amendment — Whether requirement to state sterling amount — Appeal dismissed
The appellant had obtained judgment against the respondents for a sum expressed in US dollars. In April 2002, he applied for charging orders against properties belonging to the respondents in order to secure the judgment debt. An interim charging order was granted by a master and later finalised. Both the interim and final versions stated the judgment amount in US dollars only, giving no sterling equivalent. The claimant later argued that the inclusion of a dollar amount in the charging order had been a mistake, and that the sum should be restated in its sterling equivalent as at the date of the April 2002 application.
The master declined to amend the charging order. He held that there was no reason why the court could not make a charging order expressed in the foreign currency of the judgment, if that was what the judgment creditor had asked for (the appellant had done so by asking to have the interim order made final) and the judgment debtor had no objection. His decision was upheld by a judge on appeal.
On a further appeal, the appellant contended that enforcement of a judgment by a charging order was completed when the order was made final, and that a judgment debt in a foreign currency had to be converted into sterling prior to that date. He also relied upon a 1993 High Court practice direction. By the date of the appeal, the outstanding dollar amount of the judgment debt had been paid. However, the appellant maintained that he was entitled to the balance of the sterling equivalent, calculated at the exchange rates as at the date of the charging orders, which represented a difference of £269,000.
Held: The appeal was dismissed.
Where a judgment debt was expressed in a foreign currency, the general principle was that conversion should be made as close as practicable to the payment date, having regard to the realities of enforcement procedure: Miliangos v George Frank (Textiles) Ltd [1976] AC 443 considered. The judgment debt in the present case had been ascertained, albeit in a foreign currency, and the fact that the sterling equivalent of that debt might fluctuate according to exchange rates was no more relevant to the underlying principles than was the fluctuation of the value of the land charged. The master had had jurisdiction to make a charging order in the form that he did. Although he had departed from the practice as stated in the 1993 practice direction, which would have led to the order being expressed in sterling, that was a matter of practice rather than law. The practice direction was not in terms mandatory. In the circumstances, the master had been fully entitled to refuse to exercise his discretion to amend, and the judge had been correct to uphold that refusal: Ezekiel v Orakpo [1997] 1 WLR 340 distinguished.
Amanda Tipples (instructed by Speechly Bircham) appeared for the appellant; Richard Mawrey QC and Jonathan Steinert (instructed by Girlings, of Ashford) appeared for the respondents.
Sally Dobson, barrister
