Company

Directors disqualification proceedings in High Court stayed pending outcome of criminal proceedings - directors convicted and disqualified for two years by Crown Court - not abuse of process to lift stay to permit High Court proceedings to resumeSecretary of State for Trade and Industry v Rayna and another: CA (Chadwick LJ and Rougier J): 26 June 2001In 1995 the Secretary of State commenced disqualification proceedings against four directors of companies under section 6 of the Company Directors Disqualification Act 1986.Those proceedings were stayed in 1999 when the directors were charged with criminal offences based on similar factual allegations.

They pleaded guilty and were sentenced to be disqualified for two years under section 2 of the Act from being company directors and to nine months' imprisonment.Subsequently the High Court lifted the stay and refused permission to appeal.

Two of the directors sought permission to appeal contending that, since they had already been disqualified in the criminal proceedings, continuing the section 6 proceedings would be an abuse of the process of the court and expose them to double jeopardy.Rebecca Stubbs (instructed by Marsons, Bromley) for the directors.

Richard Ritchie (instructed by the Treasury Solicitor) for the Secretary of State.Held, refusing permission, that, although there might be overlapping factors in criminal proceedings and disqualification proceedings, a section 2 disqualification applied only to criminal proceedings to penalise the offender on conviction of an indictable offence whereas the mandatory disqualification in section 6 proceedings required the court to make an order to protect the public if satisfied that a person's conduct as a company director made him unfit to hold such an office; and that, since it was impossible to say that the judge in the criminal trial had analysed the directors' unfit conduct, the appeal had no real prospect of success.