Leahy v Attorney-General for New South Wales [1959] AC 457

Facts

  • Thomas Leahy’s will left a portion of his estate to the "order of nuns known as the Sisters of Charity."
  • The Sisters of Charity were an unincorporated association lacking separate legal personality.
  • The Attorney-General for New South Wales argued the gift was void due to uncertainty, asserting that the intended beneficiaries were not identifiable with sufficient precision.
  • The Privy Council analyzed the will’s language and the association's characteristics to determine whether the gift was for the individual members as joint tenants or for the association as such.

Issues

  1. Whether a gift to an unincorporated association can constitute a valid trust, considering the association’s lack of legal personality.
  2. Whether the beneficiaries of such a gift—the members of the association—could be sufficiently identified to satisfy the requirements for a valid trust.
  3. Whether the gift could be construed as a valid purpose trust despite not being for individually identified beneficiaries.

Decision

  • The Privy Council held the gift to the Sisters of Charity was not a valid trust.
  • The court reasoned the gift was directed to the association as a whole, not to the individual members as joint tenants.
  • Due to the association’s lack of legal personality, it could not hold property, rendering the gift void for uncertainty.
  • The court found the gift did not meet the requirements for a valid purpose trust because it lacked certainty of objects.

Legal Principles

  • For a trust to be valid, it must satisfy the "three certainties": certainty of intention, certainty of subject matter, and certainty of objects.
  • Gifts to unincorporated associations generally fail unless clearly interpreted as gifts to individual members as joint tenants.
  • Unincorporated associations typically cannot hold property directly due to their lack of legal personality.
  • Purpose trusts, where property is held for a specific purpose and not directly for identifiable beneficiaries, require sufficient certainty of objects to be valid.

Conclusion

The Privy Council clarified that gifts to unincorporated associations are generally invalid unless expressed as gifts to individual members, reinforcing the strict requirements of the three certainties in trust law and cautioning those making bequests to such associations to ensure proper drafting.

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