Companies Act 1948

245 Powers of liquidator.

(1) The liquidator in a winding up by the court shall have power, with the sanction either of the court or of the committee of inspection,—:

(a) to bring or defend any action or other legal proceeding in the name and on behalf of the company;

(b) to carry on the business-of the company so far as may be necessary for the beneficial winding up thereof;

(c) to appoint a solicitor to assist him in the performance of his duties;

(d) to pay any classes of creditors in full;

(e) to make any compromise or arrangement with creditors or persons claiming to be creditors, or having or alleging themselves to have any claim, present or future, certain or contingent, ascertained or sounding only in damages against the company, or whereby the company may be rendered liable;

(f) to compromise all calls and liabilities to calls, debts and liabilities capable of resulting in debts, and all claims, present or future, certain or contingent, ascertained or sounding only in damages, subsisting or supposed to subsist between the company and a contributory or alleged contributory or other debtor or person apprehending liability to the company, and all questions in any way relating to or affecting the assets or the winding up of the company, on such terms as may be agreed, and take any security for the discharge of any such call, debt, liability or claim and give a complete discharge in respect thereof.

(2) The liquidator in a winding up by the court shall have power—

(a) to sell the real and personal property and things in action of the company by public auction or private contract, with power to transfer the whole thereof to any person or company or to sell the same in parcels;

(b) to do all acts and to execute, in the name and on behalf of the company, all deeds, receipts and other documents, and for that purpose to use, when necessary, the company's seal;

(c) to prove, rank and claim in the bankruptcy, insolvency or sequestration of any contributory for any balance against his estate, and to receive dividends in the bankruptcy, insolvency or sequestration in respect of that balance, as a separate debt due from the bankrupt or insolvent, and rateably with the other separate creditors;

(d) to draw, accept, make and indorse any bill of exchange or promissory note in the name and on behalf of the company, with the same effect with respect to the liability of the company as if the bill or note had been drawn, accepted, made or indorsed by or on behalf of the company in the course of its business ;

(e) to raise on the security of the assets of the company any money requisite;

(f) to take out in his official name letters of administration to any deceased contributory, and to do in his official name any other act necessary for obtaining payment of any money due from a contributory or his estate which cannot be conveniently done in the name of the company, and in all such cases the money due shall, for the purpose of enabling the liquidator to take out the letters of administration or recover the money, be deemed to be due to the liquidator himself;

(g) to appoint an agent to do any business which the liquidator is unable to do himself;

(h) to do all such other things as may be necessary for winding up the affairs of the company and distributing its assets.

(3) The exercise by the liquidator in a winding up by the court of the powers conferred by this section shall be subject to the control of the court, and any creditor or contributory may apply to the court with respect to any exercise or proposed exercise of any of those powers.

(4) In the case of a winding up in Scotland, the court may provide by any order that the liquidator may, where there is no committee of inspection, exercise any of the powers mentioned in paragraph (a) or paragraph (b) of subsection (1) of this section without the sanction or intervention of the court.

(5) In a winding up by the court in Scotland, the liquidator shall, subject to general rules, have the same powers as a trustee on a bankrupt estate.