The High Court later held the Ibrox club’s contract with SDIR had been breached, and granted SDIR an injunction restraining Rangers from performing the Elite/Hummel agreement. Rangers then obtained a court declaration that the injunction did not prevent it taking steps to recover sums due it under the Elite/Hummel agreement, as the act of requiring monies to be paid did not amount to ‘assisting’ a counterparty to perform an agreement.
SDIR appealed the decision to grant this declaration.
Lords Justice Phillips and Underhill allowed the appeal, in SDIR v Rangers [2021] EWCA Civ 790 last week, Lord Justice Baker dissenting.
Delivering his judgment, Phillips LJ said: ‘Demanding payment of, and if necessary suing for, a debt is an exercise in encouraging and procuring performance of the relevant payment obligation by the debtor, either by eliciting payment or converting the obligation into a judgment…I consider that amounts to "assisting" performance within the meaning of the Injunction…Rangers entered into the Elite/Hummel agreement in flagrant breach of its obligations to SDIR under the agreement, as part of an ongoing illegitimate campaign to deprive SDIR of its contractual rights. The court will require strong reasons to permit Rangers to benefit from that wrongful act without SDIR's consent.’
