It is not uncommon for a number of people to form a syndicate to subscribe for weekly tickets to the National Lottery. Invariably, there will be no written rules of the syndicate and the members will rarely consider the question of how any winnings (large or small) should be divided, particularly in the event of a member failing to pay the required sum or if the required subscription is paid not by the member themselves but by a partner or friend. To whom will the winnings belong in these circumstances?
It’s all mine!
In Abrahams v Trustee of the property of Abrahams [1999] Lexis Citation 3432, the claimant, who was separated from her husband, paid £1 a week for her own place in a lottery syndicate, plus a further £1 for her husband. The syndicate won over £3m , and the claimant’s one-fifteenth share amounted to £242,155.13. The claimant, however, also claimed her husband’s share, relying on the presumption of a resulting trust on the ground that she
