Mr Vadim Schmidt sought disclosure of accounts and information in relation to two trusts set up by his father, who had died intestate.

The Privy Council rejected the previous proprietary explanation of a beneficiary's right to disclosure that had been set out in Re Londonderry's Settlement [1965] Ch 918 per Salmon LJ.

Rather, Lord Walker (giving the advice of the Privy Council) held that: "the Board cannot regard it as a reasoned or binding decision that a beneficiary's right of claim to disclosure of trust documents or information must always have the proprietary basis of a transmissible interest in trust property."

Mr Brownbill's submission to the contrary effect tends to prove too much, since he would regard the object of a discretionary trust as having a proprietary interest even though it is not transmissible (except in the special case of collective action taken unanimously by all the members of a closed class).

Their Lordships are therefore in general agreement with the approach adopted in the judgments of Kirby P and Sheller JA in the Court of Appeal of New South Wales in Hartigan Nominees Pty Ltd v Rydge (1992) 29 NSWLR 405.

That was a case concerned with disclosure of a memorandum of wishes addressed to the trustees by Sir Norman Rydge (who was in substance, but not nominally, the settlor).