This week’s TGIF is the second of a two-part series considering Commonwealth v Byrnes [2018] VSCA 41, the Victorian Court of Appeal’s decision on appeal from last year’s Re Amerind decision about the insolvency of corporate trustees.

Under the equity of exoneration, where jointly owned property is charged to secure the indebtedness of one joint owner, the other joint owner is presumed, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, to be acting as a surety only, and is entitled to be exonerated by the principal debtor. This long established principle remains relevant in the modern day, as was recently demonstrated in Day v Shaw.