Subrogation is the assumption by a third party (such as a second creditor or an insurance company) of another party's legal right to collect debts or damages. It is a legal doctrine whereby one person is entitled to enforce the subsisting or revived rights of another for one's own benefit. A right of subrogation typically arises by operation of law, but can also arise by statute or by agreement. Subrogation is an equitable remedy, having first developed in the English Court of Chancery. It is a familiar feature of common law systems. Analogous doctrines exist in civil law jurisdictions.
Subrogation is a relatively specialised field of law; entire legal textbooks are devoted to the subject.
Countries which have inherited the common law system will typically have a doctrine of subrogation, but its doctrinal basis in a particular jurisdiction may vary from that in other jurisdictions, depending upon the extent to which equity remains a distinct body of law in that jurisdiction.
English courts have now accepted that the concept of unjust enrichment has a role to play in subrogation. In contrast, this approach has been stridently rejected by the High Court of Australia, where the doctrinal basis of subrogation is said to lie in the prevention of unconscionable results: for example, the discharge of a debtor or one party getting double recovery.
The situations in which subrogation will be available are not closed and vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Subrogation typically arises in three-party situations. Some common examples of subrogation include:
Indemnity insurance. An indemnity insurer may be entitled to be subrogated to the rights of insured as against a third party who is responsible for the damage to the insured.
Law of guarantees. A surety may be entitled to be subrogated to the rights of the creditor as against the principal debtor.
Trust creditors. A creditor of a trustee may be entitled to be subrogated to the trustee's right of indemnity.
Subrogation to outgoing securities.
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English trust law concerns the protection of assets, usually when they are held by one party for another's benefit. Trusts were a creation of the English law of property and obligations, and share a subsequent history with countries across the Commonwealth and the United States. Trusts developed when claimants in property disputes were dissatisfied with the common law courts and petitioned the King for a just and equitable result. On the King's behalf, the Lord Chancellor developed a parallel justice system in the Court of Chancery, commonly referred as equity.
A legal remedy, also referred to as judicial relief or a judicial remedy, is the means with which a court of law, usually in the exercise of civil law jurisdiction, enforces a right, imposes a penalty, or makes another court order to impose its will in order to compensate for the harm of a wrongful act inflicted upon an individual. In common law jurisdictions and mixed civil-common law jurisdictions, the law of remedies distinguishes between a legal remedy (e.g. a specific amount of monetary damages) and an equitable remedy (e.
The Court of Chancery was a court of equity in England and Wales that followed a set of loose rules to avoid a slow pace of change and possible harshness (or "inequity") of the common law. The Chancery had jurisdiction over all matters of equity, including trusts, land law, the estates of lunatics and the guardianship of infants. Its initial role differed somewhat: as an extension of the lord chancellor's role as Keeper of the King's Conscience, the court was an administrative body primarily concerned with conscientious law.