ABSTRACT
As a general rule any legal person with the capacity to own property may be appointed a trustee. Note in particular that: • aliens are incapable of owning an interest in a British ship and cannot
hold such property on trust (s 17 of the Status of Aliens Act 1914 as amended by the British Nationality Act 1948);
• infants are incapable of holding legal estates in land by s 1(6) of the Law of Property Act (LPA) 1925. In addition, s 20 of the LPA provides that ‘The appointment of an infant to be a trustee in relation to any settlement or trust shall be void’. It was, however, held in Re Vinogradoff (1935) and Re Muller (1953) that an infant may be a trustee under a resulting trust.
