At the height of the pandemic, one of the issues that much preoccupied private client practitioners was the difficulty of witnessing wills whilst observing social distancing rules – particularly for testators who were shielding or self-isolating. This lead to a variety of inventive witnessing arrangements, such as that described by HHJ Tindal in Baker […]
Category Archives: Succession
10
Sep
Sep
Shortly before the Parliamentary recess, on 25 July 2020, the Government made a much anticipated, announcement that it would be introducing legislation modifying the formality requirements of s. 9 of the Wills Act 1837 so as to expressly permit the remote witnessing of wills via the use of video-conferencing technology. The issue of making wills […]
02
Jun
Jun
It was my great pleasure to co-author this article with Juliet Brook. Juliet is a Principal Lecturer in Law at the University of Portsmouth, specialising in property law. Her research focuses on the law of succession and she has written a series of detailed articles on testamentary dispensing powers, which you can find here. This article […]
01
Jun
Jun
My last two posts have looked at the issue of will-making during the coronavirus pandemic, and the difficulties of socially distant witnessing, and some of the proposals for reform of the law of wills and the options for a temporary solution to the difficulties faced by testators during the pandemic. In this post, I address […]
12
May
May
The Law Society and the Ministry of Justice are understood to be continuing to discuss possible solutions to the difficulties of making wills during the coronavirus pandemic. Although lockdown measures are starting to loosen, concerns about the risks posed by face to face meetings and home visits are likely to persist for some time and […]
27
Mar
Mar
We are living in extraordinary times right now. In the grip of a global pandemic, many people are concerned to ensure that their affairs are in order and that they have made a Will. However, social distancing measures and the need to shield the vulnerable from infection present particular challenges in terms of the formal […]
14
Feb
Feb
The following is something of a pick and mix selection of contentious probate disputes of interest that were decided last year. James v James [2018] EWHC 43 (Ch) The claimant in James v James, in addition to bringing a proprietary estoppel claim, challenged the last will of his father, Charles, on the grounds of lack of […]
04
Jan
Jan
It’s been a bumper year for proprietary estoppel cases. Here is a round up of some of decisions that caught my attention. James v James [2018] EWHC 43 (Ch) The claimant, Sam, in James v James was the son of the deceased, Charles James. The subject matter of the proprietary estoppel claim was the deceased’s farm in Dorset. […]
12
Jul
Jul
Charles Hollander QC sitting as a Deputy High Court Judge has recently given judgment in Gupta v Gupta [2018] EWHC 1353 (Ch), a case in which the validity of the deceased’s last Will was challenged solely on the basis that she lacked knowledge and approval of the contents. Whilst it doesn’t break any new ground on […]
28
Feb
Feb
Photo credit: Composite – Reuters/Corbis/Getty The subject of posthumous DNA testing received international attention last year in the case of Salvador Dalí and we have had two decisions this month on the issue from the courts of England and Wales: Anderson v Spencer [2018] EWCA Civ 100, in which the Court of Appeal upheld the High Court’s […]