Pile v Pile [2022] WTLR 1445
Winter 2022 #189The parties, who were brothers, held two periodic tenancies as joint tenants: an agricultural tenancy and a commercial tenancy of land at Fir Tree Farm protected respectively under the Agricultural Holdings Act 1986 and the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954. The appellant and a company of which he and his wife were sole directors and shareholders, F N Pile and Sons Ltd, entered into an agreement with the landlord (the agreement) under which he would serve a notice to quit the agricultural tenancy, the landlord would serve a notice to terminate the commercial tenancy in respe...
Power v Bernard Hastie & Co Ltd & ors [2022] WTLR 1459
Winter 2022 #189The deceased had issued proceedings in 1991 against the defendants for personal injury arising from exposure to asbestos. Liability was admitted and in October 1993 the High Court made an order for damages (accompanied by a statement of agreed facts), which included a provisional damages order (PDO) under s32A Senior Courts Act 1981 in the following terms:
...‘The Plaintiff do have leave to apply (without time limit) for further damages pursuant to Order 37 Rule 10 if he does develop the aforesaid conditions or diseases or any of them.’
Reeves v Drew & ors (costs) [2022] WTLR 1549
Winter 2022 #189In the main action, the claimant sought to prove a purported will dated 2014. The second and fourth defendants challenged the validity of the will on the grounds first of lack of knowledge and approval and secondly, by a late amendment, of undue influence. That amendment required a substantial amount of further evidence to be filed. In a judgment following trial ([2022] EWHC 159 (Ch), available in the WTLR web reports as WTLR(w) 2022-08) the judge found the 2014 will to be invalid for want of knowledge and approval, but dismissed the claim that it was procured by undue influence. The jud...
Sangha v Sangha & ors [2022] WTLR 1561
Winter 2022 #189The late Hartar Singh Sangha (Mr Sangha) died on 3 September 2016, leaving a complex family life and a large portfolio of property and other assets in both the UK and India. He had made a large number of wills at various times. The interaction of these instruments produced significant disputes among his family members. Mr Sangha had at some times during his life regarded himself as married to the first respondent (Diljit). At other points, he regarded himself as married to the appellant (Jaswinder).
Four wills made by Mr Sangha were placed before the court. These were as follows:<...
Al Assam & ors v Tsouvelekakis [2022] WTLR 787
Autumn 2022 #188The claimants were the Dubai-resident settlors and beneficiaries of two Cyprus-law trusts and two trust-owned companies incorporated in Panama and the British Virgin Islands. The trustee of both trusts was a Cypriot company, controlled by directors also resident in Cyprus. The defendant gave investment advice to the trustee. On the defendant’s advice, substantial trust funds were invested in two Cypriot telecommunications companies carrying on business in Greece in which the defendant was alleged to have some involvement.
From at least 2016 the defendant was resident in England. I...
Beasant v Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind & ors [2022] WTLR 853
Autumn 2022 #188By her will (which was drafted by a legal executive of the third defendant), Audrey Thelma Anita Arkell (the testatrix) gave the ‘Nil-Rate Sum’ to the appellant. This was defined as:
‘… the largest sum of cash which could be given on the trusts of this clause without any inheritance tax becoming due in respect of the transfer of the value of my estate which I am deemed to make immediately before my death.’
Subsequent clauses gave her residence, personal chattels and specified shares to the appellant ‘free of inheritance tax’ and her net residuary es...
Butler-Sloss & ors v Charity Commission & anr [2022] WTLR 865
Autumn 2022 #188The Ashden Trust and the Mark Leonard Trust (the charities) were charitable trusts whose principal purposes were environmental protection and the relief of poverty.
The trustees of the charities sought the court’s blessing for an investment policy inspired by the Paris Climate Agreement (the Paris Agreement). The Paris Agreement’s primary objective was to limit global warming to 1.5 – 2 degrees, below pre-industrial levels, in part by reducing greenhouse gas emissions and by promoting ‘climate resilient development’.
The charities’ investment policy stood to exclude investm...
Cooper & anr v Chapman & ors [2022] WTLR 895
Autumn 2022 #188This was a probate claim by the testator’s children (minors with their mother, the testator’s ex-wife, as litigation friend). The first defendant (who was the only active defendant) was the testator’s new partner.
The claimants sought to propound a will from 2009. The first defendant sought to propound a will from 2018. The first defendant claimed that the 2018 will had been signed by the testator on 27 March 2018 with the intention of giving effect to it as a will, and that he had acknowledged his signature in the presence of witnesses who attested and signed the document in the ...
Dunbabin & ors v Dunbabin [2022] WTLR 917
Autumn 2022 #188Angela and John Dunbabin purchased a property known as 29 Beverley Place, Springfield, Milton Keynes (the property) in 1983. The conveyance was silent as to the beneficial interests though it contained a declaration that either of the purchasers could give a valid receipt for capital money arising on a disposition of land. With the assistance of Terry Oldfield, a professional will writer, they executed ‘mirror’ wills giving their own share of the property to trustees upon trust for sale and to hold the net rents and profits and the net income from the sale proceeds in trust for the other...
Dunbabin & ors v Dunbabin (costs) [2022] WTLR 935
Autumn 2022 #188On 10 February 2022 judgment was delivered on a claim brought under Part 8 of the Civil Procedure Rules in relation to issues which had arisen in the administration of the estates of Angela and John Dunbabin. The main issue related to the question whether they had severed their beneficial joint tenancy, so as to hold the legal title to their residence upon trust for themselves as tenants in common in equal shares, with the result that on the death of Angela her half share devolved according to the terms of her will instead of passing automatically by survivorship to John. The cl...