French succession law: Ça n’finira jamais

The dispute over Johnny Hallyday’s estate is an example of the problems that can arise with international estates. Patrick Delas discusses ‘If Johnny died habitually resident in France or was at least manifestly more closely connected with France, as David and Laura claim, French courts should regard themselves as having jurisdiction in relation to the …
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Musings from Manchester: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Geoffrey Shindler has some suggestions for the governance of HMRC and the process by which tax legislation is imposed ‘We need to go back to the very first principles and challenge why we need to have so much tax legislation every year.’ There are times when I wonder not only whether there is any joined-up …
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Trusts: Enforcing private purpose trusts

Mark Pawlowski and James Brown examine the possibility of using the mechanism of a residuary legatee in order to enforce a trust for non-charitable purposes ‘If there are no beneficiaries with equitable interests in the trust assets, there is technically no one “in whose favour the court can decree specific performance”.’ As trust lawyers will …
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Trustees’ powers: Beyond the deed

Mary Ashley explores a recent case considering the options by which trustees can extend their powers ‘In circumstances where trustees want to act outside of the powers which they expressly have, they will want to analyse closely what it is that they are seeking to do and therefore, the best way to do it – …
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Estate administration: North of the border

Ian Macdonald provides a comparison of the English and Scottish procedures for executors ‘The IHT400 and supplementary IHT forms request exact details of the estate assets and English executors have to complete all the forms in full. Scottish executors have however already set out all the assets and values in the C1.’ As in many …
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Deputyships and LPAs: Protecting the vulnerable?

Sue Clark highlights the risks of LPAs and deputyships and what can be done to safeguard the donor ‘The lack of court supervision over LPAs makes donors vulnerable and at risk. Although deputyships offer a greater level of supervision and protection to Ps, financial abuse is still possible.’ Throughout this article the term ‘LPA’ is …
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Divorce: A matter of trust

Oliver Auld gives the lowdown on what happens to trusts in the event of a divorce ‘Trustees need to be aware of not only the range of orders the family courts can make in relation to trust assets, but also the strategies they should potentially be adopting in the best interest of their beneficiaries, both …
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Proprietary estoppel: Reap what you sow?

In the second part of two articles Amanda Noyce continues to review recent proprietary estoppel cases, as well as outlining the lessons to be learned ‘Few High Court judges would want to divert openly from the case of Thorner, but my thesis is that the later cases have refined the law and an attempt needs …
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