Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Spring 2024 #194In 1928 Gaspard Farrer established a fund which he intended, in due course, to pay off the National Debt in its entirety, either by itself or in combination with other funds established for the same purpose. The fund was specified to be held until a specified date of application for investment and accumulation, and thereafter ‘to transfer and pay the same to the National Debt Commissioners to be applied by them in reduction of the National Debt’, with a power at any time to determine that ‘part of the National Fund should be forthwith applied in reduction of the National Debt.’ Subsequen...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Autumn 2023 #192A deceased was survived by his widow and the defendant, his daughter. Although he had been a successful businessman during his lifetime, during the economic downturn that began in 2007 the deceased’s business empire collapsed, and he died heavily indebted. The defendant obtained a grant of probate of the deceased’s will and began to administer his estate with the assistance of professional advisers. More than six years after the death of the deceased, when she realised that the estate was insolvent, the defendant applied to the County Court for an insolvency administration order under th...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Spring 2023 #190The Privy Council determined appeals from the Jersey Court of Appeal (the Jersey appeal) and from the Guernsey Court of Appeal (the Guernsey appeal) concerning the rights of indemnity of successive trustees against the assets of trusts governed by Jersey law, whose assets were insufficient to meet in full the liabilities incurred by their trustees.
The Jersey appeal
The original sole trustee of two Jersey trusts settled by the late Madam Intisar Nouri was Equity Trust (Jersey) Ltd (Equity Trust). Equity Trust was later replaced as sole trustee by Volaw Corporate Trustee L...
Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Spring 2023 #190After Jayne Hathaway (JH) and Lee Hudson (LH) started a relationship in 1990, JH moved into LH’s home and became a joint owner. They had two sons together but did not marry. After selling their home, they bought another in joint names. In 2007 they sold that home and, with a mortgage, bought Picnic House in joint names. The mortgage payments were made from a joint bank account, into which the salaries of them both were paid. LH’s contributions towards the mortgage payments far exceeded those of JH.
In 2009, LH left JH and moved in with another woman, whom he later married. JH cont...
Simon Adamyk and Jessica Powers outline welcome clarification on the application process for obtaining freezing orders In order to establish a real risk of dissipation, the claimants had to do more than merely establish a good arguable case of dishonesty: rather, the court had to be satisfied that the particular dishonesty alleged pointed to the …
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Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Winter 2022 #189By his will, the late Robert Simcock created a trust over the sum of £200,000, under which his wife Catherine was to be the life tenant. Subject to that, the capital and income of that trust was to be held on the terms of a discretionary trust of residue also created by the will, the objects of which were Catherine, and Robert’s children and remoter issue.
Solicitors acting for the family determined that only a portion of Robert’s estate would benefit from Agricultural Property Relief (APR) and Business Property Relief (BPR), with the consequence that, absent an appointment from t...
Kerry Bretherton KC and Katie Gray examine a case that finds that the service of a notice to quit is not a breach of trust Where parties have jointly contracted to rent a property and one of them wishes to quit, he or she cannot be held to a tenancy contract which is dependent for …
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Alicia Tan reports on a case that confirms the Chancery position on jurisdiction over foreign trusts The effect of Chellaram is to give the English courts a broad remit to intervene in the administration of foreign trusts by way of the in personam jurisdiction. The recent case of Heslop v Heslop [2021] has once again …
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Wills & Trusts Law Reports | Autumn 2022 #188The case concerned various agreements (including a sale purchase agreement, a headstay agreement and an alleged oral agreement) transacted between the claimants and the defendant (among others) in connection with a business venture. It was alleged that the oral agreement obliged the defendant to redevelop, restructure, manage and/or dispose of assets within a hotel portfolio in order to maximise the financial benefit realised from such assets, and then to pay a share of the net financial benefit from such activity to the claimants. The true intention behind the oral agreement was a matte...
Sukhninder Panesar examines a case that explores liability for knowing receipt and the need for a continuing proprietary interest The claimant must show that they have a continuing proprietary interest in property which is in the hands of the alleged knowing recipient. Where such a finding is not made, the requisite unconscionability does not exist, …
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