Donnelly Neary & Donnelly Solicitors

Number of wills contested soars With the number of wills being contested in the High Court up 25% in recent years, lawyers are urging people to secure their last wishes to avoid claims derailing their legacy plans.
It is important to:-
... - communicate your intentions to family members whilst you are alive to avoid beneficiaries getting unhappy surprises,
- appoint a competent executor
-communicate with charities one may want to benefit
- consider setting up a trust, which would distribute funds in line with your wishes, but would adapt to any change in circumstances instead of strictly adhering to the will.
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Probate backlog puts property deals at risk A rise in the number of probate applications ahead of a rise in charges has led to delays in grants being issued putting thousands of property transactions at risk. A glut of applications has inevitably slowed down the process, meaning that grants are taking months to be issued, rather than weeks. At the same time, the probate system is moving online and physical probate registries are closing down, with staff being gradually replaced by computers. The prospect of property deals falling through is “significant” and delays could see sellers losing their buyers.

EMA to appeal Canary Wharf commercial lease case The European Medicines Agency (EMA) is appealing against a High Court ruling that has blocked its plans to break a 25-year, £500m lease of its London headquarters and move to the Netherlands because of Brexit. Landlords fear that the case risks opening the floodgates to companies seeking to abandon multi-million-pound property contracts because of Brexit if the EMA is successful
#law #lease

Are high stress levels for Lawyers inevitable? New research shows lawyers have a lack of awareness over how to respond to stress in the workplace despite the majority considering mental well-being to be a top issue. More than 60% of the solicitors responding to a survey reported high levels of stress, with 25% experiencing extreme or very high levels. Just 8% reported low stress levels. Despite the levels reporting high levels of stress, 55% said they believed enough is alrea...dy being done. The Bellweather Research Paper from LexisNexis concluded: “It seems that for many solicitors, stress is just an inevitable – perhaps even a necessary – facet of the job. While such a cultural logic persists in the industry, it’s reasonable to assume that law firms will lag behind other workplaces in prioritising employee well-being as an integral part of their business processes”. Positivity was high, however, with 46% of respondents reporting either very high or extremely high job satisfaction.
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Campaign raises opt-out awareness
The Government has launched a £12m public awareness drive ahead of a law change that will deliver an opt-out system for organ donation. The law, dubbed Max and Keira’s Law after 11-year-old Max Johnson and his nine-year-old heart donor Keira Ball, will mean that adults in England are presumed to have agreed to donate organs unless they opt out.

TRUSTS: Bare trust can exist without a trust deed, says tribunal
A taxpayer can be regarded as holding money in a bare trust for a relative without any trust deed or other formal trust documentation being available, if other evidence supports the existence of the trust, the First-tier Tax Tribunal has decided in Tang v HMRC (2019 UKFTT 0081 TC).

Immigration Services offered Settlement Scheme applications, Corporate and business immigration, work permits and citizenship applications, investor and entrepreneur schemes, student visas, EU Treaty Rights and applications for family members. Cross-border experience and interest in working on free movement and immigration matters in context of Brexit.

Immigration Services offered Settlement Scheme applications, Corporate and business immigration, work permits and citizenship applications, investor and entrepreneur schemes, student visas, EU Treaty Rights and applications for family members. Cross-border experience and interest in working on free movement and immigration matters in context of Brexit.#immigration

Immigration Services offered Settlement Scheme applications, Corporate and business immigration, work permits and citizenship applications, investor and entrepreneur schemes, student visas, EU Treaty Rights and applications for family members. Cross-border experience and interest in working on free movement and immigration matters in context of Brexit.

INCOME TAX: Footballer’s image rights income was earnings from employment
Payments made by a professional football club to an overseas image rights company owned by one of its players were employment earnings, and therefore subject to income tax and national insurance contributions, the First-tier Tax Tribunal has held in Hull City AFC v HMRC (2019 UKFTT 0227 TC). While the parties’ image rights agreement was not a sham, the tribunal decided to take a ‘realistic view’ of the payments by reference to their substance rather than their form, finding no evidence to show that the overseas image rights had any commercial value or had actually been exploited.

PROPRIETARY ESTOPPEL: Son’s successful claim will force sale of family farm
The son of farmers David and Josephine Guest has succeeded in a proprietary estoppel claim on the family dairy farm at Chepstow, having shown that he received assurances that he would inherit a substantial interest in the farm in return for working on it. Andrew Guest will receive a lump sum payment of half the value of the business plus 40 per cent of the value of the land and buildings, but the farm will probably have to be sold to pay him, generating tax liabilities in which he will have to share (Guest v Guest, 2019 EWHC 869 Ch).

MATRIMONIAL: Russian refugee’s wife can claim financial relief in England
Elena Vasilyeva has obtained permission to apply for a financial settlement in the English courts under s13 of the Matrimonial and Family Proceedings Act 1984, even though she has lived in Tenerife since 2016, she and her husband are both Russian, and they spent most of their married lives in Moscow until her husband claimed asylum in the UK in 2011. Williams J in the England and Wales High Court said none of Vasilyeva’s arguments on their own provided a substantial or solid ground for relief, but taken together demonstrated a substantial ground (Vasilyeva v Shemyakin, 2019 EWHC 932 Fam).

BRIEFING NOTE: PPI claims against estates
It has been brought to the attention of STEP’s UK Practice Committee that practitioners may soon face an issue in relation to Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) claims against estates. A member of the Committee has raised the concern that claims management companies may begin pursuing fiduciaries based on the argument that they and their advisors would have been expected to investigate whether estates were entitled to compensation. A briefing note outlining the potential issue has been prepared.

CRIME: Paralegal who defrauded estates is jailed for more than three years
A legal executive in charge of wills at Coventry-based firm Bate Edmonds Snape has been jailed for three years and two months for stealing GBP70,000 from clients’ estates. Lucy Gunton forged letters purporting to be from the beneficiaries, requesting cash advances on their expected legacies. She was found out when her boss noticed an identical typing error in letters from three supposed beneficiaries.

CAPITAL GAINS TAX: Taxpayers escape penalties in another non-resident CGT case
A married couple have won their appeal against GBP1,600 of late filing penalties imposed under the rules, introduced in April 2015, requiring non-residents who dispose of UK property to report their capital gains tax (CGT) liability within 30 days of the sale. The Kirsopps were aware of the potential CGT liability, but when they phoned HMRC to enquire, they were told to report the sale on a self-assessment return. The tribunal accepted that they could not have been expected to realise an additional return would be required (Kirsopp & Kirsopp v HMRC, 2019 UKFTT 217 TC).