The Guildford Legal Walk, which is a 10km sponsored walk through the Surrey countryside, returns on Monday 8th July. In 2018, teams raised over £10,500 for free legal advice. This year the event will be raising funds to extend the services of South West London Law Centres’ Kingston branch throughout Surrey to become the Kingston… Read more »
To swear an oath evokes images of a Victorian court room, maybe as part of the interminable Chancery case of Jarndyce v Jarndyce in Dickens’ Bleak House. Traditionally, oaths are sworn on a holy book; the implication being that the deponent is unlikely to risk his eternal soul by admitting a false statement. The only… Read more »
The lawyers’ publication The Gazette, produced by the Law society reports: “One of the Government’s New Year announcements has been to claim another success in the move towards making the divorce system in this country an easy online experience for all. Divorce proceedings can now be issued online and since introduced in April 2018 more… Read more »
Noel Conway v Ministry of Justice Earlier this year the Court of Appeal reviewed the law on assisted dying in the UK in the case of Noel Conway v Ministry of Justice. Noel Conway (68) was diagnosed with a terminal illness called Motor Neurone Disease and has been fighting for his right to have the… Read more »
After a recent case in the Supreme Court the Government have acknowledged the need to move towards “no fault divorce”. At the present time clients’ often have to find fault to support a divorce petition and this can be very distressing for all concerned at a delicate time. The move towards no fault divorce is… Read more »
A growing number of claimants are disputing Wills and although most of these claims can be (and are) settled through mediation some cases, in recent years, have made it to court. The introduction of the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 (“Inheritance Act”) has enabled judges to vary Wills in favour of a certain… Read more »
“Solicitors app in development”, the President of the Family Division and the head of HMCTS (the courts and tribunals service) have recently announced. The app is designed to allow solicitors to apply for a divorce online on behalf of their clients and testing starts in September 2018. If testing is successful, solicitors will be able… Read more »
In the 1980s and 1990s interest only mortgages were fairly standard and were often run alongside an investment policy which was intended to grow sufficiently so that the mortgage would be repaid at the end of the term. These were known as endowment mortgages. Due to the poor pay-out and the controversy around them it… Read more »
Inheritance Tax and the implications that this can have upon a person’s estate is always a topic for much discussion. April 2017 saw the introduction of the new Inheritance Tax “Residence Nil Rate Band” for residential property that is comprised within a person’s estate. The rules relating to this important new tax relief are complex…. Read more »
There have been a number of cases where, for whatever reason, Attorneys have not always adhered to their obligations when it comes to considering gifts. An Attorney’s powers to make gifts is limited. If, for example, the Donor of a Power of Attorney is used to making a gift of £100 to their grandchildren on… Read more »
