Great Expectations--- Re Seviour Deceased

As much as I do not want to be the sort of person who runs around like a headless chicken every time a case is reported in the very fact specific realm of the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975, the recent case of Re Seviour Dec'd[2020] 3 WLUK 537 a decision of Deputy Chancery Master Stephen Lloyd (an estates and contentious probate specialist) has excited a little interest, read the article by the retired solicitor who romped home to victory as a Mackenzie friend for the Defendant here https://www.lawgazette.co.uk/commentary-and-opinion/probate-are-too-many-hopeless-contentious-cases-being-settled/5103830.article

This was a somewhat brave IHA claim by a healthy adult child (against her deceased father's estate) with a reasonable family income and unused earning capacity against a seriously disabled terminally ill widow (her step mother) with a care package, very limited income, and whose principal asset was her share of the disabled-adapted home she lived in. Even that was subject to a local authority charge for the adaptations. Add to that a small estate, most of which consisted of the deceased's share in the said house.

There is sometimes thought to be a special case for children of a natural parent whose estate passes to a step parent and are then left out by the latter, the cases cited are Re Leach [1985] 3 W.L.R. 413 and Re Callaghan [1985] Fam. 1, Callaghan deals with it more plainly. Often these claims follow the death of the step parent rather than the parent as such and the defendants are the children of the step parent who will typically benefit in the case of any intestacy of the step parent. This case was different because it was directly against the step mother, and there was no intestacy but rather the widow benefited from the will of her late husband, but it does touch upon the scenario, more familiar these days, where a child loses the last of his or her natural parents and the family wealth goes off to someone who is a non relative. The cases cited are sometimes suggested to hint at a legitimate expectation of a natural child to a portion of the parental estate stemming from the relationship with his or her parent, relevant to Section 3(1)(g). The Master in Seviour did not appear to think much of this point, see paragraph 19 of his judgement where he says "As the argument wore on it became clear that The Claimant was motivated by the view that she was entitled as of right to one quarter of her father’s estate. She clearly is not." It is not however clear from where that expectation arose.

Neither of the cases above were cited but there was no relevant point of law and in the IHA jurisdiction generally previous cases are often of limited use save for illustration. As this was a Deputy Master case (albeit the very distinguished Deputy Master Lloyd) and as with nearly all IHA cases, there is not much scope for a take-away, except the knowledge that every case turns on its own facts and, perhaps that, if there is a special case for step children, it can only go so far against a truly deserving Defendant. Once the Applicant has established a right to make the application then assuming that the applicant can establish that the distribution of the estate does not make reasonable financial provision for the applicants maintenance, having regard to Ilott, then the Section 3 factors will take over. It also emphasises the significance of the size of the estate and the type of assets of which it is comprised, in this case it largely consisted of a house specially adapted for the disabled Defendant's needs, not exactly a treasure chest.

With the benefit of hindsight the application in Seviour has been referred to as "hopeless" (see the above law gazette article) but in reality few cases are truly hopeless. I personally do not subscribe to the view that (without hindsight) the Seviour application was necessarily hopeless. Moreover those cases which do go to appeal all emphasise that the judge at first instance will enjoy a broad discretion with which the appellate court will rarely interfere (a point clearly made in Ilott). Even with hopeless cases there are often good economic reasons for settlement. The cost of taking a case to court is not often much less than about ￡50,000 with a contested hearing. Many applicants are impecunious and there is often every chance that a costs order, even if obtained against an applicant, will be unenforceable in practice. There can often be a high cost to victory and a low offer presented at an early stage may still be sensible.