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Charitable Principle Not Enough

It seems trite to say that the law is what the law is, but in cases where a decision is reached that is correct under the law but which seems unfair, or not in accordance with an underlying principle, it will nevertheless stand. There is a general principle...

IP Investment Exceeds Physical Investment

Anyone doubting the importance of intellectual property (IP) in the modern economy will be surprised by the contents of a recent report from the Intellectual Property Office that investment in research and development, software and design in 2014 was, at...

Court Compels Insurers to Honour Policy Terms

Insurers are often less than happy to pay up gracefully in the event of a claim and legal advice is sometimes necessary to enforce your rights. In one case, lawyers representing the owner of a listed building that was gutted by fire won a Court of Appeal...

Undisclosed Assets on Break-Up Cause Problems for Executor

When a couple break up, a financial settlement is normally agreed between them as part of the proceedings and that, usually, is that. However, in a recent case involving civil partners who had split up , the death of one partner shortly after the financial...

New Legislation to Counter Tax Evasion Reaches Parliament

The distaste with which the Government regards tax evasion is clear, with HM Revenue and Customs taking an increasingly tough approach both to tax evasion and (with considerable success) when mounting legal challenges to tax avoidance schemes, especially...

What You Do as Well as What You Agree in Writing Matters

It is a common misconception that contracts have to be agreed in writing or orally to be binding. However, a contract can also be valid if it is performed…even if the documentation requires that it must be formally agreed to be valid. A recent case...

Failure to Prove Trust Relationship Stymies Effort to Block Sale of Property

A surprising number of cases are brought to court each year in which allegations are made that the true ownership of an asset is something other than the 'paper' ownership, and these often involve properties. A recent case involving a divorced couple is...

Lease Break Fails Over Partition Permanence

Commercial leases normally contain a provision that if a tenant wishes to break the lease, they must remove all their property (chattels in legal parlance) from the let premises. Such provisions will often, but not always, require the removal of any...

Fertility Clinic Blunder Led to Mother Adopting Her Own Child

The requirements of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 are strict and any procedural error by fertility clinics can cause untold legal complications and misery. That was certainly so in one case in which a form-filling error led to a woman...

Will Your Property Be an IHT Trap?

Data published recently show that the new £100,000 additional 'private residence' exemption for Inheritance Tax (IHT), which is due to be introduced in April 2017 and will increase thereafter, could not come soon enough for many people. More than two...
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