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Parents generally owe no legal duty financially to maintain their adult children. That principle proved decisive in the case of a businessman who was worth almost £2.2 million when he died, but who left not a penny to his daughters. Having enjoyed a rewarding career in accountancy and merchant banking, the man died at the age of 68 from a brain tumour. By his will, he left almost all of his estate to his second wife. He bequeathed nothing to the two daughters of his first marriage, which had lasted...

Failing to accurately respond to insurers' questions when taking out a policy is highly likely to render your cover worthless. A businessman found that out to his cost after losing a £190,000 Rolex watch whilst on a skiing trip. The man launched proceedings after his insurer refused to pay out for his loss. The insurer required him to provide strict proof of how the loss occurred and argued that it was in any event entitled to avoid the policy. That was on the basis that, when the policy was applied...

The tax regime is subject to constant change and it is generally up to taxpayers to keep their knowledge up to date in a fluid landscape. However, as a case concerning tax charged on high-income recipients of Child Benefit showed, HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) is also under a duty to keep the public informed. Until January 2013, Child Benefit was not means tested. However, the introduction in that month of the High Income Child Benefit Charge (HICBC) meant that those who earned more than £50,000 a year were subject...

Restrictions on the use to which properties can be put often lurk in old title deeds. As one case showed, however, some of them only endure as long as a human lifetime whilst others have no such shelf life and continue to have effect indefinitely. The case concerned a covenant in a 1961 conveyance that placed restrictions on the purchasers of a building plot on which a bungalow was later erected. It forbade them from constructing any other building on the plot, and from making alterations to the bungalow's external...