New succession law: intestacy is still pretty bad
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
2M ago
The Trusts and Succession (Scotland) Act 2024 received Royal Assent yesterday. Three months from then, we will have a change to the intestate succession rules. The Act makes one quite significant change to the laws of intestacy. A positive and sensible change in our view. But a change that still leaves intestacy as an unattractive option in managing and governing succession to an estate. What is the change to the intestacy rules? Where the deceased has no children, the surviving spouse or civil partner will inherit the estate. The current rules of intestacy state that after certain provision f ..read more
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Spooky but with treat not trick: deeds of variation
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
5M ago
What’s more ghoulish than private client law. Death this, calamity that! Sometimes private client law can work in spooky ways. One that allows the will of a dead person to be changed. Yes, you heard that right. And in doing so to save tax, support charity or hold an inheritance in a better and more appropriate way to suit a beneficiary and their family. The trickery we speak of is a a deed of variation. But it is not really trickery and is something that is (or at least should be) considered regularly in estates. In some ways the ‘trickery’ is that the deed of variation legislation treats what ..read more
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What a load of politics: IHT change in the air
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
6M ago
There appear to be kites in the air. Flags being hoisted up the mast. And other horrible phrases. The weekend media was in a minor frenzy… “abolition of inheritance tax“! In the dim and distant past we had a thing called the Office of Tax Simplification. The OTS was itself recently ‘simplified’. Media spin… “bureaucrat bonfire“! Whenever the OTS issued a review of inheritance tax, my conclusion has consistently been that it will be a government need to pursue a particular (economic) policy agenda that will result in changes (of whatever sort) to inheritance tax. The political/economic mix matt ..read more
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Who do you think you are? Charities, mergers and legacies
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
7M ago
It may be worthwhile examining a charity’s ‘family tree’ in order to secure future legacy income. Has your charity ever been part of a merger, restructure or the recipient of the transfer of all assets from another charity? If so, the charity should be identifying key information about that. It may be that a merger or other restructuring moment happened many years ago. Charities should revisit their ‘family tree’ to find out if there has been some from of previous merger activity.  The record of charity mergers Why should this be done? To ready the charity to be able to submit information ..read more
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It’s here! The Charities (Regulation and Administration) (Scotland) Bill is passed
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
9M ago
The Charities (Regulation and Administration) (Scotland) Bill has now completed its progress through the Scottish Parliament. Next step Royal Assent. After that, there will be the implementation of the new rules for Scottish registered charities. There will be a communication exercise to inform charities and others about the new requirements under what will be the Charities (Regulation and Administration) (Scotland) Act 2023. For now we offer an overview of the Bill now that it has finished the Holyrood procedure. The final Bill has a few differences from the Bill as introduced to parliament ..read more
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That’s interesting… paying IHT by instalments
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
10M ago
Paying inheritance tax by instalments  A short blog. But it could be a valuable one. It is on the topic of interest rates on unpaid inheritance tax.  By ‘unpaid’, we mean inheritance tax that is being paid by way of an instalment option. Asset types fall into non-instalment option and instalment option in terms when any inheritance tax must be paid.  A significant member of the instalment option class is property (land and buildings). It means if there is a house in an estate or trust, there is no need to pay upfront all of the inheritance tax due on the house. One can decide to ..read more
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The Charities Bill at Stage 1: positives with opportunities missed?
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
11M ago
The Charities (Regulation and Administration) (Scotland) Bill has reached the point in its parliamentary process where the lead committee (the Social Justice and Social Security committee) considering its terms has issued its Stage 1 Report. Here is an overview the Bill in light of the Stage 1 Report. Our overview conclusion on the Stage 1 Report Our general feeling is being underwhelmed. But perhaps we had to manage our own expectations giving the terms of the Bill. The Bill was quite focussed. The lack of including reform to charities set up by way of an act of parliament to enable them to h ..read more
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You don’t need to think about having a will or power of attorney
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
1y ago
OK, that is a statement for the start of April. Everyone needs to think about having a will and power of attorney. And also thinking about having the right will and power of attorney in place. The cruel April Fool that can be played on people is that the default law will help them and pass their estate to the ‘right’ beneficiaries and on the ‘right’ basis. It often (in the vast majority of situations) won’t. If you leave it to the default rules then disappointment or a random outcome will follow. Not a great way to arrange things. Without a power of attorney assets will be frozen and no-one (e ..read more
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The Euros
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
1y ago
For many, sporting attention turns to qualification for the UEFA European Football Championship. The Euros. For the international/ constitutional lawyer (not me!), Group A offers Brexit (Scotland), EFTA (Norway), the EU (Spain and Cyprus) and, on a European level, all teams are in the Council of Europe (including Georgia). The global arena is also important for succession and estate planning matters. There are, for us, four critical points to consider when dealing with succession across borders. Domicile, land and buildings, will validity and the EU Succession Regulation. Domicile Very broadly ..read more
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Accumulation of income by charitable trusts: a rule really worth keeping?
Scottish charity and wealth law
by scottishcharitywealthlaw
1y ago
The Trusts and Succession (Scotland) Bill and the abolition of the ‘accumulation of income’ rules Section 41 of the Trusts and Succession (Scotland) Bill provides, for trusts established after any new law comes into force, that the ‘accumulation of income’ rules will be abolished. While other variants are available, the rule means that after 21 years of a trust being in existence trustees can no longer ‘accumulate’ income. This is known as the accumulation period.   What is ‘accumulation’ and what is a trust permitted to do with its income? What does it mean to accumulate income? Well, th ..read more
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