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INCORPORATED LAW SOCIETY OF IRELAND
Vol. 76. No.8
October 1982
Where There's a Will . . .
\
^ * THEN the Law Society was considering
T T following the example of two quite similar
countries, Scotland and New Zealand, where
campaigns had been mounted by the legal profession
to encourage more people to make wills, it was
spurred on by statistics for the Republic of Ireland
furnished by the Probate Office. The Society was
shocked to find that over 42% of grants, for the most
recent year for which figures are available, were
issued in cases of intestacy. While it might be argued
that, in the absence of any requirement to register
wills, there may well have been untraced wills in cases
where intestate grants were issued, any such un-
traced wills may conceiveably have been matched
by the number of cases where people died testate but
without sufficient assets to require a grant to be taken
out. The important feature of the statistic is that, of
all cases in which a grant was actually required, 42%
were intestacies.
'Y
While there may be some people who delay in
making wills because they cannot make up their
minds on the precise distribution of their assets, this
can hardly explain the high percentage of defaulters.
The inescapable conclusion is that, for too many
• people, the making of one's will involves an element
of "signing one's death warrant". It is clearly the
duty of the legal profession to disabuse clients of this
feeling and to endeavour to ensure that the client
looks after his affairs in the best way possible.
It cannot be likely that many people would like
their assets distributed in exactly the way prescribed
by the Succession Act for intestacies. It is certain that
few childless couples would be happy to see the "in-
laws" get all of one party's assets in the event of the
couple dying intestate, one after the other — perhaps
as a result of a road accident.
If a person has a particular obligation, such as
looking after or maintaining a handicapped child, or
aged or infirm relatives, or if there is a problem
member of a family who cannot be trusted to manage
things wisely, a well drawn will can, in most cases,
ensure that, so far as available assets permit, proper
provision can be made for the protection of the
problem member. In such circumstances an intestacy
would be a disaster. In passing, it must be hoped that
whatever taxation levels may be imposed on
discretionary trusts will not result in their ceasing to
be available to cope with the handicapped child or the
problem member of the family, or to simplify the
difficulty of predicting which of several children is
likely to need the greatest share of an estate.
People should make wills, not perhaps "early and
often", but certainly "early", in the sense of making a
will as soon as they marry or acquire sufficient assets
to require administration. The purchase of a house,
even one mortgaged to the hilt, is obviously an
appropriate occasion for the making of a will. Wills
should be revised from time to time on a regular
basis, as the circumstances of the will maker and the
family alter.
Even if there are no obvious problems, the parents
of young children will avoid considerable difficulty if
wills are made.
Finally, if any other argument were needed in the
cause of will-making, it is cheaper and administra-
tively simpler, not perhaps for the will-maker, but
certainly for the estate, to have a grant of probate
issued rather than a grant of administration intestate.
Solicitors' fees for drawing wills have traditionally
been very modest — seen as "loss leaders", no doubt
— but even in these days of more realistic charging
(Continued on P. 176)
"Make awil week"
isTfth LAWSOCIETY