Posted: Thursday, 10 October 2024 @ 12:10
One of the themes with those entrusted with the elderly's financial affairs is the current lack of scrutiny which is evidenced by the following:
1 The inherent difficulty to scrutinise LPAs and what is going on with financial activity.
2 The Office of Public Guardian can scrutinise a LPA(for free), but if they do investigate it will cease once the Elderly Person dies.
3 The ease with which an individual can change a will.
4 The fact that if a solicitor draws up a will this does not necessarily lead to much greater scrutiny of the way the Elderly Person has organised his/her affairs.(though it is much more difficult to challenge)
5 The onus is very much on the Elderly Person's relatives/friends to discover something untoward and they may have limited resources to do so.
6 If you go to Court you/your legal representatives will have to be very careful how you allege something untoward has happened.
7 Even in the face of something untoward (fraud) of Elderly Person's affairs being discovered the police are unlikely to intervene. To some extent, it is a free for all.
Despite this the trend is very much towards greater transparency and certainly with challenges on Executor conduct the Courts are looking for Executors to provide more financial detail as the recent case of Lane v Lane showed.
The law of undue influence of lifetime transactions(as supposed to of wills) continues to evolve.
To be effective there is a strong emphasis on victims of something untoward to explain themselves well to those in authority.