Estate talks w/ siblings that don't help - Who gets what?

My mom died this summer, after years of my helping her almost every day. Siblings did ZERO. Guess who is wanting their money? The siblings!

If your mom had a living trust or will that instrument would dictate who would get what. Depending on where you live, if your mom did not have one of those instruments, it is possible her assets would be required to be divided equally among her children. You could find out from an attorney.

I took care of my dad without any help from any family members even when I begged for help. Before he got really ill with Dementia he changed his living trust so I would get all his assets when he died. He needed a lot of professional care so most his assets were gone when he died. When he died I was required to send all his potential beneficiaries a copy of his trust within 60 days. Needless to say, I think my siblings were very hurt to see in writing that our father made these changes and they were completely left out. One sibling has never spoke to me again.

When one child is caring for a parent, that child should be getting paid. A caregiver contract should be set up between mom, or POA for mom and caregiver child. Ask the attorney to draw it up.

Big topic, glad to see it here! Glad to have the opportunity to vent in a later-hindsight review fashion, after finding my generous offer to try to "help" my disabled brother learn to interface with the adult world and leave home. That offer to help, which I thought would take 4-5 years and be interesting and valuable to maintaining some family ties for me and him - but I discovered that healthcare is based on short term crisis models - long term care is very varied, and risks and changes are vast and normal, and not set up to help frail people maintain interactions in the larger world. So here are a few thoughts I learned, when I found myself bonded to disabled brother after my help was beneficial, and I realized he needed someone to oversee the whole, and he misrepresented his own needs - I stayed involved, helped him learn, grow, stay safe, placing him in a small country town, and visiting together 4-6 times a year, as I helped him.

Seems to me that more professional education needs to be given to lawyers who draw up trusts - education that is current on the possible costs of long term care, and arrange for some significant benefit to be planned to spend on care. Family need to factor in this possible expense, to their long term and inheritance expectations, instead of just hiding heads in the sand and hoping a parent doesn't need all their legacy before they die.

A child will not be paid as much as professional services, but a respectable amount per year needs to be proposed along with tracking expenses, sharing those regularly, and sharing reports of issues and progress - those things are expected of professionals, and if it is one of the children who takes in the parent, or lives nearby and becomes the coordinator and onsite helper, they need to start out at the outset with formats for tracking and sharing progress, so it becomes routine, and all stay aware.

Currently there are mostly fears and prejudices and lack of financial planning and understanding - there is an old legacy that suggests that a child who moves back home to care for an elder parent, is a freeloader, seeking free rent and lack of need to get a job, and most other siblings fear having not one fragile person but two, draining on family resources. This prejudice needs the light of day to clarify the real costs to any caregiver, who makes time to give family care.

Some fuzzy lines may be true, but especially in today's fragmented world with family often too busy or far away, doing the bulk of care for a parent - is a job!

Many adult children would be glad to help out, put in their bit, from time to time - or they believe they would do so, even if they may find it hard in reality to allocate time when needed for the care situation. So, it can seems to work out sometimes that a nearby child can benefit from putting on an addition to their home where mom can live and be close to family.

The trick as I see it it, is to become educated and connected to others in community around the quality of care, have local signals of things going well, not only depend on distant family to evaluate. The needs here are those of the elder, not the child - some overlap may be good for both, but the benefits to the frail person need to be reported regularly, maybe monthly reports - maybe validated by community people - now we can track lots online, format reports and see they are shared with all other involved parties.

This is really important, not just as a check and balance on a caregiver who benefits somewhat by sharing financial resources with an elder - but also because emergencies and new contingencies come up repeatedly as years pass, and it can take that same child caregiver - vast amounts of time to sort out and make arrangements for new situations - maybe time spent researching a new insurance company, visits with doctors, time to educate in home care help - who all change over time.

That backup support time is invisible to distant siblings, who are often caught in a time warp with past impressions of sibling roles, suspicious of anyone who suggests the roles need changing. And, distant family members easily underestimate the impact of new disabilities on a parent's confidence and ability to participate - hearing of issues, they treat upsets or falls as one-off occurrences, where the close at hand caregiver sees each episode as a possible signal of deterioration that can be ameliorated with accomodations - but the art of finding and installing and helping a fragile person to safely use new accomodations - takes time in and of itself - that time needs tracking.

Many adult children are willing to accept changes requested by the parent directly - but the problem there is that many parents would rather endure suffering for themselves or for the caregiver - in order to avoid upsetting long established family roles. Many don't realize that their needs have grown, so what feels like a continuing family home with the caregiver living there - is not any more the same home they established - if pushed that adult caregiver would need to find ways to interact with the larger world,find some way to make money - and - my pet peeve - any job or arrangement should set up a retirement fund - so that a longstanding family care provider, does not suddenly find themselves destitute once the parent is gone - with no accumulated retirement plan, except to have the home that the other children were also expecting as their legacy.

I realize I need to write a book or manual on this subject. Get rich by my hard knocks knowledge, as I was surprised at the gaps in information that existed between me and my other relatives, when I did the care for my disabled brother, from a different country. We were best valued as "out of sight, out of mind" - and while my work was used and appreciated by the other brothers who did not then need to worry or devote their time - they still can follow the family format and worry about the care recipient, and find it self serving of me to wish for their attention to my life path, not just the needs that family defined as risky, the needs of the fragile members.

Caregivers need better plans, not free rein, for it matters to have good relationships among siblings who often remain after parents have died. The old ways of assuming that elders will be cared for "somehow" might have had application when village life was stable - in today's world, we have no plan that really works - and it is not fair to take advantage of a generous moment or time that one child offers "to help". Making sure that all elder estates budget high and low options for long term care, and those estimates are shared with the whole family - can add a basis of reality to discussions or arguments that will arise, but can become ways that adult siblings learn of each other's talents in adult life - if they are not seen suspiciously as secret arrangements.

Castle, you raise a lot of interesting and valid points. I'd like to respond to some, not to challenge but rather to point out a different perspective, which also needs to be considered in the whole scope of caregiving.

1. Attorneys generally do participate in continuing ed, although it's been awhile since I was knowledgeable on the requirements. Law firms for which I worked had continuing ed lunch programs for attorneys and paralegals. I also attended reasonably priced programs in my particular practice area. Some firms also provide community education programs for the general public, and publish newsletters on related practice area topics as well.

Attorneys and other professionals focus on the legal aspects with knowledge of ancillary issues. It's not always realistic for them to provide advice, at an attorney's billable rate, for something that can be researched by individuals. Legal advice cannot, though; it requires the benefit of legal education.

2. The need for care can often arise suddenly, before a family has had a chance to plan financially. And some families will never have the resources to plan regardless of how long a look-forward period exists. The funds just aren't there and never will be.

3. Many families or single children need to support themselves. Some of us here are in that situation. The option of quitting work to care for someone full time is not realistic.

4. The concept of sharing progress, etc. with other siblings is laudable, but if you spend some time to read some of the posts on family friction, especially between siblings, as well as factor in the knowledge that some siblings may be providing care entirely on their own w/o any other sibling or outside help, it will become apparent that some of us neither have the time for reporting, nor are other siblings always interested in that level of information. Let me ask also why I should bother to maintain reporting standards and activities to provide to someone who is not going to help? Frankly, that's a waste of my time.

5. You stated:

"Many adult children would be glad to help out, put in their bit, from time to time - or they believe they would do so, even if they may find it hard in reality to allocate time when needed for the care situation."

I would have to view that as a laudable but inaccurate assumption. Many siblings in fact do not want to participate, and won't.

6. You also wrote:

"So, it can seems to work out sometimes that a nearby child can benefit from putting on an addition to their home where mom can live and be close to family."

Where, pray tell, are these adult children going to get the money to add to their homes? I subsist on SS alone and can't even afford to buy a new car, let alone put an addition on my house. That particular suggestion really doesn't reflect a reality for many of us.

And that doesn't even address zoning and permitting issues, including whether or not there's even room on the lot to add an addition.

7. Another suggestion of yours makes me scratch my head and wonder:

"The needs here are those of the elder, not the child - some overlap may be good for both, but the benefits to the frail person need to be reported regularly, maybe monthly reports - maybe validated by community people - now we can track lots online, format reports and see they are shared with all other involved parties."

The needs are not JUST of the elder, they're of both! I'm not a martyr, and neither is anyone I know who's caring for a parent or parents.

We caregivers are still humans and have our needs, including maintaining our own health so that we can care for our parents. I honestly can't believe anyone could conceive something so naïve.

And reports, monthly posted online? For what purpose? Are you unaware of how personal information is commoditized these days? Are you unaware of privacy issues? I can't imagine even considering posting updates on my parent's care on some online reporting site available to "community" or whatever.


I could add more but I'm not sure there's a reason to. Although you seem to have experienced the sole caregiver phenomenon yourself, I can't help thinking that your approach is very academic, as if viewing the caregiving situation from a perspective not of those people on the ground and in the trenches doing the majority of the caregiving without help from siblings.

My point is not specifically to criticize, but rather to help bring the suggestions you make to a meeting with reality, with practicality, and especially of the recognition that these caregiving journeys are often sole ventures, completely without support from siblings, regardless of how much we might try or even plead for that kind of help, as well as the fact that a lot of your suggestions seem like governmental approaches - create more paperwork, more interface, more reporting, etc., but how does this REALLY help the elder and his/her caregiver?

Again, I'm not trying to challenge you, just point out some need for realism. You obviously are a good analyst and can see the situation from an analytical perspective. Blend the suggestions with practical applications and you can write your book then.

Thanks so much, Garden Artist - for the considerate and delicate way you expressed your disagreement with some of my assumptions. I won't answer right now, you and I have added a wealth of information in comprehensive posts, and I'll work on other aspects of what I need to do now!

I likely sound academic, and I may have distanced myself a bit by now, after providing 40 years of direct care for my disabled brother - I had to go through many battles around the care, often felt overwhelmed and I was actually removed from my family of origin, and never involved them, until I had done care by then, almost 30 years. Some hardening of my arteries, I think! When I finally lost the support of my long term boyfriend, and turned to family of origin over the phone, assuming that by now they'd be glad that I had pitched in and relieved them of so much responsibility for so long - and I discovered to my astonishment that they were stuck in an ancient, never examined time warp of interpretation and had paid no attention whatever to my ups and downs - I went through my years of being prostrate with grief, anger, resentment, despair - I've EARNED my present academic status! But ironically, because it was so important, I also learned how to fight, and I needed their support, because I was standing alone in this country with care for a multi disabled brother on my hands, and I wanted emotional support and attention, as well as money.

So - that accounts for the dryness of my summary, I don't intend that at all. I just came to see that from siblings point of view, they are only responsible for the needs of the frail member - they are suspicious of any other sibling claiming any expectation from them. I believe they are wrong, of course. And I support new conversations about how sharing care, effort etc, is healthy for all - and draining on all. I was just focusing in my piece on estate planning - not as it is currently done, but how it needs to be planned ahead of time, so that all family members can come to realize that every care task is work, and needs to be put into a plan. If caregivers don't have time or inclination to report regularly, family can hire someone to help, for without information that they often cannot even hear from emotional siblings - they are left with no consequences of their denial and no information. I believe information helps ground conversations, as does money, and looking through those lens actually Supports the goals of caregivers. I noted the idea of building the addition house - and realized, that is the kind of expense that should be planned to partly come out of parents' estates - not just be left to any sibling to construct that for their parent's care!

Many complications - but lawyers and eldercare mediators and caregivers need to get together and put all pieces into the pot, for the issues seem often too big, especially planning for changes through time - too big for any group of siblings to manage just through feelings and rights.

Thanks! Maybe will spend time on this next week - for now I'm working on a huge project, one I set aside for so many years, as I focused on my brother's care. I need good wishes from all on my own projects now, as I'm rusty!

Cassie

If mom has a will, you and your siblings don't have a choice. If her financial instruments don't provide for "payable on death to," you will not be able to access her money until it's been through probate. And THEN state laws will treat all siblings equally.

As to a caregiver getting a larger share, I personally, for what it's worth, don't agree. I'm pretty sure mom wouldn't want to slight her children by treating some as if they were her favorites.

Quick add - I'm no longer responsible for the direct care in emergencies for my brother, for he needed to go and live in an nursing home, and he also attends a special education day program. I"m still involved, he still needs someone who knows and supports his care and views and needs - but not on the emergency crisis prevention role I had for the first 30 years, when I supported him living in community over miles.

One other money point - it just seems it would be helpful for family support professionals - to build a complete list of likely expense areas around family support roles. For when I was caregiver, and worried about my role - I tended to undervalue the role my older brother played, in arranging funerals for parents and also for my eldest brother and older sister. So that older brother also manages estate left for disabled brother - he has areas of blindness and prejudice and fear of me and my anger ... and also, he did show up when needed, to take the lead on funeral planning, which does take lots of detailed work. All those expenses, including long term care supports, should be taught as percentage of money required in old age - so that parents can be aware, that it's not all about good feelings or health and care - and that if they have a list of issues, whether or not they have the money or all issues are used - all family members can learn what's involved - as a younger sib, I learned nothing! And ended up taking on the largest, longest, chunk of "family responsibility"!

I see your point, especially the issue of a family which I assume is from a different culture, and from the vantage point of looking back in hindsight.

I also appreciate having more insight into your perspectives; it helps me understand more why you see some issues as you do.

There are others here who would agree that planning could be better managed; I don't disagree with that, only with the fact that there are often so many financial limitations affecting these dynamics.

There is an issue to be argued though that education of long term parental care might be something to even be added in educational curricula, but I suspect that people in the teens and 20's don't see these issues as we older folks do. And of course they need to focus on an educational curriculum that will help them in finding a decent job.

I think love is more important than money, my siblings are stealing from my mother and travelling the world with funds they can't afford, I do everything and rarely go out or overseas,and yet they treat me badly. . Let's hope it catches up with them before they take the lot, my mother deserves dignity and respect and still needs some money to live on, is there such a thing as justice. I wonder,

My parents decided who and how their assets are being distributed after their deaths. My parents earned it, it is theirs to give as they see fit. Mom has passed, my father lives with me. I am his caretaker. I have 2 siblings - my brother hasn't done diddly (not even when mama died) - hasn't even visited them in 20+ years. He's an ass. My sister helps here and there - but primarily it is MY life that has changed completely - my sister visits occasionally (even though she only lives 82 miles away)....He's the thing.....as hard as it is to look after my father it is still a privilege to me. I get to see him every day, I get to have conversations with him that are invaluable, I get to help him navigate some difficult waters, I get to laugh and cry with him, I get to be the one he looks to for security and support.

My sister & I are co-executors. Personally, I wouldn't care if Dad spent every dime he had on HIMSELF before he leaves this planet & we had to bury him in a cardboard box - as long as he enjoys himself & denies himself nothing. But because it is what my folks wanted, I will see to it that everyone gets their equal share - and I hope it makes them happy, as sometimes it seems like that's all their waiting for.

My compensation for looking after my folks for the last 10 years and Dad's moving in with me after Mom's passing? I am at peace knowing that I did my best to be a good, loving daughter to my parents and that my father's last days on earth will be filled with peace and comfort with me by his side throughout. No amount of money will buy that kind of peace.

Pfontes, thanks for sharing the many positive aspects of caregiving. Sometimes it becomes so overwhelming that it's hard to think positively, so it's always a good reminder when someone with your attitude shares her feelings.

Sibling had not seen my mother for 18+ years, but came to see her for a few hours two weeks before she passed. Guess who did not wait a month to demand a copy of the will and attorney information. Followed by calling the hospital in an attempt to get medical records. Mom was 90.

I don't care, but what bugs me a lot is that she gave her life savings to my brother to hold and to use for times like now. I know this from long ago, and yet, he keeps it real quiet. He just spoke to my husband about the thousands of dollars HE is spending. Im not sure where except for his trips back and forth to her house (30 minutes each way). And occasionall things he buys. The truth is that hb and I have done the lions share for many years, send in a cleaning woman, pay and shop and cook for all the food ... sorry. This does not matter. We do it silently. For her dignity. I think that he (keeping it quiet that he has the money) and then saying he is spending thousands is totally unfair. But, it is what it is and he has a long history of using people for money. Enough said. That is my rant. I do not wish to lower myself to his level. I don't believe in "advertising" what you do. If you love someone and you can help them, you do it. You maintain their dignity by keeping quiet.. This is not for all the readers her ... this is just for me and had to get it out on this issue. He calls us all liars, and I have found out that it is actually he who does a lot of lying by omission, etc.

Trying, I wouldn't agree with you that keeping quiet is an appropriate action if your loved one needs assistance. It can be construed as acquiescence and enabling someone to continue doing what he or she is doing.

If I have to, I'll easily become aggressive and "in your face" and just did it twice with meddlers who thought they could make assumptions for my father.

GA: I have been far from quiet re getting help for my mom. Brother has POA. She is not dx'd as being unable to make decisions. My hands are tied. I cannot control what he does; only myself. I have repeatedly pointed out to him my concerns about her. Deaf ears, no response, a dysfunctional family. Perhaps I missed your point? Not sure. Thanks for responding. I appreciate the care.

Trying, I meant no offense. I was responding to this sentence:
"You maintain their dignity by keeping quiet." Sorry if there was any inferred criticism.

I do understand that it's impossible to control someone else's actions; and I know that's more than frustrating. Some people just don't listen and are going to do what they want, especially if they're convinced they know better than we do. I see that a lot with meddlers.

I don't believe inheritance should be based on the last few years of a parent's life. All of the children are your mom's children-whether they contributed to her care in the last days/months/years. Not providing care doesn't disqualify them from being her children. If the situation were reversed-and YOU were one who did absolutely nothing-would you gladly step away and say 'I did nothing these last few years so I'm not entitled to anything?' Let it go...divide to split it all equally. You do not want to live with bitterness and every night as you fall asleep be reliving the situation. Falling asleep while running the numbers and thinking how unfair it is that those siblings who did nothing still benefited is no way to live. Your siblings may have been there for your mother at various times that you've forgotten about. Just LET IT GO and split it evenly.

GA: Not offended at all. To clarify, when I said that about "keeping quiet", I meant, when you give money as support, you don't advertise this fact. We gave, we give, we keep quiet. What my mother has given to me, husband and our children I could never place a dollar value on. It is priceless and I am so lucky to have had her as my mom. I don't care about the money or who gets it. What I do care about is my brother being secretive abut money she has given him to use for her now (I have not said anything to him about this, but I know it for a fact) and then going around saying "poor me, I am spending so much money on h her". To top it off he has not! I dislike him intensely for mny reasons. He may take her to doctors but he treats her badly. No abuse, but he is just short termpered and shuts her down. Little ability to have compassion for what she is going through, which is a lot. I cannot change it. But I can do my level best to help her in my own ways. Money be damned. My break with this brother is not over money; it is over how he treats me, my other sibling, his x wife, his own Mom and people in general. I am done "reaching out" to people who do not care; who do not share medical information abut her that is vital, ffreely. On one occasion, I was with her in the ER (on the way I called him to get what meds she was on and he refused to gell me). Thankfully, I was reasonably apprised of her condition and made some educated guesses when we did get to the ER as to what she might be on, as they cut her clothes off her body (heart attack). I told them the diagnosis and that she was on statins, drugs for A-fib, and I don't remember what else as this was several years ago. They went on that and then got her files. His behavior was unconscionable. He recently did this to my brother who called from the hospital trying to get other information about my mother as they awaited the doctor. Again, no information. It was a screaming match. Sorry, I am really angry and venting. Things are not hard engouh. No. We need a nasty sob making it harder because he is a controlling sob. Sorry for the rant.

Finally, our parents did for us all their lives. What about that? They gave to us in so many ways ... why do we want payback now? Did they ask for payback for the money that went into raising us, putting us through school, etc.

And, what about the time and energy they put into parenting us for 20 something years?

Unfortunately, there are many adult children of aging parents that have very strong feelings about NOT helping/visiting their aging parents, yet paradoxically, these same non-helping siblings have very strong feelings about getting their "fair" share of the inheritance.

I don't feel its always right or best for the ones who did not caregive to get absolutely nothing, but the ones who sacrificed financially to caregive should get added compensation instead of just an equal share, to help get back on their feet and back on track with their own savings for retirement and loss of income, expenses, etc.

I agree I am not a money person, I am used to living on a budget, I believe in doing whatever needs doing to keep my mother content and comfortable , but unfortunately other family members don't see it that way, and yes they are never there and just want to spend her money, it's all about greed when it should be about quality of life and her needs, it's supposed to be her money, but I am the richest one of all, I get to spend quality time with her and continue to fight for her to give her dignity and respect,

Trying2B, my mother and I talked about your point many years ago. My mother took care of me after her mother and father took care of HER. Paying it forward. It is not quid pro quo - "my parents cared for me so I am obligated to care for them". If that were the case, many parents on this board would never get care because they did a terrible job of raising children. Or abandoned them. Or never cared personally for their parents at all or left them in a nursing home. The estate is exactly that - things left after someone dies. The money and assets should be spent on the person's care and well-being and what is LEFT when they die is divided up. The difficulty arises when an elder person is encouraged to keep assets "for the estate" instead of spending them (including caregiving contracts to people providing direct care) on the elder's care. The responsibility lies on both parties to make sure that the elder's needs are balanced with the caregiver's needs. It's a choice, slavery was outlawed many decades ago.

Guestshop, I completely agree with you. Raising your children does not, and should not, guarantee that they will take care of you later. In the vast majority of situations described on this site, the complete or at least major part of the care falls to one child, even though multiple children may have been raised. Because of this imbalance, I agree with vstefans that the one doing the work should be compensated. I admit that I resent that I am doing the caregiving for our mother while my brother is free to spend his time golfing and traveling. He has had no contact with mom since he was unable to access her funds after dad died over eight years ago. Being compensated for my time would allow me to enhance my own financial future, but my mom's dementia precludes her from signing any kind of a care agreement. I'm stuck with losing time and money for years, and yet he will get half of anything that may be left. It just doesn't seem fair. I will be doing things differently for my own children.

someone wrote, "As to a caregiver getting a larger share, I personally, for what it's worth, don't agree. I'm pretty sure mom wouldn't want to slight her children by treating some as if they were her favorites."
....it doesnt' matter what the kids want, or think. All that matters is what the senior wants. When it comes to their Will, or POA, or beneficiary designations, as long as the senior is competent, they can choose to write their children (one, several, or even all of them!) out of their Will, and to designate a all their assets to go to a charity, or even a non-family member. Spouses cannot be completely written out of Wills. But children, they can be given as much, or as little, as mom or dad decides. If mom or dad wants one of their kids to receive "more" because they were always there in a caregiving capacity, that is definitely a valid choice, and the courts will uphold that choice if it is written into the Will.

Mallory I agree with you, and I had always thought that legal principle was pretty clear; until this summer in the UK the Court of Appeal overturned a will and awarded a daughter nearly $250K. This woman had been fighting various charities for ten years. I'm not sure if they're taking it to the last stage, our Supreme Court (yeuch, can't get used to that neologism - it used to be the House of Lords) or not; but the case made me - and most of the press - spit feathers.

The testator, who to be fair was probably a bit of a handful by the sound of her, couldn't have been much clearer about her wishes. She had fallen out with her daughter big time, and stated explicitly in her will that she did not want her to inherit. Well, here we are - this is the report from The Guardian (respectable left wing broadsheet - not my daily read but good for law reports):

***

After a decade-long legal fight with three animal welfare charities over her mother’s decision to cut her out of any inheritance, a poverty-stricken daughter has finally been awarded £164,000 by senior judges.

The ruling by the court of appeal is further evidence that wills deemed to be unreasonable can be overturned or varied by the courts.

The court of appeal defied Melita Jackson’s final wishes to give all she had to animal charities and saved her only child, Heather Ilott, from a life of financial desperation.

Jackson, who died aged 70 in 2004, never forgave her daughter, 54, for eloping with her boyfriend when she was only 17, the court in London heard. She left her daughter nothing, bequeathing instead her estate, worth nearly £500,000, to three charities: The Blue Cross, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

In 2007, the county court first awarded Ilott £50,000 on the grounds that her mother had acted in an “unreasonable, capricious and harsh” way to her daughter.

In 2011, the court of appeal decided that sum was insufficient. Judges then warned that further costly litigation would eat into the value of the estate. The delays are reminiscent of Charles Dickens’ notorious case of the disputed will of Jarndyce vs Jarndyce in the novel Bleak House.

This week’s ruling increased Ilott’s entitlement to £164,000. Most of thatwill be used by Ilott, a mother of five to buy her housing association home, in Ware, Hertfordshire, with £20,000 left over to supplement her benefits.

Ilott never met her father as she was only born two months after Thomas Jackson was killed in an industrial accident in 1960. Jackson and Ilott fell out when Ilott ran away with her teenage boyfriend, Nicholas – who is still her partner.

However, the family are now living on the breadline, her barrister, Brie Stevens-Hoare QC, told the court. As well as being kept off the housing ladder, she said Ilott is so poor that she had “never had a holiday”.

“She had difficulty affording clothes for her family, was limited in the food she could buy and much of what she had was old or second hand,” said the QC.

Lord Justice Ryder and Sir Colin Rimer agreed that the award to Ilott was fair in light of her straitened circumstances and basic human needs.

Stevens-Hoare argued that Ilott’s father would have turned in his grave at his widow’s meanness. Much of Jackson’s wealth derived from assets Jackson paid for from his wages and compensation money awarded after his death.

It was not Ilott’s fault that her mother took against her, said the QC. “Heather had an unreasonable, capricious and harsh mother. Mrs Jackson took offence at Heather’s choices although they were choices she was entitled to make and it was reasonable to expect her mother to accept.

“Instead her mother consistently undermined reconciliation attempts. Although Heather was at some fault, her mother was the dominant cause.”

In a press release, James Aspden, solicitor for the three charities said they were “surprised and disappointed” by the court’s decision.

Nearly £2bn a year goes to charity through legacies and the lawyer said the ruling had “major implications for the work of the whole charity sector”.

***

Moral of the story? I suppose, if you want to be absolutely on the safe side and you really can't stand your children, you'd better give your money away to charities while you're alive. Or take it out of the bank and burn it. Interestingly, none of the reports that I have seen discuss the legal principles of the case; and given the cost to the public purse of supporting the claimant and her family I guess this is a public interest judgement if ever there was one.

So look out for developments - because precedents creep across boundaries these days.

By the way, for those who are interested, Jarndyce v. Jarndyce cited in the article is of course a fictional case. But as Dickens pointed out in a preface to a later edition, it was by no means exaggerated, and he described real cases carrying on in the Court of Chancery that made his own creation look like a friendly scuffle.

Afterthought - I wonder what would have happened if Mrs Jackson had chosen her charities with more finesse? If she'd left her money to children's welfare organisations, or a political party, or a lawyers' and judges' benevolent fund, now...