Intestacy in UK Law

There is no doubt that a creditor of an estate does not have sufficient interest in an estate to bring a probate claim and that Menzies is still good law. But the interests of the two types of creditor are fundamentally different. The interest of the creditor of a beneficiary is to ensure that the beneficiary receives what is due to him or her under the will or on an intestacy. The interest of a creditor of an estate is to ensure that there is due administration of the estate.

In the former it is such financial provision as it would be reasonable in all the circumstances of the case for a husband or wife to receive whether or not it is required for his or her maintenance.

The reading of words into a will as a matter of necessary implication ie a measure which any court of construction should apply with the greatest caution. This type of treatment of an imperfect will is only legitimate where the court can collect from the four corners of the docuisent that something has been omitted and, further, collect with sufficient precision the nature of the omission.

In English law the rights of a testamentary legatee in the unadministered estate of a testator are well settled: see Lord Sudeley v. Attorney General [1897] A.C. 11 and Commissioner of Stamp Duties (Queensland) v. Livingston [1965] A.C. 694. A legatee's right is to have the estate duly administered by the personal representatives in accordance with law. But during the period of administration the legatee has no legal or equitable interest in the assets comprised in the estate.

In the light of Buchanan v Milton, the domestic law is clear. If there are no personal representatives, then it must be asked: who has the best claim to be appointed as administrator of a deceased person's estate. If there is a dispute, then section 116 may come into play if no compromise is possible.

I regard it as clear law, at least since Ingall, that an action commenced by a claimant purportedly as an administrator, when the claimant does not have that capacity, is a nullity. That principle was recognised and applied by this court in Hilton v. Sutton Steam Laundry [1946] KB 65 (per Lord Greene MR, at 71) and Burns v. Campbell [1952] 1 KB 15 (per Denning LJ, at 17, and Hodson LJ, at 18). In Finnegan v. Cementation Co. Ltd [1953] 1 QB 688, Jenkins LJ said, at 700:

As to the law, so far as this Court is concerned it seems to me to be settled by the cases of Ingall -v- Moran and Hilton -v- Sutton Steam Laundry and, I may add, Burns -v- Campbell, reported in 1951, 2 All England Reports at page 965, that an action commenced by a plaintiff in a representative capacity which the plaintiff does not in fact possess is a nullity, and, further, that it makes no difference that the claim made in such an action is a claim under the Fatal Accidents Acts which the plaintiff could have supported in a personal capacity as being one of the dependants to whom the benefit of the Acts extends.