"One Day My Son, All This Will Be Yours"

• Published date: 30 November 2022
• Subject Matter: Litigation, Mediation & Arbitration, Family and Matrimonial, Trials & Appeals & Compensation, Wills/ Intestacy/ Estate Planning
• Law Firm: Birketts
• Author: Mr Sunday Aladetoyinbo

This is a proprietary estoppel case law update for Guest & Anor v Guest [2022] UKSC 27

How do you deal with a situation where promises are made by one person, and relied upon by another at their detriment, but are subsequently broken? This is the common dilemma considered by the Courts in a claim for proprietary estoppel.

As is clear from previous articles authored by Birketts on this topic (such as "Broken promises and the law", "Were you promised a share in a property which is now being reneged upon?" and "You broke your promise! Estoppel in the commercial property context"), such informal promises, where broken, can commonly erupt into hotly contested court litigation.

There have historically been two conflicting approaches on how the issue of "relief" should be decided in proprietary estoppel cases. The first school of thought was to uphold the promise, i.e. to give the promisee what they were promised. The second school of thought was to compensate the promisee for the detriment and loss suffered in reliance of the promise, with the latter approach usually being far less generous to the claimant promisee.

The Supreme Court has now clarified the law in this area and given much needed guidance on which approach should be adopted. Its widely anticipated judgment can be found here, and related to an appeal in the case of Guest v Guest. The decision of the Supreme Court will have a lasting effect on future legal claims concerning proprietary estoppel and represents an important landmark case.

The facts of the case in Guest

"One day my son, all this will be yours". These were the words spoken by a farmer (David Guest) to his eldest son (Andrew Guest) and repeated for many years thereafter.

In 1981, David Guest and his wife (Josephine) prepared their Wills, stating that their two sons would inherit the farm in equal shares, in expectation that the two sons would work on the farm upon leaving school. Relying on this expectation that the farm would one day be his, Andrew spent substantial part of his working life on the farm in return for a low wage.

Some years later, the relationship between Andrew and his parents broke down irretrievably, such that they could no longer work together or even live in close proximity.

In 2014, David and his wife prepared new Wills, removing Andrew as a beneficiary. The farming partnership was dissolved and Andrew moved out to find alternative work and rented accommodation for himself and his family elsewhere. Andrew issued...