Hansard

The spirit of this afternoon’s debate has served to highlight the value that the scrutiny of the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee brings to the Scottish Law Commission bill procedures. In front of a reasonably full public gallery, it also shows that the Parliament can occasionally agree on matters of importance to the people of Scotland.

There is little doubt that the reform of the law of succession has been long awaited, as Nigel Don, John Scott, Richard Baker and Graeme Pearson have indicated. It has been a long time since the issue first came up, and I echo the points that were made by members about the new procedure allowing important work to come forward when it is merited. There is a clear view that change is overdue and that it is being eagerly anticipated.

There is a lot of good will out there for the legislation as it goes forward and I very much welcome the positive thoughts of members across the chamber. The debate has highlighted a tricky area of law that has been well served by the Law Commission exposing difficult issues and anomalies and providing solutions that will lead to a fairer and more consistent law. After all, as I said in opening and as a number of other members have acknowledged, the bill has the potential to affect everybody. The one certainty in life is, of course, death. For that reason, we all have an interest in ensuring that succession law is fit for purpose and meets the challenges of today’s society and expectations.

Woody Allen famously said:

“I’m not afraid of death, I just don’t want to be there when it happens.”

I think that we can all echo that sentiment. However, the difficulty with not being there is that what the deceased wanted to happen to their estate is often not very clear. That touches on Stewart Stevenson’s point about online wills. The law therefore needs to step in and fill that void, and deal with things in a fair way. It is therefore only right that generally overlooked and neglected areas of succession law are thoroughly debated, as the impact of such law on individual people and families can be considerable.

In my opening speech, I talked about some of the key provisions of the bill. Others include clarifying the law on forfeiture, which has also been referred to. Forfeiture is a legal rule that prevents someone who is responsible for the unlawful death of another from benefiting under the deceased’s will. I will take on board Stewart Stevenson’s point and reflect on it. There has been some colourful evidence on this issue. Among other things, the bill will place it beyond doubt that the children of a forfeiter will not be punished for the actions of their parent under the law of succession.

The bill will also restate and improve some protections around the administration of estates. Those changes have been described as useful and practical additions to the administration rules, which will have benefits for executors and beneficiaries alike.

There is little doubt that the combined effect of the initial work of the Law Commission, the professional scrutiny of the committee and the comments offered by experts in this field of law will result in a bill that will make a difference and meet our policy aims of a more consistent, clearer and fairer law. I hope that the Scottish Parliament is reassured that we have listened hard to the committee and the experts and continue to liaise with the Law Commission on the points of detail.

We will lodge a number of amendments at stage 2, as mentioned by John Scott and others, to address many of the points that were raised in the stage 1 report and by those giving evidence.

There are other issues on which we are continuing to reflect. As I have mentioned, the law that is being changed is technical and tricky, so we need to think through the consequences of any amendments to ensure that they deliver something that is fit for purpose. For that reason, we will continue to seek views from the profession and work closely with the Law Commission to test the amendments.