Package includes:

Online CPD Module  l  Electronic booklet  l  PowerPoint Presentation

Package Fee (incl GST)

• $145 - NZLS members and Associate members
• $195 - Non-members

Note: Access to the online files is via your "My CPD" page. If you would like to purchase multiple packages, please contact us here.

Online CPD Module

The Law Reform (Testamentary Promises) Act 1949 is a piece of legislation unique to New Zealand that stipulates “better provision for the enforcement of promises to make testamentary provision in return for services rendered”. This seminar will provide practical guidance to lawyers when drafting wills to ensure that they are less vulnerable to attack and also to practitioners advising clients in relation to bringing or defending a claim based on a promise.

This seminar will include:

• An overview of the Act and an analysis of recent decisions under this legislation, including Couter v Norris [2018] NZCA 572 and Hill v Waddingham [2019] NZHC 3505
• A discussion on bringing and defending claims under the Act, including procedural requirements and the role of an executor
• A discussion on strategies when drafting wills and providing advice to testators regarding potential claims under the Act.

Please contact us if you use a dial up internet connection.

Learning objectives

By completing this module you will be able to:

• Draft wills that are less vulnerable to a claim under the Act.
• Understand what is required to bring or defend a claim under the Act.

Electronic paper 

Authors: Sally Morris, Georgia Angus
Published: 16 February 2021
Pages: 10

Introduction

A person might work for a long time and render services, maybe over many years, in the faith of that expectation, and yet be defeated in respect of it, and have no remedy of any sort.¹

This quote from the Attorney-General in 1944 highlights the inequitable result that Parliament sought to remedy when the original testamentary promises provision was enacted. This was contained within a section of the Law Reform Act 1944, an Act which addressed miscellaneous reforms of the law. At that time, the idea of an enforceable testamentary promise was unprecedented. It remains the case that there is no equivalent anywhere else in the world.² (Continues...)

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1 (23 November 1944) 267 NZPD at 300.
2 B Patterson Law of Family Protection and Testamentary Promises (4th ed, LexisNexis, Wellington, 2013) at 13.1.

PowerPoint Presentation

These are the slides included in the presentation.