Two sisters have finally lost their long battle with the Inland Revenue over the rights they wanted for inheritance tax relief. They took their injustice all the way to the Human Rights judges in the European Court in Strasbourg.
In a vote that was 15-2 against the ladies, Joyce Burden aged 90 and Sybil Burden aged 82, lost their last chance of legally getting the result they wanted.
The two sisters have lived together in their Wiltshire home all of their lives. They wanted the same rights as either married couples, or gay/lesbian couples. If they have to pay inheritance tax on the estate of the first of the two of them to die, they will have to sell their joint home to meet the bill. Their house is worth around £875,000. They are allowed £312,000 at the nil rate with all assets over that taxed at 40%. We don’t know what their other assets are, but if the property is their only asset they’ll need to raise £50,000 to clear their IHT bill on the first to die if it’s in the current tax year. The second sister may face the same problem later in life.
The sisters have been writing to whoever is the chancellor every year since 1975 to point out their plight and the unfairness of how they’ll be affected, just because they’ve continued to live together.
When the laws changed for same sex couples on 2004 the sisters applied to the human rights section of the European court and lost 4-3 in the vote. Although not a same sex couple obviously, they thought they should have the same rights.
While you, I and any sensible person can see that this is a total travesty of justice, until this ridiculous law is overturned, we shall continue to read of circumstances, such as these two fine ladies find themselves in.
LSUK can help people plan ahead and deal with some if not all inheritance tax problems. Talking early is the key to planning.
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