Richard Adkinson Estates, Trust & Tax

Richard has gained a wide experience in Estates, Trusts and Tax and is instructed on behalf of central government, local authorities and private clients.

Estates: Richard has advised and represented clients in contested proceedings to remove and replace executors of a will. He has also advised on merits and procedure executors who are unable to distribute the estate because there is a dispute amongst the beneficiaries on whether certain valuable items formed part of the estate for distribution or whether they were gifts made by the deceased. Richard has also acted for widows, children or others who have not been provided for in a will or administration of the estate. He has also acted for a local authority seeking to enforce a debts for care charges against an estate where the assets appear to have been dissipated by the executor. 

Trusts: He has experience from pre-issue advice to trial of disputes over the ownership of land (i.e. trusts of land claims) between cohabitants and where a third part asserts and interest in the context of trusts, estoppel and undue influence. He has acted in high value cases, cases involving property situated overseas, properties also used as partnership property by the cohabitants and has appeared in both the High and county court. He has lectured solicitors on the law and practice of trusts of land.

Richard has experience of mediation in these sorts of claims. 

Tax: Richard is very keen to develop his experience in taxation. He has acted on behalf of HMRC before the General Commissioners and Tax Chamber of the First Tier Tribunal (Tax) in cases concerning the liability of employers to National Insurance contributions on what the employers said were in fact payments in kind and whether payments were relevant motoring expenditure for the purposes of calculating National Insurance contributions. He has also acted in a contested case in the county court where a taxpayer sought repayment of a large sum of tax mistakenly paid on behalf of another taxpayer.

Further Experience: 
Richard has presented seminars on probate and trusts to solicitors.
 

QUALIFICATIONS

M.Eng. (Hons) Electronic (Communications) Engineering, Dip(Law)

MEMBERSHIPS

Employment Law Association
Employment Law Bar Association
Midland Chancery and Commercial Bar Association

APPOINTMENTS

Richard is a member of the Attorney General’s Panel of Junior Counsel to the Crown for the Midlands’ Region

NOTABLE CASES

Cheshire Employer and Skills Development Ltd v Revenue and Customs Commissioners: [2010] UKFTT 379 (TC) [2010] STI 2890; and on appeal to the Upper Tribunal [2011] UKUT 329 (TCC); [2012] STC 69; [2011] B.T.C. 1832; [2011] All ER (D) 96 (Sep)
Whether certain lump sum payments were relevant motoring expenses for the purposes of reg. 22A of the Social Security (Contributions) Regulations 2001. For HMRC

Donaghy v Revenue and Customs Commissioners: [2012] UKUT 148 (TCC)
Whether, when implementing the farmers’ averaging scheme, HMRC was correct to treat a loss as nil? Whether the farmers’ averaging scheme was discriminatory or a breach of the European Convention of Human Rights? For HMRC.