We live in a big and beautiful country that is great for summer vacation travel from sea to sea. The vast distance from British Columbia to Nova Scotia is not just geographic, as shown by court decisions involving the review of wills. There is also a great deal of public policy distance between these provinces.

In the recent British Columbia decision on July 17, 2019 of  Grewal v Litt, 2019 BCSC 1154 the  four daughters of the deceased sought a court-ordered variation of the mirror wills of their parents using the Wills, Estates and Succession Act, S.B.C. 2009, c. 13. In their wills, the parents left 95% of their nine million dollar estate to their two sons and the remainder to their four daughters. The daughters sought and obtained a variation based on the facts and legislation with the court ordering 15% to each of the four daughters and 20% to each of the two sons.

In the Nova Scotia decision in Lawen Estate v Nova Scotia Attorney General, 2019 NSSC 162, the court ruled that the deceased had a great deal of testamentary freedom and that this freedom was constitutionally protected. The Estate of Jack Lawen was subject to a claim by some of his adult and competent children under the Nova Scotia Testator’s Family Maintenance Act for a change in the distribution of assets from what was specified in his will. In this case, the daughters applied, but they were not successful. It is interesting to note that the Judge agreed with the argument that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms could be used to strike down those provisions of the legislation that allowed the adult competent children to even bring their application to the court. The Charter, it was argued, protects the right to decide where the property would go and to disinherit his children. Presiding Justice John Bodurtha wrote in his decision dated May 24, 2019, “A testamentary decision is a fundamental personal decision that is protected under section 7” of the Charter.

Legislation that infringes and limits a testator’s freedom, however, can be justified in some instances, and to certain degrees, depending on the province and the case facts. If you try to disinherit your dependant spouse then the courts would step in and limit your testamentary freedom. This also applies to not providing for dependants who are minor children, non-competent adult children, and even competent adult children in some provinces. One could ask, however, if it is fair and just that the daughters in British Columbia could achieve an equitable distribution of the family estate, but in Nova Scotia, they would have failed.

Canadian limitations on testamentary freedom are small and balanced in comparison to the forced heirship provisions of many European civil law jurisdictions. In those countries, a testator is forced by law to leave a portion of the estate to family members. The percentage of the estate to be distributed and those who are eligible varies by jurisdiction.  It is an interesting public policy approach to make the family unit legally paramount in forced heirship jurisdictions, and not the individual testator.

Thanks for reading!
James Jacuta