Mum died July 2019

Are you aware that in the UK, when you die, there is no legal requirement that any family member has to be advised of your death! That is also the case when any other family member dies, you have no legal right to be advised. So, why is it that when you die, your home, money, pensions and other assets are fully governed by legal requirements?

Are we to conclude then that in the UK, what you leave is more important in terms of the law, than your life and death? It certainly appears that way based on the experiences of dealing with my mum’s death and her will since she passed away in July 2019. I have relayed events surrounding these issues to friends and acquaintances, and on every instance of relaying my experiences and what we are going through to resolve some of the issues, without fail, the reaction is horror that always leads to anger.

People in the UK have absolutely no idea how bad things are in terms of legal rights to be informed and involved in the loss of a loved one and how utterly naive, bordering on conveniently obscure and lacking in transparency, almost dishonest, how we handle a persons will through to probate and disbursement. It appears to me that those who have written the laws governing this important area, have done so in order to financially benefit from a process that is not fit for purpose. Read more here.

So what am I twittering on about, please bear with me for a paragraph longer. Have you ever considered why we have laws and what the laws are there to achieve? Is it to protect and enhance our way of life by dealing with issues based on how we have evolved as a society and in deciding on issues and laws do we take into account right and wrong based on natural, moral and in certain instances, religious evolution. If you answer yes to that, you like me have a problem because it appears to me that this is not how the law is practised in the UK. More on that in a different post so lets get to the story.

I am going to highlight my brother Adrian’s experience at this point. Mum passed away in July and Adrian was not advised by mum’s primary carer who was his sister Linda, or by any of her family, of mum’s death. He was not advised that mum was ill at any point and was not advised that she had been in a home receiving palliative care owing to her illness being terminal. He was not advised of the cause of death, of the funeral parlour where mum lay or that there was a funeral, or of the timings of the funeral or of a wake or gathering, from his sister Linda or any of her family.

On the other hand, I was advised not by my sister Linda, but by my niece the day after mum’s death, that mum had passed away. As with most people receiving such news, it was emotional and I was a little bit in shock. The information that I gleaned from the short telephone conversation, was that mum had died. I asked about seeing mum and was advised against that because “she had been badly pulled about a lot and that she had not been embalmed”. I sent a text asking for the funeral director and funeral parlour details and received that information back.

I had not been advised that mum was ill at any point and had not been advised that she had been in a home receiving palliative care owing to her illness being terminal and I was not advised of the cause of death. I was advised of the date of the funeral and of the timings of the funeral. I was also advised that there would be no wake or gathering after the funeral. As it turns out this was incorrect.