Fiona Bruce MP has today welcomed the Government’s decision to scrap plans to raise the court fees payable after death to obtain a grant of probate, following campaigning by Fiona and other MPs. Under the plans, probate fees would have risen from £155 to £215 for an application to the probate court to up to £20,000 from May.
Speaking after the announcement, Fiona said:
‘This planned increase was shocking. As I told the Lord Chancellor when I strongly objected to these proposals in March, having practised probate law for many years, I simply could not accept that the work of the probate court staff involved justifying such an increase. Indeed, I argued that any such payments must therefore be subsidising other parts of the court services and were therefore effectively a tax.
Fiona Bruce continued:
'I am pleased that the Government have listened to these concerns, which had worried many constituents. It was particularly disturbing to think that they could be paid on the death of the first of a husband or wife to die, who jointly owned a house, the survivor of whom could, in many cases, be faced with bill of several thousand pounds just to stay in their own home- and that on top of facing the tragedy of facing the death of a loved one. The Government already charges inheritance tax – the proposal for these steep fees, in addition, based on the value of an estate, particularly in an area like this where house values are high, was simply wrong.
'Should similar changes ever be proposed in future, constituents can be assured that I will fight them just as rigorously, again.’