Gill v Woodall [2010] EWCA Civ 1430

Mrs Gill left her £1m farm to the RSPCA, disinheriting her only daughter. The Court of Appeal revoked probate, finding Mrs Gill's severe agoraphobia meant she did not know or approve of the will's contents when executed at her solicitor's office.

Facts

Mrs Joyce Gill and her husband John Gill owned Potto Carr Farm in North Yorkshire. Their only daughter, Dr Christine Gill, and her husband had for many years provided substantial unpaid labour on the farm and lived on adjoining land (White House Farm). In April 1993, Mr and Mrs Gill executed mirror wills prepared by Mr Argyle of Hunt & Wrigley solicitors. Mrs Gill’s will left everything to her husband, failing which to the RSPCA, expressly excluding Dr Gill on the basis she had been well provided for.

Mr Gill died in 1999 and Mrs Gill in 2006, by which time the farm was worth over £1 million. Dr Gill challenged the will on three grounds: want of knowledge and approval; undue influence by Mr Gill; and proprietary estoppel. The trial judge (Mr James Allen QC) found that Mrs Gill did know and approve the will, but that it had been procured by undue influence, and alternatively upheld the proprietary estoppel claim. The RSPCA appealed, and Dr Gill cross-appealed on knowledge and approval.

Critical to the case was evidence that Mrs Gill suffered from severe agoraphobia with panic disorder. Expert evidence (accepted by the judge) established that attending a solicitor’s office would have caused her anxiety so severe that her thoughts would have been dominated by an impulse to escape, materially impairing her ability to concentrate on and absorb what was said. Mr Gill was described as domineering and bullying, while Mrs Gill was dependent upon him.

Issues

The principal issue addressed on appeal was whether Mrs Gill knew and approved the contents of her 1993 will at the time of execution. Issues of undue influence and proprietary estoppel were raised but ultimately not determined, the court considering it unnecessary once the knowledge and approval point was resolved in Dr Gill’s favour.

Arguments

For the RSPCA (Mrs Talbot Rice QC)

The RSPCA contended that undue influence should be considered before knowledge and approval. It submitted that the surprising terms of a will should not, without more, excite suspicion; that Mrs Gill simply deferred to her husband’s wishes, explaining the will’s terms; and that the three factors identified by the judge (a prior instructions meeting, the draft being sent home, and clause-by-clause reading at execution) properly dispelled any suspicion. It was also submitted that any case based on inability to comprehend was really one of testamentary capacity, not knowledge and approval.

For Dr Gill (Ms Angus)

Dr Gill argued that knowledge and approval was properly considered first; that the twelve factors identified by the judge justified excitement of suspicion; and that the three reasons given by the judge for dispelling that suspicion were not supported by the evidence.

Judgment

The Court of Appeal (Lord Neuberger MR, Lloyd and Jackson LJJ) dismissed the RSPCA’s appeal, upholding the revocation of probate, but on the alternative ground advanced in the respondent’s notice, namely that Mrs Gill did not know and approve the will’s contents.

Approach to knowledge and approval

Lord Neuberger MR expressed a preference for a single-stage approach over the traditional two-stage test (suspicion excited, then rebuttal), citing the formulation by Sachs J in Crerar v Crerar adopted in In re Morris deceased [1971] P 62. The court should consider all the relevant evidence and decide whether the propounder has discharged the burden of establishing knowledge and approval. Nevertheless, it followed the judge’s two-stage approach for analytical convenience.

Suspicion rightly excited

The court upheld the judge’s conclusion that suspicion had been properly excited. Whilst the surprising terms of a will alone will not generally suffice, the twelve factors identified by the judge—particularly Mrs Gill’s severe agoraphobia, her likely acute anxiety at the solicitor’s office, her probable inability to concentrate, and her subsequent conduct consistent with not knowing the RSPCA had been made the beneficiary—amply justified the judge’s finding.

Rebuttal not established

The court held that none of the three reasons given by the judge for finding the suspicion dispelled was open to him on the evidence:

(i) The finding that Mrs Gill attended a prior instructions meeting with Mr Argyle was unsupported. Given her acute agoraphobia and Mr Gill’s character, it was very improbable she attended; Mr Argyle could properly have taken instructions from Mr Gill alone.

(ii) The inference that Mrs Gill read the draft will at home was pure speculation. Her subsequent statement to her daughter (saying only that she and her husband had left everything to each other, omitting the RSPCA gift) was more consistent with her not having read or absorbed the will’s terms.

(iii) The finding that Mr Argyle read the will clause by clause, explaining each separately, was contrary to his evidence. His normal practice was to read the will through in one go. Professor Howard’s accepted evidence was that, in that mode of reading, Mrs Gill would have been unable to understand the will owing to her anxiety.

Capacity versus knowledge and approval

Lloyd LJ rejected the RSPCA’s submission that the argument was really one about capacity. Capacity concerns general understanding of the nature and extent of property and the claims upon the testator’s benevolence; knowledge and approval concerns whether the testator actually understood the particular document being executed in the particular circumstances.

Implications

The decision reaffirms the strong presumption that a properly executed will, prepared by a solicitor and read over to a testator of competent mind, represents the testator’s intentions—a presumption rebuttable only by the clearest evidence. Lord Neuberger MR emphasised that the facts were “quite exceptional” and that the decision should not be seen as a green light for disappointed beneficiaries to challenge wills.

The case is nonetheless significant for several reasons. First, it endorses a preference for analysing knowledge and approval as a single question rather than in two stages, drawing on the formulation in Crerar v Crerar and In re Morris. Second, it illustrates that surprising testamentary dispositions, while not of themselves sufficient to rebut the presumption, can be weighed with other factors that genuinely call knowledge and approval into doubt. Third, it demonstrates that acute psychiatric conditions affecting a testator’s ability to absorb information in a solicitor’s office—even where such conditions would not be apparent to the solicitor—may, where supported by expert evidence, suffice to undermine the presumption of knowledge and approval arising from execution following a reading of the will.

The decision maintains the distinction between testamentary capacity (a generalised ability to understand) and knowledge and approval (actual understanding of the document in fact signed). It also confirms that the Court of Appeal will only overturn first instance findings of fact where the judge’s conclusions were not reasonably open on the evidence—here satisfied because the three reasons given for dispelling suspicion were each contrary to or unsupported by the evidence.

Verdict: Appeal dismissed. The order revoking the grant of probate of Mrs Gill’s will of 27 April 1993 was upheld, but on the alternative ground that Mrs Gill did not know or approve of the contents of the will, rather than on the judge’s ground of undue influence.

Source: Gill v Woodall [2010] EWCA Civ 1430