Where two or more people together own real property, they hold it under a trust of land. Where property is held on a trust of land, the legal estate and equitable estate are separate. The legal estate must be held by the co-owners as joint tenants. The beneficial interest is held either as joint tenants or tenants in common. See Practice Note: Establishing a beneficial interest (joint ownership). There are two ways in which the mother and son could be co-owners, either as joint tenants or as tenants in common. If they are joint tenants, then each tenant has an indivisible share in the property and each is entitled to the whole of the property. Any dealing with the land, such as sale, requires all the joint tenants to participate in the transaction.

A parent may change a child’s forename by enrolling the new name with the Royal Courts of Justice and lodging a notice with the London Gazette. The appropriate forms can be found here, and the fee is £36. Completed forms should be sent to the Queen’s Bench Division (Queen’s Bench Division, Enforcement Section, Room E15, The Royal Courts of Justice, Strand, London, WC2A 2LL). If both parents have parental responsibility then both will need to sign the change of forename form and have their signatures witnessed, or if a parent who has parental responsibility does not consent to the change of forename then the other parent will need to apply to the court for an order allowing the name to be changed. If, as in the scenario of this Q&A, only one parent has parental responsibility

Property analysis: Jennie Graham (Knowledge Lawyer Director), Colette Brimble (Senior Knowledge Lawyer), Emma Moscoso (Senior Knowledge Lawyer), Sue Thompson (Associate Director) and Rebecca Francis (Partner) of Osborne Clarke examine the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act.

What is the ISDA Schedule? The International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) documentation framework involves layers of documentation (often referred to as the ISDA documentation architecture). The key layers of the documentation for a trade under the ISDA documentation framework are: • master agreement • schedule to the master agreement • credit support documents, and • confirmation The ISDA master agreement is a pre-printed umbrella document which includes the boilerplate provisions. The schedule supplements and amends the master agreement, as required by the parties. It allows the provisions of the master agreement to be tailored to the particular needs of the parties, by inserting amendments to the provisions of the master agreement or including additional or alternative provisions. The schedule is the part of the ISDA master agreement that is negotiated by the parties. The majority of protection comes from the master agreement itself. If transactions are entered into before the schedule is negotiated and agreed, it should be specified in the confirmation that a deemed master agreement has been entered

Ireland—Commercial analysis: This article, was written by Richard Ryan, Patrick Horan & Simon Breen of Arthur Cox LLP.

Law360, Expert analysis: On 6 December 2022, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published the consultation paper 'Introducing a gateway for firms who approve financial promotions'. Gavin Punia, partner at Bird & Bird, explores the effect and relevance of this consultation in further depth.

Family analysis: The Court of Appeal’s departure in Sharp v Sharp from the sharing principle creates more questions than it answers, say Joanne Edwards, partner, and Dickon Ceadel, associate, of Forsters.

Section 3(7) of the Land Registration Act 2002 (LRA 2002) provides that where a tenant holds a lease in possession and has been granted another lease of the same land to take effect in possession within one month of the expiry of the first lease, the two leases are treated as creating a single continuous term for the purposes of the LRA 2002, s 3.

The terms of a lease govern the relationship between the landlord and tenant, and any modification to those terms, such as a change of use, should be formally documented. Nevertheless, a distinction needs to be drawn between a personal concession and a variation. In the case of the former, consent for a change of use which applies only to the assignee

FORTHCOMING CHANGES: At Budget 2025 on 26 November 2025, the government announced that it would make minor corrective amendments to the residence-based tax regime introduced in Finance Act 2025. Key points include: • qualifying new residents for the foreign income and gains (FIG) regime must be at least ten years old at the beginning of the tax year • ensuring that claims for relief under the FIG regime can be deducted only from the foreign income, foreign employment income or foreign gains to which they relate • alignment of the qualifying asset holding company (QAHC) rules so that carried-interest-style returns connected with services to a QAHC qualify for relief under the FIG regime • correction to the capital gains tax (CGT) residence test for personal representatives to ensure that they are not UK resident where the deceased was UK non-resident but was a long-term UK resident for inheritance tax purposes • the requirement that an individual must file a tax return where they are not entitled to the annual

Pension analysis: Chief Master Shuman granted rectification of two pension scheme deeds that had inadvertently introduced and then repeated a Courage-type fetter preventing the breaking of the final salary link. Applying Mitchells & Butlers, the court found a continuing subjective common intention to carry out consolidation or housekeeping exercises, not to confer enhanced benefit protection, and accepted that the 2012 deed was a serial rectification case. The decision illustrates the evidential weight of explanatory materials, trustee records, drafting history and commercial context in pensions rectification claims. It also reinforces the court’s willingness to dispose of clear drafting errors proportionately, without requiring exhaustive investigation where the balance of probabilities is plainly satisfied. Produced in partnership with James McCreath of Wilberforce Chambers.

Until 2008, it was standard practice for married couples to include in their Wills a discretionary trust of the nil rate band (NRB) to avoid it being wasted where the estate would otherwise pass to the surviving spouse with the benefit of the spouse exemption (and perhaps any children were too young to inherit outright). This is less common since 2008 because of the facility to transfer any unused NRB to a surviving spouse’s estate. There are still many such trusts in existence that were created prior to 2008 and which will need to remain in place until the death of the surviving spouse if they are to achieve the inheritance