Unmarried couples would automatically inherit some of their partner’s estate on his or her death under radical reforms proposed today.

The plans from the Law Commission, the Government’s law reform watchdog, would extend rights enjoyed by married couples to about two million cohabitants.

At present where couples live together and one of them dies without a will, the survivor has no automatic right to inherit their partner’s home or belongings.

Professor Elizabeth Cooke, the Law Commissioner leading the project, said: “These reforms would bring the law into line with public expectation and attitudes, as well as with the law in other Commonwealth countries. People still believe the myth that they have rights as ‘common law wives’ if they live together.”

But at present, a bereaved partner would have to go to court at great financial and emotional cost to make her or his claim, she said. “When someone dies, the process of grieving can be made far worse by uncertainty and anxiety about money and belongings.”

The Law Commission, the official independent body that advises the Government on legal reforms for England and Wales, says that the time has come to bring the intestacy laws up to date. Every year tens of thousands of people die without leaving a will and their property is distributed between family members according to a complex 80-year-old set of rules.

The commission says that for many couples cohabiting is a natural step towards marriage or civil partnership but four in five couples living together have not made a will because they think they do not need to.

Under proposals outlined today, the new inheritance rules could see cohabiting couples, including gay partners, given guaranteed rights to at least part of their loved one’s estate. If they have lived together for five years, or had a child together, they should have the same rights as spouses, the commission suggests.

The commission accepts that some will find it controversial but says that research shows it would match public expectations.It adds: “It would still be open to cohabitants to make a will naming other beneficiaries (subject to the family provision legislation.)” Those who have cohabited for at least two years could receive half the share of the estate that a surviving spouse would receive, it says. But a cohabitant would receive nothing if his or her deceased partner was still married or in a civil partnership at the time of death, however long they had lived together.

Professor Cooke said that the commission did not believe the proposals undermined marriage, as critics of extending legal rights to unmarried couples argue.

She added that the issue of rights on the break-up of a relationship was “quite different” from the situation of one partner dying.

The commission’s report, which will be under public consultation until February 28 next year, also proposes that married couples with no dependent should automatically inherit their deceased partner’s estate, even if there was no will.

It suggests improved rights for children who are adopted after the death of a parent which would end the unequal treatment of half-brothers and sisters in inheritance law.

The commission says that each year a least a third of people who die have failed to make a proper, legally binding will, leaving their property to be distributed according to antiquated and complicated rules dating back to 1925.

Source: Times Online