Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Wednesday, May 4th, 2011
Elderly Drivers:
Did You Pass Your Driving Test Many Years Ago? Perhaps You Never Sat A Test At All? Do you Worry About Your Driving Now? Or Do Family And Friends Tell You Not To Drive?
Matchlight, (the Television Company that brought you, BBC1’s ‘Taking The Keys Away’) are making a new documentary series about driving. We’re working with the Automobile Associate (AA) for a Channel Five series and we’re looking for people to take part.
If you want some reassurance that your driving skills are still up to scratch, and if you fancy taking part in some fun, TV filming, then please get in touch.
Perhaps your family and friends constantly criticize your driving, or perhaps a few ‘near misses’ have caused you to be concerned about your driving techniques. Do you struggle to keep up with the fast moving pace of today’s road networks? Perhaps modern driving gets you down and you find yourself taking the bus more often, but you’re keen not to lose your independence.
If you, or someone you know, might appreciate some help with driving, get in touch.
We are looking for retired people, who might like to take part in a fun, and high profile, documentary series and improve their driving at the same time. Email me, telling me a bit about yourself on rosy.marshall@matchlight.co.uk or call Rosy on 0141 332 0319.
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Friday, April 15th, 2011
Only the most politically aware and committed older folk will have waded through the Scottish Government’s recent publication “Reshaping Care for Older People, A programme for Change 2011- 2012”. Certainly it does not provide gripping reading for the layman although no doubt many NHS and Social work professionals will find it riveting.
In some ways it is almost impossible to summarise for the public much of the document since it relates to changes in approach and methods within the NHS and other bodies. However, in the broadest of terms the Scottish government document implicitly accepts, that maintaining care standards for the elderly in future is going to be a massive challeng, due to two overriding factors. First, the need for care is bound to increase hugely in the future due simply to the increasing numbers of older people living longer. Second, this increasing care requirement is going to have to be met out of budgets which are under pressure already and likely to become more so in the future.
So how is the trick of providing more care, to more people, at less cost to be pulled off? Very broadly it seems that as quasi reorganisation of how care is to be delivered is being attempted – to make every pound go a bit further. There is lots of stress on pulling in other resources with the third and independent sector cooperating with Local Authorities and National bodies. Shades of Mr Cameron’s Big Society perhaps.
But cutting through the jargon it seems that a principal goal is to provide care in the home – which should frankly be cheaper to provide. Alongside that is to be a concentration on preventative measures which would keep older people in their homes. These would involve more community support and home adaptations as well as providing more support to carers. Since for older people staying at home would probably be the most desirable outcome it would appear for once that perhaps the most popular policy should turn out to be financially the most efficient.
As an interesting aside the place of Equity Release being a way of older people helping fund themselves in retiral is given a brief acknowledgement in the publication. At Caesar and Howie we see this first hand as our Equity Release team has never been busier. But where the public seem to be picking up on the desirability of equity release – too many of the public still fail to take the simple step of preparing a Power of Attorney to ensure someone has powers to take steps to look after them and their affairs should incapacity strike.
With countless thousands of bed days being taken up in our hospitals by folk who cannot be moved till a guardianship application wends its way though the court – maybe the Scottish Government could save the NHS a fortune by giving free legal aid for adults to have a Power of Attorney done – thereby stopping the bed blocking at source!
However joking apart – the challenge of care for older people in the future is indeed massive and will be for whatever government is in power. Hopefully if some of the proposed changes work – at least a start on dealing with this huge issue will have been made.
David Borrowman
Caesar and Howie Managing Partner
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Thursday, March 24th, 2011
With a £900 million cut in the Scottish Budget next year it is clear various services must be hit. A whole series of bodies including Age Scotland and the Scottish Association for Mental health have flagged up worries facing various sectors in society – particularly disadvantaged groups.
The Law Society of Scotland has joined the debate and warned that cuts in the legal aid budget would threaten the public’s access to justice. An unseemly spat between some lawyers and the chief executive of the Scottish Legal Aid Board followed by disagreements between Glasgow lawyers and the Law Society of Scotland must have induced a sense of foreboding amongst the public following the debate. With such bad news all around perhaps the whole system is in meltdown.
But in fact the truth is far from catastrophic at least for one group – older people in Scotland. One little publicised feature of the Scottish Legal Aid system is that it is relatively generous to pensioners. Through the “Advice and Assistance” element of the legal aid system a high percentage of Scottish pensioners can have basic legal work done absolutely free or at a significantly subsidised cost. Older people on a state pension only can be homeowners and have up to £25,000 in the bank and still be entitled to Advice and Assistance. This type of legal aid does not cover court hearings of course but it does cover items of great interest and importance to older people such as the preparation of wills, powers of attorney and advance directives.
David Borrowman of Caesar and Howie “I am pleased that his relative generosity to older people has remained in place meantime at least – with the Legal Aid Board at the moment looking elsewhere for cuts. A key document every older person should prepare is a Power of Attorney appointing a trusted friend or relative to look after their affairs should they become unable to themselves. Powers of Attorney can still be prepared free of charge for many older people because of legal aid and I would hate to see that benefit removed. But logically leaving that benefit in place probably reduces legal aid expenditure in the long run anyway. Apart from anything else the cost of dealing with incapacity would go up because the less powers of attorney that are written the more court applications for guardianship there will be. Of course legal aid remains available for guardianship applications – which are much more expensive.”
David’s advice to older people and to those involved in pensioners groups is simple.
“Pensioners should act now – the three key family care documents, a will, a power of attorney and a living will can all still be done on legal aid. Do them now – who knows what the future is going to bring anyway and who knows what the Legal Aid position will be in the future.“
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Wednesday, March 2nd, 2011
We are only weeks away from a major change in employment law which will affect many people throughout the country. The Default Retiral Age where employees can be compulsorily retired because they have reached the age of 65 will go. The Default Retiral age will end finally on the 30th September but the last date on which and employee can be given notice of retirement under the DRA is actually 5th April. This change in the law has been subject to much political debate – with some groups complaining that this change will exacerbate the already high youth unemployment figures.
Whatever actually happens the new rules will present challenges to employers and employees alike. For an employer to fix a retiral date without approval of individual employees the employer will have to be able to justify that choice of date. This might be possible for certain types of employment – for example employment requiring exceptional physical fitness – but probably the bulk of employment will not come into that category.
With no compulsory retirement in place it will be for employers and employees to agree retiral dates – presumably following communication and discussion. These discussions may be wide ranging covering performance of the employee together with their reasonable aims and aspirations. Whilst the stated aim of the government is to reduce the number of employment tribunals it might be thought that a whole new generation of such claims might arise out of this legislation. That remains to be seen of course.
One great and obvious benefit for someone at the old Default Retiral Age will of course be the prospect of working on with all the financial benefits that may bring. But for many the decision might not be so straightforward, with health, lifestyle and other issues to consider as well as the effects on tax and benefits of working on. How long would you wish to work on? On the same hours or not? Perhaps it would be wise for all those approaching 65 to review fully their finances, their wishes, aspirations and health prior to entering into discussions on their employment. It is probably much better to have planned sensibly for the future after such a review – then discussions with the employer might just be that much more meaningful.
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Wednesday, November 24th, 2010
Anyone with an interest in the house market in Scotland must find some of the recent published articles confusing. One headline claimed “Scotland bucks the trend as house prices hit new highs”. Yet this article had been preceded only a week before by a property “expert” claiming prices and the housing market would be depressed for up to five years! Both cannot be right – so what is the layman to make of all this?
Well the first thing to note is that there is no single Scottish house market. The market for a city centre flat in Aberdeen will have few characteristics in common with the market for a property in rural Skye for example. This means aggregation of prices obtained and other data can be a bit meaningless. Consequently, recently when reading of house price rises readers on close examination of the data may well find one or a few areas with brisk markets responsible for the overall rise.
At Caesar and Howie, we tend to feel there is much too much emphasis by journalists on prices alone when describing market trends. The underlying assumption seems to be that rising prices are good and static prices are bad. We do not share that view – fast rising prices tend not to benefit anyone, purchases are more difficult and if prices rise too fast there usually follows a painful correction. Many householders are experiencing that now. On balance we feel that static or very modestly rising prices over longer terms makes the market more stable for everyone. Hopefully, the recent house price correction will be the start of a more predictable next decade than the last one has been.
Again the emphasis on prices seems almost to make secondary the real issue for buyers – which is – “can I find and buy accommodation suitable for me and my family.” By that yardstick it might be said that the market was good now in that there are lots of properties of all types on the market. Sadly, supply is only half of the story and ready buyers are just not out there in the same numbers. The reason for that is quite clearly the lack of available mortgage funds. When bank officials say banks are “ready and willing to lend” people should take that with a pinch of salt. The truth is all lenders have tightened their criteria so much that potentially sound borrowers are simply frozen out of the market. This is particularly true for first time buyers. Without first time buyers this market will not function properly because the age old pattern of buying say a small flat to start with, then steadily trading up through the years cannot work properly. If a first time buyer cannot sell the whole process is brought to a halt or slowed significantly. That is where we are now and until that changes talk about a market revival is simply not sensible.
Having said that, there still is a market out there of sorts and for those who can get the funds there are bargains to be had. Despite all the current gloom, recessions never last forever, and the long term trend in house prices is still likely to be upwards as demographic changes and population increases put pressure on housing stock. Scotland simply does not have the oversupply in property that for example is noticeable in Ireland. Consequently a buyer with funds and taking the long view of prices might be able to make a very wise purchase now.
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Tuesday, August 17th, 2010
(Senior Partner Ivor Klayman of Caesar and Howie sounds a note of caution)
We live in austere times these days. Money is tight in most households and we are all looking for ways to get things done cheaply if we can. DIY stores are apparently bucking the retail trend for that very reason. We are also seeing from time to time some legal work being done by individuals themselves. This seems to be limited to probably two areas of work, letting residential property and writing wills. On the letting side some people are reluctant landlords rather than landlords of choice – with letting being a last resort when the housing market is poor. These landlords may be trying to let “on the cheap” On the wills side there has always been a small number of people who go “DIY”.
Sometimes a DIY legal job is done properly but over my career, for every well done DIY job I have seen, I have probably seen 10 times as many failures. That’s a pretty horrible ratio and the consequences for the individuals and their families can be damaging and expensive to fix – if they can be fixed.
Not setting up a Short Assured Tenancy properly can make it very difficult to recover the property from the tenant. Not serving Notices to Quit properly can have the same effect and cause significant wasted court costs. On top of that there is now a mass of legislation placing obligations on landlords, where if any obligations are not met, the consequences are potentially extremely serious. So letting a house in Scotland without understanding the legal framework surrounding residential letting in Scotland is risky to say the least.
On the wills side I have seen “self made “wills which vary from being completely invalid to ones which were wholly confused and contradictory. I have even seen a DIY will which did not actually leave the person’s property to anyone!
If legal documents are to have legal effect, experience of drafting such documents and of the meaning of legal terminology is really necessary to get things right.
I would never dream of rewiring my own house because I don’t have the skill and knowledge of an electrician (and anyway, it would now be illegal!). I think DIY in critical areas is simply dangerous and usually a false economy. In our field we generally earn higher fees sorting out an estate for example with a shambolic DIY will than we ever would from doing a correct will in the first place.
And one last point – all Scottish solicitors carry compulsory insurance against defective work. If a solicitor does make a mistake clients can be and are compensated for losses occurring. This is a massive protection for the Scottish public and really should make people think twice before perhaps dabbling in drafting legal documents which if wrongly completed could cost them or their family dear.
Ivor Klayman
Senior Partner
Caesar and Howie
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Monday, April 19th, 2010
A large gathering of senior citizens enjoyed a lively annual conference of the Scottish Pensions Associating in Edinburgh on the 15th of April. George Henderson, OBE chaired the conference which was the seventy third in the Association’s history. Keynote speakers were Margo MacDonald MSP, Justin Glass from the Glasgow Old People’s Welfare Association and David Borrowman from Caesar and Howie.
A theme of all the speeches was the lack of publicity given to many of the benefits available, as of right to senior citizens. The speakers emphasised that this resulted in many benefits readily available not being taken up through lack of knowledge in the senior citizens community. Justin Glass highlighted in particular the lack of take up by senior citizens of Attendance Allowance, a completely non means tested benefit which has transformed the lives of many older folk. Justin forcefully made the point that this benefit was still not claimed by many senior citizens who were clearly entitled to receive it. David Borrowman made a similar point, advising the audience of the generous legal aid available to pensioners in Scotland and yet not known to many. David pointed out to the audience that Wills, Powers of Attorney and Living Wills could all be completed under legal aid and that according to the Scottish Legal Aid Board probably 80% of pensioners would qualify for financial help in preparing them.
Margo MacDonald delighted the audience with an interesting speech, in which she mischievously passed on some of her inside knowledge of leading politicians and the running of the current election campaign.
George Henderson OBE, called on all present to support the Pensioners Manifesto of the National Pensioners Convention and urged delegates to challenge all candidates in the election on the issues contained in the manifesto.
The gathering stimulated some spirited discussion on the issues affecting older people and many of the delegates left the conference resolved to make campaigning politicians aware of their views.
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