History of Contesting Wills

The process of "contesting a will" is legally described as an application for "family provision". Such applications have in fact been around since historical times and have been traced to Roman time [see: "Family Provision in Australia, de Groot J; Nickel B, 5th ed (2016].

New Zealand was one of the first countries to introduce legislation that permitted a will to be challenged and Australia later followed with the "Testator's Family Maintenance and Guardianship of Infants Act 1916" [see: Blore v. Land (1960) 104 CLR 124. 

The original intent of this legislation was probably to provide for widows and children who were left out of the will. A closer examination of the legislatio suggests that there is still freedom of testamentatory disposition (but not if you are going to fail to adequately provide for eligible persons). Some people equate this with fairness but courts often say that the focus is not fairness per se.  

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