The UK’s Supreme Court has handed down its judgment on HMRC v Parry & Ors, also known as HMRC v Staveley, which has rumbled on for six years.

The decision concerned the actions of terminally ill woman Ms Staveley, who in 2014 transferred some of her pension that had been set up with her ex-husband into a different pension pot just for her children. Ms Staveley died just weeks later.

HMRC classed the money transfer as a ‘chargeable lifetime transfer’ as well as an ‘omission to act’ as Ms Staveley drew no benefits, saying that the two acts were linked and therefore liable for inheritance tax.

While...