Succession Act 1965 section 67B

Share of issue where no surviving spouse or surviving civil partner

Section 67B sets out how the estate of a person who dies without a will is distributed among their children and descendants when there is no surviving spouse or civil partner.

• Where a person dies intestate leaving children or descendants but no spouse or civil partner, the entire estate passes to those children or descendants.
• If all the surviving children or descendants are at the same generational level (e.g. all are children of the deceased), the estate is divided equally among them.
• If the children or descendants are at different generational levels (e.g. some are children and some are grandchildren of a predeceased child), the estate is divided per stirpes — meaning each branch of the family receives the share their parent would have taken.
• This section was introduced by the Civil Partnership and Certain Rights and Obligations of Cohabitants Act 2010 to reflect the recognition of civil partnerships alongside marriage in succession law.