A Swindon man has been awarded £1.3 million after he took his parents to the Supreme Court - and won.

Andrew Guest and his partner have been involved in a long running inheritance case against Mr Guest's parents after they wrote him out of their will following an argument.

He had been given assurances by his parents that he would inherit the family dairy farm in Monmouthshire, which he had worked on for less than minimum wage - typically between £9,000 and £11,000 - since the age of 16.

The Guest family owned the 300-acre Tump Farm near Chepstow since 1938 and was part of the household for three generations.

When the relationship between Andrew and his parents broke down in 2015, he was told to find another job, and move his family out of the farm’s cottage, the business was then dissolved. 

The parents, David and Josephine, 81 and 80, then decided to favour the younger siblings after they cut Andrew out of the will.

Andrew was able to take his case to court under a law called proprietary estoppel.

Under this piece of legislation, a person automatically gets legal rights to a property even if nothing is put in writing, so long as they can prove they have been “given a clear assurance” during their lives that they would inherit it.

Following a trial at the High Court in 2019 and a subsequent hearing at the Court of Appeal, the case went to the Supreme Court.

After the parents lost the appeal, they were ordered to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds to Andrew after three out of the five judges ruled in favour of Guest.

The court ordered David and Josephine to pay Andrew 50 per cent of the farm’s business now, and 40 per cent of the value of the farm which can be paid either on the parents' death or put in trust.

The settlement was previously valued by the Court of Appeal at £1.3 million.

Delivering the verdict on Wednesday, one of the judges, Lord Briggs, said: “'One day my son, all this will be yours’, [was a phrase] spoken by a farmer to his son when in his teens, and repeated for many years thereafter.

“If David had not encouraged him to believe that he would one day benefit substantially from Tump Farm, Andrew could and would have found better financial reward elsewhere.”

Speaking to The Times after the hearing, Andrew, who now lives in Wanborough and works as a herdsman on a farm near Swindon, said: “The door has been open to my parents to resolve this. I have been wanting them to come to the table and we could sit down.

"I am very sad it has come to this, but I felt I had no choice.”

The Times reports that there were repeated rows about plans to modernise the farm, to which his parents objected, but that it was not clear what caused the falling out.

He also argued with his parents 14 years ago about his pay, which prompted him to write to a tribunal and him receiving an extra £25 per week.

In a statement issued through his law firm, Thrings, David Guest said fighting his son in Britain’s highest courts has caused considerable strain to him and his wife.

He said: “Josephine and I took a mortgage out when I was just 19 and kept up repayments until we owned the farm together.

“Having undergone all the stresses associated with keeping our heads above the water through the ups and downs of farming, and seeing many others go under, it was more than disappointing to be faced with this dispute when we had hoped to enjoy our retirement after more than 50 years working to achieve our dream.”