Financial Remedies Journal – 2024 Issue 1 | Spring

2024 - Issue 1 - Spring

Issue 1 of 2024 was published in March 2024.

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All articles in the Journal are also available individually.

Financial Remedies Journal 2024 Issue 1 Digital

Financial Remedies Journal 2024 Issue 1 Digital.pdf

Chair's Column (Spring 2024)

Chair's Column (Spring 2024)

The Financial Remedies Journal now enters its third year, and this edition is fizzing with interesting comments and ideas. Transparency and the FRC Pilot One of the issues of the moment for family lawyers is the extent to which the press should be able to identify in public the names

HHJ Edward Hess | Chair of the Editorial Board

Businesses in Financial Remedy Claims

‘Business’ is a term that covers a multitude of different structures. The most common are limited companies (whether public or private), partnerships and sole traders. There is obviously a big difference between a multinational PLC and a sole-trading plumber. The courts will treat different businesses in different ways. This article

Fair Shares and the Financial Reality of the ‘Everyday’ Divorce

Introduction The Fair Shares research study provides the first nationally representative picture of the financial arrangements made by divorcing couples in England and Wales. While approximately 100,000 couples divorce each year, of these only around one-third leave the marriage with a court order in relation to finances, with the

Potanin v Potanina – the Supreme Court Decision

Background On 31 January 2024 the Supreme Court handed down the much-awaited judgment in Potanina v Potanin [2024] UKSC 3. These proceedings relate to financial claims which can be brought in England for financial provision after an overseas divorce. Although the parties in this case have been described as ‘massively

Financial Dispute Revolution? The Family Procedure (Amendment No 2) Rules 2023

There was a time when an unwritten rule seemed to provide that a marriage could only be described as long once the parties had celebrated their china anniversary and entered a third decade together, but times change, and so eventually do some rules. On any view, however, 20 years is

Non-matrimonial Assets – The New ‘Conduct’?

In the recent decision of RN v DA [2023] EWFC 255 (HHJ Vincent – 30 November 2023) the court was faced with an application by a wife to rescind a decree nisi that had been pronounced in 2012. The husband, conversely, had applied for the decree to be made absolute. The

Financial Remedy Proceedings Transparency Reporting Pilot: Launch date 29 January 2024

Introduction Those of you who have appeared in Children Act cases in Leeds, Cardiff or Carlisle in the last 12 months will have encountered the transparency pilot scheme established in those courts in January 2023 and which will be expanded to more courts in January 2024. The essence of the

Groundhog Day Again: A Response to The Transparency Reporting Pilot for Financial Remedy Proceedings

The Financial Remedies Sub-Group of The Transparency Implementation Group, chaired by HHJ Farquhar, produced its long-awaited Final Report, dated April 2023 but published in May 2023, Transparency in the Financial Remedies Court. On 6 July 2023 I published Groundhog Day: A Response to the Report of the Financial Remedies Sub-Group

‘What’s In a Name?’ Anonymising Financial Remedy Judgments

This article addresses four questions posed by Sir Nicholas Mostyn: (1) How engrained is the practice of anonymisation in financial remedy (FR) judgments? (2) What rationale was given in those cases for naming the parties or anonymisation? (3) What is my view of the legal issues in relation to anonymity?

Maintenance for a Disabled Adult Child: A Case of Legal Blogging

Between August 2022 and June 2023 I observed, via Teams, a number of hearings in a single case heard by HHJ Shelton in Leeds and now reported as AB v CD [2022] EWFC 197 and 198; and [2023] EWFC 103. The case concerned cross-applications for variation of a 2012 maintenance

Xydhias, 25 Years On – What Exactly IS a Xydhias Agreement?

Practitioners will be familiar with the oft quoted phrase that ‘the court is not a rubber stamp’ (Kelley v Corston [1998] 1 FLR 986). The court must continue to exercise its discretion under s 25 MCA 1973 even when presented with an agreement between parties. The court will scrutinise the

Costs

Most readers of this publication will be familiar with the expressions of horror over costs in financial remedy proceedings from the High Court bench in recent years, culminating in a few memorable adjectives (‘nihilistic’,[[1]] ‘apocalyptic’[[2]]). In Xanthopoulos, Mostyn J described ‘exploding with indignation’ at the rate and scale

Historical Business Valuations and the Goldilocks Principle: Not Too Much or Too Little but Just the Right Amount of Hindsight

This article compares the attitude taken to the use of hindsight in the commercial courts with that in the family courts. GA v EL The recent case of GA v EL [2023] EWFC 187 and [2023] EWFC 206 provides a useful review of case-law in relation to historical valuations of

Securing Property Situated Outside the Jurisdiction of England and Wales for the Benefit of Minor Children

Readers of the Financial Remedies Journal will, of course, be familiar with the operation of s 23(1)(d)–(f) Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 (financial provision for children in connection with divorce/dissolution of civil partnerships), as well as s 24 of that same Act insofar as it makes available

Qualified Legal Representatives in Financial Remedy Proceedings

The recent decision in AXA v BYB (QLR Financial Remedies) [2023] EWFC 251 (B) is the first time in which a qualified legal representative (QLR) was appointed and used in a financial remedies final hearing at the Central Family Court. There had been scant other authorities in respect of QLRs

Armed Forces Pension Schemes (AFPS)

Armed Forces pensions are among some of the most complex pensions that practitioners can be faced with when dealing with divorce and financial settlements. Their complexity arises not only from the myriad of scheme types, but also the differing aspects of each scheme including accrual rates, the ages that the

Cohabitation – The Case For and Against Reform

Opener Harry Benson Divorce law, in principle at least, seems pretty sensible. You keep what you brought into the marriage and share what you gained. At least that’s my limited understanding, courtesy of my colleague former High Court Judge Sir Paul Coleridge. So why shouldn’t the same or

DR Corner: Fair Shares – Mediation Under the Microscope

1 November 2023 saw the launch of the Fair Shares report, which presents the results of the first fully representative study of the arrangements families make on separation and divorce.[[1]] Following a bespoke survey of 2,425 individuals who had divorced in the last 5 years, the report helps

Tech Corner: Twenty Simple Excel Tips for Financial Remedy Practitioners

Microsoft Excel is a spreadsheet program for presenting formatted numbers and for performing calculations on them. It also offers basic text-editing for labelling and for explaining any figures and calculations. The spreadsheet consists of thousands of ‘cells’. A cell may contain text, numbers, dates, formulas, calculations, or nothing. Each cell

Money Corner: Financial Planning for Non-UK Resident Beneficiaries of Pension Shares

Introduction Once a pension sharing order is obtained from the courts in England and Wales, the division of pension assets between UK residents is usually straightforward. The beneficiary will typically have a pension in the UK that can receive their share. Failing this, if they don’t already have a

Book Review: Cohabitation and Trusts of Land

Elizabeth Darlington and Laura Heaton (Sweet & Maxwell, 4th edn, 2024) In the absence of a specific family law-based remedy, it is a fair comment to say that practising cohabitation law in England and Wales is more complicated in 2024 than it ever has been before. This significant publication is

Financial Remedies Case Round-Up (Mid-September 2023 to mid-January 2024)

Post-separation accrual The judgments published within the autumn period fall sharply at each end of the spectrum of wealth. A number of cases involving significant assets have involved arguments around post-separation accrual, perhaps trickling through as a result of Moor J’s decision in DR v UG [2023] EWFC 68.

The Summary of the Summaries (Spring 2024)

Simon v Simon & Integro Funding Limited [2023] EWCA Civ 1048 (King, Moylan, Popplewell LJJ) The parties agreed an order that had the effect of depriving a litigation funder (Level) of the repayment of a loan advanced to W. Level were joined as a party, and the order was set

A Crib Sheet for those New to Financial Remedies Practice

By way of an extract from Polly Morgan’s Family Law (OUP, 2nd edn, 2024), we present an aide memoire of the relevant principles and practicalities for the new financial remedies practitioner. Summary of the principles and practicalities (1) Consider ‘all the circumstances of the case’: s 25(1). (2)

Interview with Hilary Woodward

Hilary Woodward is a former solicitor and mediator, academic and the about to retire CEO of the Pension Advisory Group. At the launch of the Second Edition of the Pension Advisory Group report, Hilary’s contribution in the field of pensions on divorce was described as ‘incalculable’. She talks to

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