The High Court ordered a husband to provide €450,000 for his wife’s pension and pay her €5,000 a month in maintenance, after granting a divorce and considering a Dutch divorce agreement that had not been recognised in Ireland.
In a judgment delivered on 10 February 2012, Mr Justice Abbott said the pension payment was to be invested for the wife’s pension. The monthly maintenance is to be reviewed after one year if she establishes a new profession. The court also ordered the husband to pay the costs of the proceedings, to be taxed if the parties could not agree.
The couple, identified in the judgment as D.T. and F.L., married in 1980 and have three adult children. The wife had sought judicial separation or, alternatively, divorce. The case took eight years to reach a hearing, following unsuccessful challenges by the husband to the Irish courts’ jurisdiction based on a Dutch divorce and European law arguments. At the start of the hearing, the judge dismissed a further document raising objections, citing the Supreme Court decisions and an undertaking given by the husband not to raise further preliminary issues.
The court found that the parties had lived apart for at least four years during the five years before the proceedings began, that there was no reasonable prospect of reconciliation and that proper provision had been made. It therefore granted a divorce under the constitutional jurisdiction and the Family Law (Divorce) Act 1996.
The judge said the 1994 Dutch divorce agreement should receive “almost decisive weight”, applying a Supreme Court decision on the treatment of prior settlements. But he identified the wife’s lack of pension provision and the risk that she would not meet her employment goals as needs that justified additional orders. He found the agreement’s maintenance provisions had become deficient over time, given the substantial difference in the parties’ incomes.
In assessing resources, the judge considered sharply different valuations of the husband’s business interests and the strain on his short-term finances. He assessed his assets at about €1 million for the present, with a potential value of €8 million in five years, while the wife’s assets were valued at about €300,000. He noted that she had no pension or home and was living in rented accommodation. The court said she could apply to the husband’s estate for maintenance if needs arose.
The written judgment set out the proposed orders and said the parties could address the court on costs, timing and technical aspects of the draft order. The pension order’s form was to be settled in light of pension law requirements.