The High Court granted a decree of divorce and made financial and parenting orders in proceedings between a husband and wife whose combined assets, including pensions, were estimated at about €6.5 million to €7 million.
Mr Justice Jordan delivered the judgment on 3 February 2022. The divorce proceedings alone were heard over four days in October and November 2021, by agreement of the parties. The wife’s separate judicial separation proceedings were not the proceedings decided in this judgment.
The court directed the wife to buy out her husband’s interest in the family home for €900,000 within six weeks of the judgment. She must take responsibility for the mortgage and indemnify him against it. The court valued the home at about €1.96 million and its net value after the mortgage at about €1.8 million. It said a sale could involve disposal costs, put both parents in competition for other homes and disrupt the children’s connection to a familiar house.
The wife must also pay the husband a lump sum of €280,000 on or before 31 January 2024. The court ordered pension adjustment orders to equalise the parties’ pensions. It said this would be achieved by transferring the husband a 29.4% share of the wife’s pension funds, stated in the judgment as about €470,476. The court granted liberty to apply so the appropriate pension orders could be made if they were not ready at that stage.
The judgment ordered joint custody and a shared parenting regime, to follow suggestions in a report prepared under section 47 of the Family Law Act 1995. The parents are to share equally the children’s education, health, extracurricular and ordinary upbringing costs. The court directed them to put childcare arrangements in writing and encouraged them to agree on a facilitator for disputes.
The wife is to retain sole ownership of an apartment abroad, and each party is to retain their other assets except as adjusted by the orders. The court said it intended to make mutual blocking orders and grant the wife an exclusive right of residence in the family home. It left any disputed further consequential orders for submissions and decision. It also said its present intention was that each party bear their own legal costs, subject to submissions.
The wife alleged that her husband had threatened and assaulted her during the marriage. He denied most allegations but acknowledged pushing her during a November 2020 confrontation and said he regretted it. The court found that he pushed her and she fell, but rejected her account that he struck her or threatened to throw her down the stairs. It found that the wife had not proved gross and obvious misconduct that would justify a financial penalty. The court noted that an earlier Protection Order was granted ex parte and a later Safety Order by consent on a without-prejudice basis, without an inter partes hearing on the alleged incident.