The High Court granted V.M. and J.P. a decree of divorce and varied several financial and custody provisions made by the Circuit Court in 2011. The judgment was delivered by Ms Justice Bronagh O’Hanlon on 23 March 2015. The appeal concerned the Circuit Court’s divorce orders and related reliefs; the High Court set out the replacement arrangements in its judgment.
The parties married in May 2003 and had two children. They had lived apart since February 2004. The judge found that the marriage was short and had irretrievably broken down, with no prospect of reconciliation, and that proper provision could be made for both spouses and their dependent children.
The court ordered joint custody and detailed access arrangements. These included alternating weekend periods, two after-school periods each week, and time during school holidays. The father was to collect the children from school on two set days each week, care for them until their mother returned from work, and take them to her property. The parties had agreed to attend three post-separation counselling sessions.
The previous weekly maintenance order was vacated. The father was ordered to pay €160 per week for both children until the first lump sum, due by 30 October 2015. Thereafter, he must pay €5,000 each October and €3,320 each December, during the children’s dependency, including if either remains in full-time education or training after 18. The court described this as equivalent to €160 weekly. It also ordered a separate €72,000 lump sum to the mother, payable in six annual instalments of €12,000 from 15 October 2016, to buy out any interest she may have had in his assets.
The court declared that the mother had no claim to the listed lands, farm stock, machinery or buildings, and that the father had no interest in the mother’s property. The father’s interests in three specified folios were to be held in trust for the children during their minority and could not be sold or pledged as credit. The court also made an order concerning the father’s contingent entitlement under the mother’s HSE pension if she predeceased him, excluding a lump sum, and directed that a separate order be prepared with HSE Pensions Department approval.
The High Court vacated further provisions of the Circuit Court order and granted a declaration blocking either party from claiming against the other’s estate on death. It made no order as to costs and gave liberty to apply.