The High Court granted a decree of divorce to R.L. and M.S. and set out proposed financial provision for the applicant, including €500 a week in periodical payments. It also proposed an adjustment concerning 50% of the respondent’s AMF fund and adjourned consideration of a possible lump sum if specified conditions are met following a sale of the respondent’s family company.
In a judgment delivered on 31 May 2016, Mr Justice Henry Abbott found that the parties had lived apart for the required period, that there was no reasonable prospect of reconciliation and that proper provision was being made. They married in 2005, stopped cohabiting in 2009 and had no children together.
The judgment assessed the applicant’s 2013 income from art, farming and forestry at €9,000, €1,705 and €12,824 respectively. It said mortgage repayments to two banks exceeded €100,000 a year. The respondent’s stated income included a net salary of €53,708 a year and net rent of €84,992.
A major dispute concerned the value of the respondent’s 40% shareholding in a family company. The court valued the share at €4.5 million before tax and €3 million after tax. It rejected both the applicant’s higher valuation and what it described as the respondent’s valuer’s overly pessimistic assumptions. The judgment said a lump sum or transfer of shares was impractical and could destabilise the company, which the respondent had said would remain in the family.
The respondent had sought repayment of €620,000 she said she had loaned to the applicant’s ventures. The court found the payments were not loans, citing the absence of documentation and its assessment of the evidence. It also found the applicant had supported the respondent’s children and contributed to ventures in France and Asia, while describing his involvement in daily childcare as less continuous than the respondent’s.
The court set €500 a week as an appropriate periodical payment, taking account of tax and the respondent’s potential to increase her income or draw on assets. It proposed a pension adjustment or property adjustment order concerning 50% of the AMF fund.
It adjourned consideration of a lump sum of no more than €500,000. That question would arise if, within five years of the judgment, the company were sold and the cash or equivalent value realised for the respondent’s 40% shareholding reached at least €5.25 million. The court proposed costs for the applicant on the High Court scale and awaited submissions on the forms of order and any adjustment to costs.