A farmer with property and land assets with an estimated net value of up to €1.9 million must pay his estranged wife a €650,000 lump sum, plus a further amount relating to other lands that were not disclosed, a High Court judge has ordered.
The additional lands, inherited by the man and valued at about €150,000, were not disclosed during the hearing of judicial separation proceedings and the farmer had denied ownership during cross-examination, Ms Justice Nuala Jackson said.
There was a “deliberate telling of lies” amounting to litigation misconduct, she said. As a consequence, the man must pay the woman 60 per cent of the net value of the inherited lands after deduction of relevant taxes, plus her legal costs arising from the non-disclosure.
Both sides had earlier agreed legal costs would be at Circuit Court level, the judge said.
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Those and other orders, including requiring the man to pay €500 monthly maintenance for his youngest child, who is still a minor, were made as part of proper provision.
In her judgment, Ms Justice Jackson said the man and woman, aged in their 50s, married more than 20 years ago.
He is the legal owner of all the real assets, including the “large and comfortable” family home built during the marriage and a substantial farm holding advanced to him by his family before his marriage.
The construction of the family home was funded by his family, mortgage payments were paid from farm earnings and only a small mortgage remains, the judge said.
There was an issue whether the monies were a gift, as the woman said, or a loan as the man said.
For the purpose of the proceedings, the judge said she believed the moneys were probably an informal loan/quasi-gift, which was “not unusual” in families, and the best approach was to allocate responsibility for them to the man.
The evidence was the man was a committed and successful farmer, she said. She was “not impressed” by the woman’s efforts to demean his abilities and activities in that regard.
The woman had worked outside the family home but, soon after the marriage, was a full-time homemaker and carer for the children. She resumed part-time employment some years ago and will be in a position to work full-time.
She had no significant assets and was dependent in that context, although not in an income context, and the court accepted she did not have borrowing capacity, the judge said.
The evidence appeared to show the man was “somewhat parsimonious” during the marriage, but overall the family appeared to have lived a life “of restrained comfort”, the judge said.
The woman, who wished to move away from the farm and relocate closer to Dublin, had provided property valuations of about €700,000 for certain areas while the man provided valuations of about €250,000 to €300,000 for properties in other areas.
The €650,000 lump sum included €500,000-€550,000 payable to the woman for a house purchase. As with all house purchases, accommodation requirements “must be calibrated with financial resources”, the judge said.
She said neither party had any significant pensions and the woman had said her husband had indicated the farm would be their pension. There was undoubtedly some undisclosed cash income, the judge also said.
The man had indicated his legal costs of the proceedings were about €120,000, which did not include the costs of the case having been prolonged due to his non-disclosure, the judge said.
The woman had estimated her costs at €80,000 prior to the prolongation of the case.
Both parties were “well served” by their lawyers, the judge said.
However, it seemed there was “much unnecessary prolongation” of the case by “suspicion, denial and criticism, which ill-served the family and was uncalled for, given the knowledge each had about the activities of the other”, she said.
