Divorce refused- why?

building_with_lego

My OH mentioned having seen this on the BBC.

How is it that the divorce was refused? I thought that 'unreasonable behaviour' was the coverall which got a divorce through, but apparently not. Am I missing something?



(Apologies if this is a duplicate thread/ should be in The Arms. I did have a quick search.)

hazyjo

It was quoted as being 'Extraordinarily unusual' and I expect the decision will be overturned.

Watch this space, I guess...

FBaby

Playing devils' advocate....how many marriage end not because there is not marriage left, but because the marriage is going through a difficult patch and one of the couple of both don't want to ride the wave that often leads to a stronger marriage?

I'm wondering if the judge saw exactly that, an extreme case of a marriage that was just going through some issues that he felt could easily be resolved by some counselling or something?

Maybe he has enough of breaking up marriages which he sees unnecessary? I know quite a few couple who had reached that stage of feeling that their marriage/partnership had reach the end, thought there was nothing left to fight for, and strongly felt that their only way to happiness again was getting away from it, to decide to give it one last try and somehow made it work.

Over-crossing of legal and psychological counselling?

Callie22

It's a dangerous precedent though - I don't agree with a judge making a statement that basically says that one should expect to be unhappy in a marriage and that in itself isn't sufficient grounds for divorce. Of course you can't expect to be ecstatically happy all of the time and of course some people probably have unreasonable expectations of that, but who gets to decide how much unhappiness is 'enough', or how much 'mistreatment' is ok? Abuse isn't always physical - I'm not suggesting that's the case since we don't know the details but if this ruling is upheld then it seems a step backwards in acknowledging non-physical forms of abuse as being grounds for divorce.

GDB2222

hazyjo wrote: »

It was quoted as being 'Extraordinarily unusual' and I expect the decision will be overturned.

Watch this space, I guess...

The appeal was heard and she has lost.

The point is that the court decided that the husband's behaviour was not unreasonable. Normally, there's no dispute about this, and the court doesn't have to decide. It doesn't affect the financial settlement, so most spouses blamed in this way simply acquiesce. On this occasion, the husband decided to dispute it. I can only guess what his motives are.

The wife can still get a divorce eventually, after five years separation. If you think that this is all wrong, lobby your MP, because all the courts are doing is applying the law Parliament decided on.

lobbyludd

FBaby wrote: »

Playing devils' advocate....how many marriage end not because there is not marriage left, but because the marriage is going through a difficult patch and one of the couple of both don't want to ride the wave that often leads to a stronger marriage?

I'm wondering if the judge saw exactly that, an extreme case of a marriage that was just going through some issues that he felt could easily be resolved by some counselling or something?

Maybe he has enough of breaking up marriages which he sees unnecessary? I know quite a few couple who had reached that stage of feeling that their marriage/partnership had reach the end, thought there was nothing left to fight for, and strongly felt that their only way to happiness again was getting away from it, to decide to give it one last try and somehow made it work.

Over-crossing of legal and psychological counselling?

that would be a moral judgement not a legal one: a judge is not an expert on marriage, and even if they were would not be able to tell anything about a couple's marriage from their divorce petition. So they have applied their interpretation of what is unreasonable behaviour to this case in order to follow the law, and it is one that many people would disagree with.

To my mind, refusing to allow your spouse to exit the marriage when they are desperately unhappy sounds like the definition of unreasonable behaviour. This emphasises the fact that we should make divorce entirely non-fault based - we should be able to dissolve a marriage before 2 years separation without having to resort to "unreasonable behaviour", and without wasting judges time on assessing whether this behaviour is unreasonable or not.

I absolutely would not want to stay married to someone who wanted out - whether they consented to try and work on the marriage or not - if one person feels the marriage is over and doesn't want to work on it, then it is over.

GDB2222

lobbyludd wrote: »

that would be a moral judgement not a legal one: a judge is not an expert on marriage, and even if they were would not be able to tell anything about a couple's marriage from their divorce petition. So they have applied their interpretation of what is unreasonable behaviour to this case in order to follow the law, and it is one that many people would disagree with.

To my mind, refusing to allow your spouse to exit the marriage when they are desperately unhappy sounds like the definition of unreasonable behaviour. This emphasises the fact that we should make divorce entirely non-fault based - we should be able to dissolve a marriage before 2 years separation without having to resort to "unreasonable behaviour", and without wasting judges time on assessing whether this behaviour is unreasonable or not.

I absolutely would not want to stay married to someone who wanted out - whether they consented to try and work on the marriage or not - if one person feels the marriage is over and doesn't want to work on it, then it is over.

I agree with you, but the government has already said that they are not going to change the law.

However, I don't agree that simply contesting the divorce constitutes unreasonable behaviour. At least not under the current law.

onomatopoeia99

GDB2222 wrote: »

However, I don't agree that simply contesting the divorce constitutes unreasonable behaviour. At least not under the current law.

If contesting unreasonable behaviour was itself unreasonable behavior, then that would create instant divorce - either it's uncontested so you get it, or it's contested, so you get it.

It is clear that parliament does not want that. I feel the law should be changed and the proposal to allow one year, no fault divorces with no consent should have been passed when it was made a few years ago, but too much lobbying from the church and other reactionary elements killed that, so we are left with the absurd situation that exists today.

Rosemary7391

If you could get a no questions asked divorce in 1 year, surely that means a marriage only has a minimum duration of 1 year. That doesn't seem very long for something intended to last a lifetime... I certainly can't understand why opposing that should be seen as absurd

hazyjo

Rosemary7391 wrote: »

If you could get a no questions asked divorce in 1 year, surely that means a marriage only has a minimum duration of 1 year. That doesn't seem very long for something intended to last a lifetime... I certainly can't understand why opposing that should be seen as absurd

Sometimes things 'break' though, even if they are intended to last a lifetime. I'm sure none of us go into marriage lightly - but it's not always a joint decision to end a marriage, sometimes your hand is forced (unless you want to spent the rest of your life with MUG or VICTIM tattooed across your forehead).

Jx

Rosemary7391

hazyjo wrote: »

Sometimes things 'break' though, even if they are intended to last a lifetime. I'm sure none of us go into marriage lightly - but it's not always a joint decision to end a marriage, sometimes your hand is forced (unless you want to spent the rest of your life with MUG or VICTIM tattooed across your forehead).

Jx

I get that - not arguing against divorce altogether. I just think 1 year, without grounds, is quite a short amount of time. I can see that there could be arguments for and against it being 1 year - it's calling being against that absurd that I found so strange!