W v H (Financial Remedies: Pensions)

       [1]     This judgment follows the hearing of the financial remedy application of the applicant wife Mrs W. The respondent to the application is the husband Mr H. I shall refer to them respectively for the sake of convenience as the wife and the husband, intending no disrespect in so doing. The wife is represented by Mr Duncan Maxwell-Stewart and the husband by Mr Roger Bickerdike.

       [3]     The combined legal costs are over �200,000. However, this is not in any sense a �big money� case. One of the few issues which the parties can agree is that this is a needs case. Taking the position at its highest, the parties� combined net liquid assets (excluding pensions) amount to just over �450,000. The costs therefore represent in very broad terms 45% of the liquid assets.

       [4]     In Azarmi-Movafagh v Bassiri-Dezfouli [2021] EWCA Civ 1184 , in a judgment handed down the day after I had concluded the present hearing, King LJ made these opening comments:

[1] This is a second appeal in a straightforward financial remedy case �marked� as HHJ Robinson put it at the trial, by �extreme positions and a degree of bitterness�. The judge if anything understated the position; the degree of acrimony on both sides has been such that the parties embarked on a course of litigation which became an exercise in self-destruction. As a consequence, the costs have become so disproportionate relative to the assets that it is now hard to achieve an outcome in this uncomplicated needs case which will not leave each of the parties profoundly discontented.

       [5]     The wife is aged 46 and works part-time as a teaching assistant. The husband is aged 51 and works as a technical architect/IT manager.