Laura Clay-Harris reports on the recent decision by the Supreme Court to dismiss appeal but the call for parliament to review divorce laws continues.
On Wednesday, five Supreme Court judges came to a unanimous decision to dismiss the appeal of a wife wishing to divorce her husband. Mrs Owens has been attempting to divorce her husband on the grounds of his unreasonable behaviour since 2015, but has been prevented from doing so as the court do not accept her examples of unreasonable behaviour are sufficient to show their marriage has irretrievably broken down. Mrs Owens will now have to wait until 2020 to petition for divorce on the grounds of five years separation without consent.
Currently, in order to obtain a divorce without waiting two or five years, you need to establish that the other person has committed adultery, or behaved unreasonably to the point that you should not be expected to live with them. These limited reasons lead to people making accusations of unreasonable behaviour simply to achieve the divorce.
Family law practitioners and groups across the country have been petitioning the government for a change in the law to allow for no fault divorce. Further information regarding no fault divorce can be found here: https://www.howespercival.com/articles/all-signs-point-to-no-fault-divorce/.
Although Mrs Owens’ appeal was dismissed, some of the judges expressed their unease at this decision. Lady Hale reminded everyone that judges have a responsibility to implement the law, rather than change it. It is parliament’s job to change the law, and the judges urged them to consider doing so.
Many countries around the world, including Australia, Spain, Russia and Chile offer no fault divorce and there is no doubt that pressure groups will continue to urge parliament to bring the divorce law of England and Wales up to date.
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