Does the Court care about bad behaviour? What about..
- Cheating
- Coercive control
- Abuse
- Gaslighting
- Financial control
This is often asked by our clients during the course offinancial proceedings.
Yes, they should care, but our response is always….is it arelevant factor in financial remedies litigation?
It is difficult to explain to clients that there needs to be a link between the wrongdoing and financial loss. Even if you establish this link, the thresholds are high and examples of successful cases are rare. This appears insensitive but the Financial Remedies Court is not a moral adjudicator. Whilst there is more focus on domestic abuse and coercive control in society generally, the high bar to conduct claims remains unchanged.
Raising conduct is now causing a bigger stir and the courts seek to address any such allegations head on. Where there is no benefit to raising conduct, clients should be cautious about referring to it. If you raise conduct you need to follow through otherwise you might be wasting the courts time and your money.
There is some light. The courts are taking a stricter approach to parties behaving badly within the court proceedings – we are talking litigation conduct. Judges are using costs orders now more than ever to address the imbalance where one party has behaved particularly badly in litigation.
This is not to discourage clients from raising conduct – but it needs to be properly worked through at the outset. It might not be relevant for the finances but it should not be ignored. If the behaviour is still prevalent and impacting you then there are other ways to tackle this such as protective orders.
We are outcome driven lawyers and we want to achieve what is best for you. Speak to us, tell us everything and let us guide you towards the right course of action.