HUSBAND and STRIFE
THE marriage vows we take are pretty clear… for better, for worse; for richer for poorer; in sickness and in health. But a controversial divorce case this week has raised an intriguing question: should the wedding ceremony also include the words “for happier, for grumpier; in love and out of love”?
Because an embittered wife has asked three of our highest judges to consider whether a divorce judge was right to rule that having a grumpy husband who denigrates his wife in public is not grounds for divorce.
Dutch-born Tini Owens, 65, had her divorce refused after the judge said the way her husband Hugh, 78, constantly criticised her was to be “expected in a marriage”. Now she must wait weeks before she learns if the Appeal Court agrees that being locked in a loveless 38-year marriage is wrong and the divorce should be allowed to go through against her husband’s wishes.
The case is unusual because fewer than 1,000 of Britain’s 110,000 annual divorces are ever contested. Lawyers believe that if Mrs Owens loses her appeal, there may have to be a campaign for the law to be changed.
The Owens married in 1978, had two children and built up a £7million-a-year mushroom growing business. They amassed four “nice houses”, the court was told, including a manor house in Willersey, Worcestershire, that became the matrimonial home. They also owned properties in Wales and France, living a “genteel life in genteel company”.
But slowly it all turned sour and they grew apart. Then in November 2012 something happened that was described in court in emotion-free legalese: she “commenced an intimate relationship with another man”, Ted Olive. Her affair lasted until August 2013 and when Mr Owens found out there were bitter arguments. His wife said his “continued beratement” included criticising her in front of their housekeeper, rowing with her in an airport shop after a holiday in Mexico, making her pick up bits of cardboard in the garden, not speaking during a meal in a pub and “stinging remarks” he fired at her in front of a friend.
That she said amounted to unreasonable behaviour and earlier in 2015 she left him and filed for divorce, moving into a property barely 50 yards away that they jointly own. For his part Mr Owens claimed he had forgiven his wife for her “misguided” fling, saying he wants them to remain married as they “still have a few years of old age together”.
BUT Mrs Owens insists she feels “unloved, isolated and alone” and says her husband’s behaviour amounts to grounds for divorce. Unfortunately for her, when the case was heard in the divorce courts by Judge Robin Tolson QC, he disagreed. The Appeal Court heard that Judge Tolson’s ruling described her allegations against her husband as “exaggerated” and “at best flimsy”, claiming they were “minor altercations of a kind to be expected in a marriage”.
The judge accepted that Mr Owens’ attitude towards marriage was “old school” and found that Mrs Owens was “more sensitive than most wives” and had “exaggerated the context and seriousness of the allegations to a significant degree”. But her counsel Philip Marshall QC told the Appeal Court she was now a “locked-in” wife.
“She cannot get divorced unless the husband changes his mind and agrees,” he said. He insisted it was unreasonable to expect Mrs Owens to stay in the marriage: “There doesn’t have to be violence, or threats of violence, or gambling or drinking or shouting. There is a cumulative effect of what may be regarded as inconsequential conduct, which may justify a finding that it is unreasonable to expect her to stay with her husband. In his attitude and manner and the way he did and said things, treated her in a childlike and patronising way and thought she ought to comply with his will. They ordered their lives in a traditional old-fashioned way.”
But it was unfair that a wife must under current law separate from her husband and then wait five years before being allowed a divorce without his consent, he said. Mrs Owen faces three more years living next door to her husband. Mr Marshall said Mrs Owens had made 27 allegations about the way Mr Owens treated her. She said he was “insensitive” in his “manner and tone” and she was “constantly mistrusted” and felt unloved. Her witness statement read: “The simple fact is that I have been desperately unhappy in our marriage for many years. There is no prospect of reconciliation.”
Mr Owens had talked of being a tease and said he had a loud voice, the judges heard. “I am somebody who teases my wife,” he had said during the case. “I do it all the time. I know she doesn’t always appreciate it.”
Nigel Dyer QC, for Mr Owens, said the divorce judge had been “entitled to reject the wife’s case”. He added: “It might be said that elderly parties to a 40-year marriage might be more robust in their relationship with each other.” Appeal judge Lady Justice Hallett said on the question of what constitutes unreasonable behaviour, it was clearly an unhappy marriage: “What may be regarded as trivial disagreements in a happy marriage could be salt in the wound in an unhappy marriage.”
The case has sparked criticism of our divorce laws. Jo Edwards, a partner at Forsters LLP, said: “It is an unfortunate quirk of our divorce system that we retain a fault-based divorce. It is us out of step with most jurisdictions.”
Philippa Dolan, of Collyer Bristow, added: “We need a family law system that reflects the way relationships and marriage works in 2017, a move towards ‘no-fault’ divorces where there is no requirement for one spouse to prove the other did wrong.”