In the case of VWvBH, a husband tried to contest a divorce which was based on his adultery. In the extraordinary case, the couple’s daughter was cross-examined during the three day trail.

Her Honour Judge Lynn Roberts heard the contested divorce (one of around only 20 divorce trials per year) at which the husband contested the divorce despite admitting that he had committed adultery for 22 years of the marriage.

The husband had already delayed the trial due to a claim that he was attacked the night before the first day, a claim which the Judge has not given any great weight to.

With regards to examining his wife’s witness statements, the husband’s actions were recorded by the Judge who stated “and, if I had not intervened, would have questioned each one of them for very long periods of time… it was a difficult and painful experience, in my judgement, for each of Ms W’s witnesses and for Mrs W to observe. His cross-examination of his daughter, M, was particularly excruciating” and that asking his daughter questions about herpes was “unfortunately and wholly unnecessary [stet]”.

She added “Mr H’s whole case has indeed has been completely futile, a huge waste of money, a tragic destruction of family relationships, and all, in my opinion, to satisfy Mr H’s own vanity and need to be in control and for other reasons I have suggested earlier. All he had to do was not contest the divorce, a divorce he wanted, as virtually everybody else in the country does, and this couple would have had their decree nisi last year, the various relationships would, in all likelihood have been well on the way to healing by now and the money saved for the family.”

The wife was granted a Decree Nisi, the husband was ordered to pay her costs on an indemnity basis “because of the totally unnecessary proceedings that have taken place, a huge amount of costs which have been made much more expensive than they needed to because of decisions taken by Mr H.” This is another reason why no fault divorce is so important. Changes will hopefully happen in the New Year.