Matthew David Baldwin (Petitioner) v Selamawit Semu Baldwin
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judge | Mrs. Justice Parker |
| Judgment Date | 14 March 2014 |
| Neutral Citation | [2014] EWHC 4857 (Fam) |
| Court | Family Division |
| Docket Number | Case No. TN13D00521 |
| Date | 14 March 2014 |
[2014] EWHC 4857 (Fam)
Mrs. Justice Parker
Case No. TN13D00521
IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE
FAMILY DIVISION
Royal Courts of Justice
Mr. N. Wilkinson (instructed by Alderson & Associates, Ras Al Khaimah, UAE) appeared on behalf of the Petitioner.
Miss L. Mottahedan (instructed by Expatriate Law) appeared on behalf of the Respondent.
This hearing is about jurisdiction in a case relating to maintenance obligations for a wife and child. It was listed for two and a half hours yesterday. It took almost twice that time. Many, many different points were run. I had to adjourn judgment until today to the great inconvenience of my listed case. This morning I received, without notice, an application from Mr. Wilkinson, who appears on behalf of the husband, that I should abandon these proceedings on the basis that I have considered without prejudice material which should not have been before me, and re-list the case for hearing in front of another judge, and therefore these proceedings should be wholly derailed.
I have come to the view that this husband will run any argument, and employ any tactic, to avoid his responsibilities to his wife and child, and that he has deliberately sought to engage in these proceedings so as to starve her of litigation funds. I reject the application not only because it is made at the last possible moment, but because the information contained in correspondence to which the husband now objects has been before the court since a hearing in Tunbridge Wells in January.
The correspondence records that on 20 th June 2013 a meeting took place between the wife's English solicitors in Dubai who represent her in this jurisdiction and the husband in person. The wife's solicitors referred to an interim financial maintenance arrangement which had been agreed between the parties. Apart from recording that fact, nothing which passed between the parties up until that meeting, or in that meeting, is revealed. The husband confirmed five days later by email that in the interim he was happy to pay the sum agreed of AED 10,000 (Arab Emirates Dirhams) per month as maintenance. He now says that he was bullied or coerced into that agreement by the wife's solicitors since he did not have legal advice. I have pressed Mr. Wilkinson for a precise date as to when the husband first sought advice from his current solicitors, or indeed any solicitors. I was told yesterday that it was no later than 4 th July. That date appears in the papers. I still do not have a precise answer. I note that in R v. Manchester Crown Court(ex parte R) (Legal Professional Privilege) [1999] 1 WLR 832 Lord Taylor LCJ held that a record of a client appointment in a solicitor's appointments diary was not subject to privilege and could be required to be produced under the Police & Criminal Evidence Act 1984. In The Queen on the application of Miller Gardner Solicitors v. Minshull Street Crown Court [2002] EWHC 3077, Mr. Justice Fulford (as he then was) ruled that information which does not relate to the obtaining, or giving, of a legal advice and formalities did not breach legal professional privilege.
I am unable, on the basis of the present information, to assume that the husband did not have legal advice from some source at the date of that meeting. At the moment I can take it no further. However, if Miss Mottahedan, on behalf of the wife, wants to pursue this matter, I would be receptive to an application.
There is also reference in Miss Mottahedan's skeleton argument to alleged exchanges between the husband and wife with regard to jurisdiction. I have no evidence whatsoever of that. I said yesterday morning that I completely ignore this assertion for the purposes of this hearing, and I shall do so. I rely, as will appear from the contents of this judgment, on later events and on the documents. I do not assume that the agreement for interim maintenance, whether challenged or not, demonstrates that the husband had invoked the jurisdiction of the English court to award maintenance at that point. Indeed, the correspondence is entirely consistent with this being a consensual arrangement to meet the wife's immediate needs. The existence of the agreement is common ground. Although Mr. Wilkinson says it is vitiated by duress, that is a totally different point. The husband has not complied with the agreement but paid some monies to the wife for the support of herself and the child until October 2013, and then ceased paying her. No clear explanation has been given for that. Mr. Wilkinson accepted yesterday that his client, without prejudice to the jurisdictional issues, does accept responsibility to maintain his child but not his wife, but could not explain why he is currently paying no maintenance.
I make no criticism of Mr. Wilkinson for advancing every argument at his client's disposal because I am sure that he is doing his best to represent his client's interests, on instructions, in the best traditions of the Bar. However, as I have already commented, this court process has taken considerably longer than was originally envisaged.
I reject the husband's application now to abandon these proceedings.
This is a trans-national case which concerns an Ethiopian wife and mother presently in Ethiopia with the parties' baby son, Joshua (who was born in Dubai on 1 st February, 2013), and an English husband and father who is now living and working in Indonesia, I am told. Both the husband's solicitors and the wife's solicitors practice in Dubai and have expertise in English/Dubai cases.
The parties were married on 4 th July, 2010 in Dubai. Their married life was in Dubai and Bahrain. Their last common residence was Dubai. The husband has issued divorce proceedings in this jurisdiction. There is some debate as to the status of these proceedings, to which I will later turn. At the moment these are extant proceedings. The wife has acknowledged service and accepted the jurisdiction here. She has issued proceedings for an interim maintenance order for herself and the child and for a Legal Services (Funding) Order. The husband now says that this court has no jurisdiction to make an order for maintenance and legal funding for the wife. He says also that there is no jurisdiction to make an order for Joshua but presses that case less forcefully.
The parties were married for nearly three years before Joshua was born. The husband has described the marriage as "rushed"; and that it took place, he says, because of the attitude of the Dubai authorities to cohabiting couples. The husband has also described it as a marriage of "convenience", but I do not know what he means by that. The wife says she had worked in Dubai as a hairdresser. The husband says that she has never worked to his knowledge and he claims that she was a prostitute. I am sure that the wife denies that. But, even if it were true, it has nothing to do with her claim for support. The husband married her and she has borne their child. The husband's assertion does have considerable relevance to the wife's ability to litigate in other jurisdictions, which is one of the central issues in these proceedings.
These assertions are also material because it is clear to me that the husband wants to downplay the significance, the relevance and the importance of this marriage, and the wife's claims. That is apparent from the chronology and from his stance, through Mr. Wilkinson, in these proceedings. I will not decide this case on the merits because this is not a merits-based issue. It is a jurisdictional issue and a forum issue. But the husband's attitude to the wife is an important backdrop to understanding the way in which these proceedings have continued and the way in which he has represented his position in proceedings in this country.
According to the wife, the husband left her shortly after Joshua was born, after some very aggressive behaviour. I form no conclusion as to whether that is true or not. That was after, she says, he told her that he wanted her to leave. He then told her to leave the matrimonial home immediately and to take the baby with her. The husband disputes that he then left the parties' home in June 2013 and cancelled the lease. The husband's case is that she left him. The wife says that she did not know where the husband was because he left Dubai at some point, having been in steady employment there. The round table meeting, to which I have referred, took place on 20 th June. There is subsequent correspondence. Then, without any notice, on 4 th July, 2013 the husband signed an English divorce petition which contained a financial remedy application. That was sealed on 23 rd July, 2013. His notice of acting in person says that he is being advised and assisted by Dubai solicitors Messrs. Alderson & Associates, who instruct Mr. Wilkinson in these proceedings.
The husband's petition is brought the basis of the wife's behaviour. He relies on his English domicile as the basis of jurisdiction. At Part 10, after the prayer for dissolution, the petition continues on the printed form, "3. Financial order. (If you wish to make an application for a financial order)". He has ticked the box "the petitioner may be granted the following financial orders —" and then the following boxes are ticked: an order for maintenance pending suit/outcome; periodical payments order; secured provision order; lump sum order; property adjustment order; order under ss.24(b), 25(b), or 25(c) of the 1973 Act or pension sharing/attachment order; and then (b) for the children, (which...
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...cannot reasonably be brought or conducted or would be impossible in a third state. See Expatriate Law's case of Baldwin vs Baldwin [2014] EWHC 4857 (Fam): https://www.familylaw.co.uk/news_and_comment/baldwin-v-baldwin-2014-ewhc-4857-fam The implications of a No-deal Brexit The sole domicile......