Financial provision - mother's application for financial provision for child - order to reflect father's exceptional wealth

In re P (Child: Financial Provision): CA (Lords Justice Thorpe and May and Mr Justice Bodey): 24 June 2003

The mother and father, who were not married, had a relationship towards the close of which the child, L, was conceived.

The mother came from an affluent background and the father described himself as 'fabulously rich'.

The mother applied for financial provision under section 15 of and schedule 1 to the Children Act 1989 and appealed against the orders which the judge made on the basis that some elements of the financial provision for the child did not reflect the scale of the father's fortune.

Barry Singleton QC and Howard Shaw (instructed by Lloyd Platt & Co) for the mother; Judith Parker QC and Jonathan Tod (instructed by Cawdery Kaye Fireman Taylor) for the father.

Held, allowing the appeal, that the welfare of the child would be a constant influence on the discretionary outcome of the exercise of the court's jurisdiction to make orders for financial provision under schedule 1 to the 1989 Act; that where one or both of the parents were exceptionally wealthy, the starting point was to decide the home that the respondent must provide for the child; that the judge would balance the applicant's entitlement to an allowance as the child's primary carer with the fact that the applicant had no personal entitlement; that the court would recognise the responsibility of the unmarried parent with the primary care of the child and, in order to discharge this responsibility, the carer had to have control of a budget which reflected her position and the position of the father, both social and financial; that those elements of the judge's order would be increased as appropriate in the sums assessed by the court (see [2003] Gazette, 14 August, 33).