CA-2024-000509 - [2025] EWCA Civ 1055

The judge discussed in a number of places the relationship of the wife with the father. He described it as ‘complicated and often uneasy’ and one where there was a great imbalance of power. The judge held that the wife did not really know what assets were in her name and said that she was anxious, if not actually afraid of asking her father for details. The judge said:

“64….I can well understand that the wife did not want to ask her father for details of her financial resources if it meant enquiring into something that he regarded as deeply private.”

This observation cannot be reconciled with the wife’s statement to which a statement of truth is attached and quoted at para. [43] above where she had said that she ‘did not consider it appropriate to set out as part of an appendix to our agreement, shares which my father had placed in my name as a form of inheritance planning’.

Further, it was not the wife’s case that she did not know the business assets were in her name. The issue of disclosure of those assets was put this way in the written opening submissions filed on her behalf:

“64.

W’s disclosure at Appendix A did not include business assets / shares in her name but controlled by her father; she explains why in her statement and makes clear that she continues to consider that in reality these are her father’s assets. Prior to these proceedings W had limited knowledge about these assets.”

In her oral evidence the wife said that she had ‘asked her dad about the assets in her name’ but that they had not ‘discussed it properly’.

“I just said before that I did know there was assets or companies, that were in my name or part in my name, my name was attached to, but I didn’t know the extent. I certainly didn’t know anything about worth or numbers or anything like that, so I didn’t think it was appropriate…”

It was put to the wife by Ms Bangay in cross- examination that she was aware when she gave disclosure that it was ‘inadequate or dishonest’. The wife said that she ‘didn’t think it was dishonest’. She knew she said that there were assets in her name but not ‘the extent’.

In the closing note filed on behalf of the wife, it was suggested by Mr Harrison KC that the parties had expressly agreed to exclude the business assets in the Appendix A in private conversations before the agreement was signed and that the wife did not know the values of the business assets. Therefore, even at the conclusion of the trial, it was not the wife’s case that she did not know that she had the business assets in her name, just that she was unclear of their value and that her father controlled them. Her focus was more on the fact that she alleged that the husband was aware of the business assets held in her name.

The position therefore at the conclusion of the case was that in her written statement, the two position statements filed on her behalf and in oral evidence, the wife accepted that she was aware that significant and very valuable business assets were in her name, that she had spoken to her father about the assets prior to the signing of the agreement and that she knew that she had not made full disclosure of her assets. It follows that whilst this court is always reluctant to interfere with a finding of fact made by a judge who has heard all the evidence, (see Volpi v Volpi [2022] EWCA Civ 464; [2022] 4 WLR 48 para. [2]) the judge’s finding that the wife was unaware that she had business assets in her name, and was effectively too scared to ask her father about it, cannot stand. It is clear from all the evidence that, whilst unclear of the precise worth of her business assets, the wife knew they were in her name, had talked to her father about it and had made a conscious decision not to disclose them in Appendix A.