Case No. FD20F00034-and-FD19P00380

30. In the run up to this hearing, a considerable number of documents have been filed setting out HRH’s financial position and the respective contentions of the parties. Given that I did not require any disclosure from HH, his contribution to the issue of disclosure has been, understandably, limited. He did file some Replies to HRH’s Questionnaire. He said that, other than shares in a hotel in Dubai known as La Ville Hotel, the children do not own any real property in Dubai. The “affection plans” that they should have, for example, the Beach Palace, are not proof of title. Their interest in La Ville Hotel amounted to AED 190m in November 2018. In addition, they do have deposits in bank accounts amounting to AED 35 million in the case of Jalila and AED 14 million in the case of Zayed as well AED 51.8 million for Jalila in W deposits. 31. HRH has filed a detailed schedule of her assets, which is to be found at pages 1181 and 1182 of the Core Bundle. HRH’s home near Kensington Palace is held in a trust structure with HRH, Jalila and Zayed as discretionary beneficiaries. As at December 2017, the property was valued at £95 million. It will be subject to an IHT charge to tax of £5.278 million in 2026 and a further sum of £5.7 million in 2036. In consequence, the net value ascribed to the property is £83,156,664. Turning to the C Trust, again HRH and the two children are discretionary beneficiaries. It has a net value of £18,886,522, of which the house itself is valued at £4.5 million. There are various assets held in portfolios of approximately £10,375,000. The property will incur IHT charges in 2026 and 2036 of £388,500 and £420,000. There are two further trusts, the G Trust and the R Trust containing £2,922,030 and £5,325,244 respectively but in both cases, by far and away the largest asset is money owed to the Trusts by HRH herself, in the sums of £2.6 million and £5.15 million respectively. Again, HRH and the children are the discretionary beneficiaries. Turning to her own financial position, she has land in Jordan worth £2,781,729; a sum of £180,386 in C (which previously owned a property near Newmarket) and £192,538 in J Ltd, both of which are companies in which she is the 100% shareholder. She is also the sole shareholder of King Hussein’s Team Ltd which owns the various horses. The remaining horses, valued at cost, are worth £7,616,089 and there is cash of £4,282,413 from the sale of some of the horses. However, HRH owes (£13,582,720) to the children as the money to purchase many of the horses came from their bank accounts. Overall, HRH herself is owed approximately £1.25 million. Taking all this into account, King Hussein’s Team Ltd is in deficit to the tune of (£2,935,639). HRH owes money to a number of entities. Overall, she owes (£6,293,417). She is owed money by G Trustee in the sum of £545,000; she owes (£205,200) to her London Office; she is owed £2.2 million by R Ltd; £83,645 by T Ltd; £335,887 by the Security Company; and she has a net figure of £2,475,680 in various bank accounts. Her estimated outstanding legal fees were (£1,482,177) after the order I made at the Pre-Trial Review is paid in full, but they have since increased. This all meant that, in terms of her personal resources, HRH’s net position had deteriorated from a positive figure as at 29 May 2020 of £6,363,000 to a negative position on 31 August 2021 of (£2,217,134). 32. HRH had also set out, at page 1184 of the Core Bundle, a schedule of the various asset sales that she has made to help her meet her shortfall in expenditure during the period of the litigation. In total, from August 2019 to July 2021, she had sold assets to the value of £15,568,997, consisting primarily of horse sales of £9,692,089; jewellery sales of £2,059,849; and other sales of £3,817,059. In the latter category, the biggest component was the sale of a property known as 31 Chestnut Court in the sum of £2,559,266 but, by way of indication, she sold clothes with a value of £200,100. At the conclusion of her oral evidence, either I or Mr Dyer requested further schedules of expenditure. The first was a schedule showing her total expenditure on all aspects of life from December 2019 to September 2021 (namely 30 months) in the total sum of £35,643,751. This is an annual level of expenditure of £14,257,500. Projected to the end of the hearing, this increased to £39,220,137. There are many components to this schedule but the magnetic ones seem to me to be £1,874,568 on HRH’s home near Kensington Palace; £1,589,189 on Castlewood; £10,701,068 on security; £7,354,435 on her London Private Office; £2,908,139 on her Jordan Private Office; £1,706,216 on Capital Expenditure; and £2,877,782 on legal fees, not connected with this litigation. She also produced a schedule of her spending from the sum of £1 million that I awarded to her for summer holidays in 2021. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, she had not been able to go on a foreign holiday but she had spent £397,421 on holidays in this country and £77,770 on additional security for those holidays. I accept that the latter figure would be far greater if foreign travel was involved. This does mean that, out of the provision I made in the sum of £1 million, a sum of £524,809 remains. 33. In addition to the above, HRH filed a significant number of statements in support of her case. She said in her statement dated 12 October 2020, that she was continuing to fund the PT operation via O to promote integrity in sport in the sum of £100,000 per month. She was using her resources, held in R, to do so. At the time, she had received an offer of £8 million to acquire all the remaining King Hussein’s Team Ltd horses after a recent sale of Chianti’s Champion for €1.5 million. She had recently accepted an offer of £480,000 for the property near Newmarket and had started to sell her jewellery. She also dealt with the allegations of blackmail made against her by four security operatives. She said she had paid a total of £6.7 million to these four men. There is little doubt that this money emanated from accounts held by the children into which their “allowances” were being paid but it happened prior to the separation of the parties. I will obviously have to return to this when I consider my findings of fact. 34. Director 1 filed two further statements, dated 23 April 2021 and 24 August 2021. In the third statement, he said he had initially assessed the security threat to HRH and the children as severe but this could rise to critical, in other words, a serious threat to HRH’s life or of the children being abducted. He made the point that HH has tried to exploit vulnerabilities in her security arrangements even whilst under the gaze of the English High Court of Justice. He considered that there is a serious risk of her being killed or harmed and the children being abducted unless the requisite security measures are in place immediately. In his fourth statement, he made the point that the hostile threat to HRH is made by one of the wealthiest and most powerful states in the world. He added that the cost of security increases if either or both children are at boarding school, when they are at university and when they are subsequently living separately. He had reduced the figure in the security budget for severance costs from the original figure which was 25% of salaries down to 15%. This is an aspect of the budget which is particularly contentious . There had been substantial delays to the delivery of the two armoured vehicles that I had provided for in my April judgment. As a result, the family had been having to travel by helicopter on occasions. By the time of his statement, one had been delivered and another was due soon. He reaffirmed HRH’s case about the total that is needed and that they should be replaced every two years. A new provision was being claimed for additional security in the sum of £2.16 million per annum from an outside contractor, known as Company X. The statement also deals with other immediate capital provision required, such as to extend the provision at Castlewood; for further improvements to the security lodge at the property . There are also plans for a parking facility for the cars at a cost of slightly over £1 million. Director 1 ends by saying that an annual budget for security of £3.6 million would leave the family seriously vulnerable to risk of abduction, harm and loss. 35. HRH’s three final statements are dated 7 September 2021 and 15 September 2021. In the first, she referred to Lord Pannick QC saying at a hearing in April 2021 that it should not be assumed the order for security would continue for the rest of the children’s lives as all such orders are subject to variation. This was a real concern for her. She said that her application for capitalisation was therefore crucial. She said she felt hunted and harassed. She could not be involved in further litigation. She made the point that HH should not, as payer, be the ultimate employer of her security operatives, which she felt would be the position if security was paid for by continuing periodical payments. She said that she had been forced to borrow £5 million from the R Trust to meet their everyday expenses. It had been progressively harder to manage on the sum of £84,000 per month which was the interim periodical payments order. It had merely been designed to cover the costs of HRH’s home near Kensington Palace rather than all the other areas of expenditure for the children. She had been forced to liquidate assets to the value of £15.6 million, including horses at £9.7 million; jewellery at £2.1 million; as well as cars, property, gold and the like at £3.8 million. The items that should be returned to her included Persian rugs; the children’s bedroom contents; Jalila’s jewellery; Zayed’s car collection; her horses from Godolphin; cars that had previously belonged to her parents; haute couture clothing, which had cost approximately €74 million; and her jewellery that cost £20 million. She said that one particular horse, New Approach, had been given to her by HH on the birth of Jalila. It had gone on to win the Epsom Derby. The horse’s stud fees ran to many millions and had all been retained by Godolphin. She complained that HH had been telling the world he had paid her billions when nothing could be further from the truth. She asserted that the risk from Dubai will continue even if HH passes away. She said that her financial position was so bad that she was fast approaching the point where she would have to sell paintings but she did not wish to do so as the children would then see what she was doing as there would be gaps on the walls of the property. 36. The second recent statement, her 15 th in all, deals with the findings of the President in relation to hacking. She reminded the court that the President said that his findings were “ of the utmost seriousness in the context of the children’s welfare ”. She said she felt under siege. The psychological impact on her has been overwhelming. Surveillance of this nature could not be more intrusive and distressing. She felt hunted. She referred to the Guardian’s description of the hacking as a “ pernicious form of abuse ”. Her final statement supported publication of the various judgments to date, which was ordered shortly before this final hearing commenced. Finally, on 24 September 2021, she filed her position statement in relation to the Scott Schedule of the items which she says should be returned to her. She said that over 400 horses had run as belonging to Princess Haya of Jordan. Indeed, she asserts that she and the children are still the registered owner of the horses. Some horses had been transferred into the name of Godolphin without her consent, such as Terebellum. Only the most basic items of clothing had been returned to her. She does not seek a declaration as to the specific ownership of each horse but rather a declaration that there was a common understanding that these horses were hers together with an order for financial compensation. She seeks in total an award of £75 million under that heading. She puts the cost of her clothing at €74 million but the compensation she seeks is £32 million. She refers to some specific items, such as some motor vehicles that she had inherited from her father, King Hussein. 37. HH has filed a significant number of Position Statements, as he himself has not filed any statements of evidence. On 17 September 2021, a Position Statement gave his response to the hacking judgment. It said he was not able to comment on matters of state intelligence or security. He has no “hacked” material in his possession and there was no surveillance undertaken with his express or implied authority. I remind myself that I am bound by the President’s findings of fact to the contrary . He has now removed from the internet the “Lives and Dies” poem that upset HRH so much. He said he has no intention of causing harm to HRH. He opposed the publication of the judgments due to an inability to anonymise the identities of the children. On 27 September 2021, a Position Statement was filed in relation to his case as to the use by HRH of funds belonging to the children. He accepted that he regularly deposited AED 5 million per month in accounts for Jalila and AED 2 million per month for Zayed, making an annual payment at the time of £18 million. These accounts were administered by HRH. In his view, they were not to be used by HRH for spending on herself. He reminded the court that she had £83 million per annum for her household spending plus an allowance of £9 million per annum for herself as well as various ad hoc payments, although this does ignore the fact that all this provision came to an end on the separation. He said that it was a recent invention of HRH that this was all one fund or family money available to be spent. He referred critically to the payments to the blackmailers and the cost of the elite show jumpers, saying that they could have been added to Team Harmony for the children. He also referred to her payments to Prince Ali and to O for PT. He asserted that, due to this misuse of funds, there should be a conventional, albeit secured, periodical payments order. 38. On 11 October 2021, he filed a Position Statement dealing with HRH’s recent evidence. He made it clear that his Open Offer was now to pay £1.9 million per annum per child payable quarterly for their general maintenance as well as £6.2 million per annum for their security. He proposed that this should be secured by the provision of a bank guarantee in the sum of £500 million. He agreed to pay a lump sum of £5.278 million payable by 31 October 2026 to cover the IHT that year on HRH’s home near Kensington Palace, together with the agreed payment of £3.04 million for the children’s education fund. He said that, in total, he has paid the sum of £36.9 million so far by way of general maintenance, security provision and legal funding. He accepts that there are special circumstances in the case. In relation to the earlier suggestion that he should have to fund payments to the TUA poverty charity in Jordan, he said that it is not the function of the English Family Court to intervene in a dispute between a foreign government and a foreign charity. He referred to the fact that HRH had taken 66 containers of belongings from Dubai and he asked, rhetorically, why did she not take her most valuable items if they really had been left behind. He did not accept that any clothing was still to be returned to HRH, although I do not understand this point, given that I was shown, during the trial, a 28 minute video of staff at the Beach Palace filming a great deal of HRH’s designer clothing at that venue. He said he knows nothing about HRH’s jewellery as he has had no access to her safe. Again, I was shown, during the trial, a 23 minute video of the safe being opened and various items of jewellery inside being filmed. I will return to this in due course. He said it would be wrong to remove all trace of the children from HH’s properties, but he will send the contents of the children’s bedrooms to the UK with great sadness. He will also send the Persian rugs. He asserted that HRH’s valuations were completely arbitrary. He contended that the horses that had been purchased had, at all times, belonged beneficially to Godolphin, which had bought them and paid for their upkeep, whilst receiving any winnings, stud fees or sale proceeds as part recompense. He said that the nomination to family members, including HRH, to permit the horses to run in the colours of the family member was merely a licence. He said that HRH had never received any stud fees for any of the horses. Finally, in relation to the legal fees fighting fund, he said that the court can, in the future, make legal services funding orders without the need for a capital fund. 39. In relation to the Scott Schedule, he made the point that the court had not, at least at the time, made any finding of fact as to the legal ownership of these items. He said that, initially, HRH claimed ownership of 53 horses. It then increased to 63 horses before becoming 42 for her and 19 for the children. It had now gone up again to 89, of which 62 were racehorses and 21 showjumpers. The original 16 racehorses were, on her figures, worth £9.89 million, whereas she now claims horses to the value of £19.1 million. Many of the horses she valued had sold for far less than the valuations. He gave as an example a horse called Ben Vrackie which she had valued at £400,000, yet it had sold for £20,000. In total, horses she valued at £5.6 million had sold for £2.5 million. Three of the horses, which she valued at £660,000, have died. The stud fees of New Approach, which she had put in the millions of pounds per annum, had fallen in value. 15 of the horses she claims were sold before April 2019. He also complained that she argues that she should benefit from the assets but not from the liabilities . He added that registration of a horse in the name of an individual can be only for a single race and can be easily varied. He said that HRH had never received any prize money, although there is clearly an issue about this as she says she was paid £15 million at one point. He says that a claim for a lump sum of £95 million to cover these items is well outside the ambit of her permitted Part III claim. Finally, he acknowledged that a number of heirlooms, such as some ballet shoes given to HRH by Dame Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev, would be sent to her.