Case No. BV20D0029

 at para 101:"The correct view must be this. If the court is satisfied on the balance of probabilities that an outsider will provide money to meet an award that a party cannot meet from his absolute property then the court can, if it is fair to do so, make an award on that footing. But if it is clear that the outsider, being a person who has only historically supplied bounty, will not, reasonably or unreasonably, come to the aid of the payer then there is precious little the court can do about it."The judge was there addressing the second of my suggested two scenarios, but in my view his remarks apply with equal force to the first scenario.(vi) In either scenario, where the evidence shows, to the requisite standard of proof, that third party family members will likely provide financial support to one or other of the spouses, that, in my judgment, constitutes a resource that a court is entitled to take into account. To do otherwise would be artificial. As to the sort of evidence which the court will evaluate when deciding upon the likelihood of future assistance:(a) Usually, the court will look to see whether bounty has been provided in the past, in what quantity and over what amounts of time, as evidence of a pattern.(b) Additionally, the court can look at specific offers of long-term future financial support made to a spouse before or after marital breakdown.(c) Offers of interim provision to tide the spouse over with assistance towards legal fees and income needs during the period of litigation will be of very limited evidential relevance to the question of whether long-term future support will be forthcoming. Usually, such payments are transitory in nature, designed to assist the recipient spouse with the demands of the litigation.(d) Absent clear evidence establishing (i) a track record of historic payment and/or (ii) reliable representations of future subvention, the court will be hard pressed to be satisfied of this class of resource.”