We often talk about spousal maintenance, perhaps more correctly we should talk about former-spousal maintenance or ex-spousal maintenance. But it is not often that lawyers stop to ask themselves why spousal maintenance is paid at all. Why, after the dissolution of a marriage, does the law permit, and indeed order, one spouse financially to maintain the other? Well, it is an effect of the common law duty imposed upon spouses to support each other whilst the marriage subsists. That duty continues after separation as a result of statute. Even before judicial divorce first became law in this country (in 1857),…
Spousal maintenance (and maintenance for a former civil partner) is one of the areas of financial settlement which is more likely to cause disagreements. This is primarily because spousal maintenance ties two people together who are no longer in a relationship, through the medium of a monthly payment from one to the other. It is frequently a bone of contention, and the cause of ongoing resentment, and even litigation between a former couple. That said, for many people coming out of marriages without the means to support themselves, it can be an essential lifeline. First a brief reminder of the…
