APPEAL BY HUSBAND

Dominion, Volume 27, Issue 9, 5 October 1933, Page 2

APPEAL BY HUSBAND

Divorce Granted to Wife

SEPARATION DEED TERMS

A decision of Mr. in the Supreme Court, bnWiionr of a petitioning wife, Gladys k ° formerly of Wellington, but now S’ at 106 Bristol Road, Fores Gate? London, who sought in the firs case a divorce from her husband, Con wav de Vaice Blenheim Williams labourer, Wellington, based on a deed of separation, and in th s case £463/10/- as arrears of mam tenance under a deed in respect of the children of the marriage, came under consideration of the Court of Appea vesterdav. His Honour at tbe trial held that the wife was entltlef “ o b ceed in both cases, a decree ms be n granted in the divorce suit, and judgment’ being entered for the a “ ou ”£ claimed in the maintenance action. It was from this decision that the bus the adjournment was taken and Will be continued this morning at JO.oU ° The Court comprised the Chief Justice (Sir Michael Myers), Mr. Justice Reed and Mr. Justice Smith. Mr C. A. L. Treadwell, with him Mr H. J. V. James, appeared for appellant Williams, and Mr. W. E. Leicester, with him Mr. T. I. McCarthy, for Mrs. Williams, respondent.

Unusual Clause. The case revealed rather an unusuai clause in an agreement to separate. The petitioning wife agreed, among other things, not io associate in any way with any male person employed on either the steamships Athenic or lonic during voyages between New Zealand and England in 19-3, and should she do so tbe whole agreement would be accounted null and void. The facts stated were that the parties were married in. England in 1919’ and some time later they came to New Zealand, residing here some years. In 1923 Mrs. Williams and her two infant children visited with the qpnsent of her husband, and returned to New Zealand toward the end of the same year. Unhappy differences arose between husband and wife, and a deed of separation was signed bv the parties in March, 1026, bv which Williams agreed to pay his wife 30/- weekly for the maintenance of herself and children. This agreed sum was regularly paid until April, 1027, when Mrs. Williams with her two young children left New Zealand for England without her husband’s knowedge or consent. Since then no payment for maintenance had been made by Williams, and his wife accordingly sued him for arrears up to April 7. 1032, amounting to £463 JO/-. Mrs. Williams gave her evidence iu England on affidavit, while her husband’s evidence was given in Wellington in open court at the hearing.

Caso for Appellant, .Mr. Treadwell, for ajipellant, submitted that construing lhe deed of separation as a whole and in a reasonable light, the wife was not entitled to her judgment as she had broken her covenants in several material respects, namely, by surreptitiously removing the children from New Zealand and depriving her husband of access to them, by doing so she had molested and annoyed her husband within the meaning of'the deed, and that she had associated with a member of the crew of the lonic against the terms of her undertaking in the deed. After dealing with the claim in the civil action, Mr. Treadwell said the Court had not previously been asked in a New Zealand case to construe section 10 (i) of the Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Act insofar as the words “agreement is in full force” were concerned. It was not the mere fact of separation that mattered, he submitted, but that the whole of the terms of the agreement had been dishonoured by the person seeking the divorce.

Mr. James was addressing tbe Court on behalf of the appellant when tbe adjournment was taken.