Partner Russell Bywater, Associate Amy Barrow and Solicitor Kate Brett represented the appellant Mr Charles Villiers and instructed Michael Horton and Alexander Laing of Coram Chambers.
By a bare majority of 3 to 2, Mr Villiers’s appeal was dismissed. The majority adopted a strict interpretation of EU law in this important judgment concerning forum shopping.
It was held that due to the ‘first in time’ rule within the relevant regulations, and because divorce/matrimonial claims in Scotland are not a “related action” to a maintenance claim in England, there was no power to stay maintenance proceedings because one UK court was less appropriate.
After reading the narrowly-decided judgment which the court said could produce “unpalatable” scenarios, Russell Bywater said: “the government intervened in the highest court in a divorce case”.
Read the full Press Release and Judgment
