Is it time to end the ‘meal ticket for life’?

A man who believes that he has been unfairly treated by being ordered to pay maintenance to his ex-wife for life (unless she should remarry) is raising money via crowdfunding so that he can take his case to the Supreme Court, and change the law.

Graham Mills and his wife wife Heather were divorced in 2002. At that time he agreed to pay her a lump sum of £230,000 to enable her to purchase a house for her and their young son, as well as pay her maintenance of £1,100 per month. In 2014, having remarried and had another child, he applied to the court for the maintenance payments to stop. However, the court refused to stop the maintenance. Mr Mills appealed to the Court of Appeal and in February this year the Court of Appeal not only dismissed the appeal, but increased the maintenance payments to £1441 per month.

Mr Mills claims that his ex-wife is perfectly capable of supporting herself. He believes that the law should be changed, as it treats men as “cash machines for life”, and also encourages women to be “dependent upon men”.

He is not alone in this view. Not only have many members of the public indicated their support for it, former chair of the Bar Standards Board Baroness Deech has said of the case: “If there is one thing that stops women getting back on their feet and being treated seriously and equally at work, it is the assumption throughout the legal system that once she is married, she is somehow disabled and incapable of ever managing on her own. It is a very serious impediment to equality. This case shows how unethical, unpopular and out-of-date the law is.”

Last year the Baroness introduced a private member’s bill that would limit the duration of spousal maintenance orders to a maximum of five years, unless the court is satisfied that there is no other means of making provision for that spouse, and that that spouse would otherwise be likely to suffer serious financial hardship as a result.

So, should the ‘meal ticket for life’, as life-long spousal maintenance orders have been called, be ended? We will have to wait and see whether Mr Mills gets his case to the Supreme Court and, if so, what the Supreme Court Justices have to say. Otherwise, it does appear that the time may have come for the matter to be given proper consideration.

Image by Alex Liivet, licensed under CC BY 2.0.