MH v FD

I have before me an application for interim relief within proceedings brought under Schedule 1 of the Children Act on behalf of [“X”], who is under four years old. The proceedings have been instituted by X’s mother, [“M”]. She is represented at this hearing by Charles Howard KC and Zoe Harrison. The respondent is X’s father, [“F”], who is represented by Philip Blatchly. I am very grateful to all three counsel for their helpful written and oral presentations.

M is self-employed. She comes from what might be described in old fashioned terms as a well-heeled family. She and X live with her parents in her childhood home in County A.

F is a high-profile entrepreneur and philanthropist. He has a home in City A and in County B and holiday homes abroad and on the continent. He has two other children by different partners, one who is grown up and the other who lives with him full time. F is very wealthy and is taking the ‘millionaire’s defence’ within these proceedings. This is not a defence against the disclosure of resources. Such disclosure must always be made, albeit in attenuated form, as the court is mandated under section 4 (1) to consider those resources when exercising its powers. It is, rather, a defence against the discovery of documents and the interrogation of assertions made through disclosure. The purpose of the defence is to limit unnecessary enquiry into a respondent’s resources and consequent legal expenditure, when that respondent has conceded that he or she is capable of meeting any order the court might reasonably make. F has made that concession in this case.

There is an issue between the parties about the exact length and quality of their relationship. That issue has no bearing on the matters with which I must deal in this interim application. Whatever its quantity and quality, the parties’ relationship was over before X’s birth. It is, however, not in dispute that, save for meeting X’s nursery fees of about £650 for this current term, F has not paid anything towards X’s expenses since the child was born some years ago. F, I think, explains this lacuna by reference to a discussion he says that he had with M’s father who, F says, indicated that he would support M and X and, more recently, to issues surrounding contact arrangements.

I do not have, and do not need, a complete understanding of the issues which have arisen during X’s short life and which relate to contact arrangements. Contact currently takes place in City B. X’s nanny is present during those visits. M says that F has regularly failed to take up contact. F says that contact is often offered in such a way which makes it impossible for him to take it up. That is not a dispute I need to resolve.

There have been many disputes between M and F about arrangements relating to X. M has made two applications to court relating to X’s visit to a foreign city to accompany M for work, X’s attendance at nursery and a visit to a European Country. The parties have attempted mediation unsuccessfully. F has issued an application for substantive child arrangements, which is before a lay bench sitting in City C. An independent social worker has been instructed to produce a welfare report and the matter is listed for an adjourned first hearing dispute resolution appointment on 9 January 2026. M has raised allegations of coercive and controlling behaviour against F, which she says will need to be tried at a fact-finding hearing. That question will be resolved at the hearing in January. It is also possible that the adjourned FHDRA will lead to resolution of all issues relating to child arrangements.

M issued proceedings under Schedule 1 on 5 August 2025. Alongside the main application, she issued an application for interim relief, with which I am dealing today. Those proceedings were originally allocated to the Family Court sitting in the City C. The interim application came before Judge Hyde KC for a remote hearing on 2 September 2025. At that hearing, M was represented by leading counsel and F appeared in person. Judge Hyde KC allocated the case to a judge at High Court level sitting in the Family Court at the Royal Courts of Justice. He directed that this interim hearing be listed and provided that F should respond to M’s statement by 30 September 2025. I am told that M wished to pursue her application for interim provision on that day but that Judge Hyde KC took the view that this was impossible. Judge Hyde KC is an expert in all types of financial cases and would have been able to deal with the interim application on that day had it been appropriate. I presume that he took the view he could not proceed because F had not put in a statement and was not represented. I note that the judge ordered F to pay £10,000 towards M’s costs of that hearing.

The case has been allocated to me for this interim hearing and for all other hearings, save financial dispute resolution. At the start of the hearing before me, I indicated to counsel that I was minded to list the case for trial as soon as possible on the basis that the parties would organise a private financial dispute resolution hearing in January and then appear before me for a post pFDR directions appointment. Over the luncheon adjournment, the parties were able to agree that they would hold a pFDR on 21 January 2026 before Mr Ewins KC, attend before me for post FDR directions on 3 February 2026 and then again before me for final hearing on 2 March 2026 for five days. The Clerk of the Rules has put those hearings in the court diary.

I am therefore dealing with interim provision for aliment for the next four and a half months or so and for legal fees funding until the hearing before me on 3 February 2026, at which time I shall consider what further legal funding is required both for these proceedings and any ongoing section 8 proceedings, in the event that the child arrangements are not resolved before the lay bench in January.

The interim provision sought by M is as follows:

There is no question that I have the jurisdiction under Schedule 1 to make all the orders sought save for the interim maintenance. M has not obtained a maximum assessment from the CMS and as such I have no jurisdiction to deal with that matter; see section 8(6) of the Child Support Act 1991 and Dickson v Rennie [2014] EWHC 4306 (Fam). However, both parties want me to adjudicate this issue and so F has sensibly agreed to invest me with theoretical jurisdiction by agreeing to honour whatever I suggest is a reasonable figure. He also agrees this should happen at the final hearing. The precise mechanism for which will be ventilated at the final hearing.

There is a minor dispute between the parties as to whether the word ‘reasonable’ should appear before the word ‘maintenance’ in F’s agreement that he would honour my indication. I think that the word ‘reasonable’ should be in the agreement as that reflects the terms to which he agreed. The wording will therefore be:

I turn now to the parties’ resources. I have a narrative statement from each of the parties and some documents relating to M’s financial affairs.

I can deal with F’s resources very briefly. He accepts that he is very wealthy and can afford any reasonable provision which I might now make or might make in the future. I have been shown pictures of his homes abroad (albeit I note there is an issue about the ownership of one) and his County B estate. There is no doubt that he is a very wealthy man. I do not for the purposes of this application need to know anymore. No doubt at final hearing I will have a clearer picture of his annual expenditure and lifestyle, appraisal of which will form part of the framework for deciding this case.

M’s position is more nuanced. In her statement, she explains that she previously owned a property in the same village as her childhood home. It was purchased with a loan from her parents. That loan is vouched. She says it was purchased on the basis that it would have to be sold if her parents needed the money back. I do not know if she ever lived at the property, but I do know that she and X have lived at her childhood home (i.e. her parents’ home) since the child’s birth, as she says in her statement that this is the only home in which X has ever lived. The property, which she owned, was sold and she repaid her parents part of the loan, although about £40,000 remains outstanding. She says the sale was occasioned by her parents’ need to pay inheritance tax consequent on the death of one of her grandparents. At trial, the fact that this loan is vouched and other loans are not may be significant. On the other hand, it may be insignificant.

In M’s statement made in August she sets out her capital position, which she put as follows:

She updated this position for the hearing before me as follows:

In addition, in August she had tax liability of £10,000 which she had paid off by October. She also had credit card debt of £3,400 by October. These are in addition to the debts she says she owes her family.

Regardless of the position in respect of debt to her family, M has wholly insignificant resources when measured against F’s resources. F suggests that M’s resources include access to her wealthy family’s resources. I have no doubt that her family are wealthy but there is no evidence before me which suggests that M has any entitlement to draw on resources held by her family. F also complains that the figures are not properly vouched and that she ought to have made disclosure by Form E1 with documents in support. I do not think it is necessary for me to have a completely documented picture for a hearing such as this and I am satisfied that I have enough material to do justice on an interim basis between these parties.

M’s income position is somewhat more complex. She is self-employed and there does appear to be some demand for her work. Her income comes from the primary sale of her work and in some very small measure from her family’s business. I note in passing that M suggests that F’s behaviour during their relationship had a negative impact on her earning capacity. That has no relevance to this interim application. It may or may not be important at the final hearing. M has produced an analysis of her net income from tax year 2019/2020 to tax year 2023/24. The net income figure for 2022/23 is £69,000 and for 2023/2024 some £53,000. The figures for 2024/2025 and the period since have not been calculated by her accountants and there is a significant dispute between the parties as to how I should assess those figures, or at least those from April 2025 to date.

M says her total gross receipt from all sources for the year to April 2025 is £109,000 before expenses and tax. On the face of the analysis of previous years this would indicate a net income somewhere between £53,000 and £69,000. As I have already stated, F complains that all of these figures are not properly vouched. As I have explained, I am satisfied that I have enough material to reach a fair decision and, in any event, I do not perceive that F takes serious issue with these figures. He does however take serious issue with the figures arising since April 2025. He says that her total income since that date is £267,000. He bases this on assertions in respect of sales made in a foreign city earlier this year. M explains that she has in fact received £43,000 from sales this Spring and will receive a further £43,000 in due course. M says that she has not made the level of sales F has suggested, because no contractual liability was created with potential buyers. For the purposes of this hearing, I see no reason to make any assumption other than that these sales will not proceed. I do not think that is unfair. Mr Blatchly on F’s behalf has shown me that, if I am wrong, M’s capital position would increase by £251,750. I note that this figure must be wrong as it does not take into account tax and expenses. He also says on his client’s behalf that M has an additional back catalogue of work worth £162,500. M says all of this (or perhaps some of it) has been sold. However, if I take Mr Blatchly’s figure, then M would have an extra £587,000 in capital. If she did, it would make no real difference to my appraisal of her capital position, which would remain, when measured against F’s, extremely modest. If I am wrong about this and if I have underestimated either M’s capital position and/or income position, I will be in a position to do corrective justice between the parties at the final hearing. For the purposes of this interim hearing, I will fix M’s total net income at £50,000 net per annum. This may be overstated, certainly for the next few months. It may be understated. Nonetheless that is the figure I will use for this interim hearing.

I turn now to M’s liability to her parents. She alleges that she owes her parents £164,000. She says that £92,000 of that relates to X. These loans are not documented. F’s position is that far from being liabilities these sums represent payments made to M and are effectively an ongoing resource. At the trial I will be able to decide whether or not these are loans and how I should treat them. For the purposes of this hearing, I am not going, as F invites me to do, to assume that this represents a source of income for M from her parents. I find this a very unattractive submission. F is a very wealthy man who has not been paying anything, other than a term’s nursery fees, for X. It is unsurprising that M’s parents would help her in those circumstances. The fact that they have done this throughout X’s life is to my view neither here nor there. X is not their responsibility. He is the responsibility of M and F. I remind myself of the dicta of Mostyn J in TL v ML [2005] EWHC 2860, namely that I should look carefully and critically at assertions about the termination of third-party bounty. I think that it is of no application in this case. As Mr Howard KC reminded me, those words were about bounty received by the payer not the payee. Even if Mr Howard is wrong about that, and I do not think he is, this is a case in which F should be making proper provision for X as a matter of principle. And that principle does not apply to M's parents.

I turn now to the specific heads of relief under the interim applications before me. It has been suggested by F that this is not an urgent application. I do not understand what this submission can possibly mean, save in respect of those parts which seek relief for sums paid. The main thrust of this application is for interim provision for general maintenance and legal fees in the context of ongoing proceedings. M made the application in August and we are now in October. The trial will be heard in March. There is nothing remotely inappropriate in the timing of this hearing. Had F engaged properly with the application, it would have been heard by Judge Hyde KC in September. There would have been nothing inappropriate with dealing with the application at that time, had it been possible.

The first head of M’s claim is for a lump sum of £94,101 for non-legal expenditure incurred relating to the costs of X’s birth and expenses since. This forms part of the liability which M asserts she has to her parents. This part of M’s application is not in any way urgent and I will not determine it now. I will deal with it at the trial. The second head of claim is for £160,483 for legal costs incurred and paid. This too is not urgent and will await my adjudication at trial.

I now turn to the provision for legal costs (a) incurred and unpaid, (b) to be incurred within section 8 proceedings and (c) to be incurred within these Schedule 1 proceedings.

Before I turn to those specific heads, I remind myself that these are proceedings brought on X’s behalf by M and that I have found for the purposes of this interim application that her resources are wholly insignificant when compared with F’s. I also remind myself and the parties that I will approach all issues afresh at trial when I have the benefit of a complete picture including oral evidence.

The law relating to applications for legal fees provision in Schedule 1 cases is well settled. The core principles derive from Currey v Currey (No2) [2006] EWCA Civ 1338 and Rubin v Rubin [2014] EWHC 611 (Fam). Those core principles can be stated as follows:

Addressing the core principles, I can detect nothing unreasonable in M’s stance in the proceedings. She is seeking capital and income provision for X from F, who is very rich and has not made provision for X. It seems to me an unimpeachable proposition that both parties should have proper representation and that F can afford to pay for proper representation for both parties in this claim relating to their child’s needs.

I have seen evidence that M cannot borrow funds from commercial lenders and I have evidence from her solicitors that they will not act on a Sears Tooth charge. It will be plain from comments that I have already made that I do not think it would be reasonable for M to deplete, what I have found in the context of this interim application to be, her modest capital resources. Nor do I consider it reasonable to expect M’s litigation to be funded by her parents whether outright or by loan.

M seeks £148,834 for costs incurred with her current solicitors within the Schedule 1 and section 8 proceedings. She also seeks £5,000 relating to costs with another firm. F offers nothing and says this liability must be met by M or by her family. It will be clear from my previous comments that I reject his approach.

Until Cobb J’s decision in BC v DE [2016] EWHC 1806 (Fam) there was some dispute about whether or not the dicta in Rubin (supra) prevented the court from making provision for historic costs. The relevant ratio of BC v DE is that a level playing field is unlikely to be achieved where on one side solicitor and client are beholden to one another by significant debt but on the other side there is no issue about the payment of legal fees. That case narrowed the concept of historic costs to costs predating the ongoing proceedings.

M produced a letter from her solicitor, Ms Hughes, which explained that her firm would not continue to act unless costs incurred were paid off and that the firm would not act on a Sears Tooth agreement in respect of ongoing costs. It was suggested in F’s written submissions that the letter produced by Ms Hughes, M’s solicitor, fell short of what MacDonald J considered to be necessary evidence in the case of DH v RH [2023] EWFC 111. I am not sure that I read that authority as requiring a formal sworn statement in all applications for payment of incurred costs. Regardless of my thoughts, a sworn statement was produced at the hearing before me confirming that M’s solicitors would not continue to act unless those incurred costs were paid in full.

So how should I deal with this head of claim? I can dispatch the claim for £5,000 relating to previous solicitors easily. In line with the general thrust of all the authorities, I do not make any provision for that now. I note that this is not a hard and fast rule. There may well be circumstances in another case where such provision would be appropriate (for instance, if debt collection proceedings had commenced) but it is not so in this case. This small liability can be raised at trial but I decline to make provision for it now.

As to the claim for £148,834, F complains that this is an enormous sum for M to have incurred up to this hearing. I am told the figure relates to these proceedings and the section 8 proceedings. I have to say that I agree with F. This is an enormous and seemingly disproportionate sum. How do I square my reservations about this sum with Ms Hughes’ evidence? I am not a taxing master and I have no detailed breakdown of these sums. I must make an order that I think is appropriate. I remind myself of Peel J’s dicta in KV v KV [2024] 2 FLR 951, namely that I have a broad discretion in determining this issue. I do not think it is appropriate for me simply to require F to pay this liability in full, whatever assertion has been made by Ms Hughes. I intend to deal with this in rough and ready way. I will order that F pay £90,000 to cover this liability. I am confident that provision of at this level will allow M’s solicitors to reconsider their position and continue to act. Were they to do so, I would not consider that Ms Hughes’ statement was inaccurate. I take it to be an accurate reflection of her firm’s current position, which of course may alter once the firm has considered the totality of the provision I make. If they are not able to reconsider their position, M will have to dip into her personal resources. This is simply an interim order to hold the ring.

At the start of the hearing M sought £263,664 for s8 proceedings. As a result of my listing directions, this figure reduced to £48,948 as she will only need funding to the FHDRA in January. To the extent that further funding is needed I will be able to re-consider the position in February.

F offers nothing and says this figure is, in any event, far too high. He says that he will be instructing a junior for the FHDRA and the junior will not be attended by a solicitor. I find this an unlikely proposition and I suspect that it may be driven by desire to portray the sums sought by M as far too high. Ultimately, I have to make an award which I consider reasonable. In KV v KV (supra), Peel J noted that some authorities applied a tariff which mirrored the assessment of costs on a standard basis but he concluded that, although that might be of utility, he preferred to look at figures in the round and assess an overall reasonable figure.

So what should I do? In my view a reasonable figure to fund M’s costs in the section 8 proceedings up to conclusion of FHDRA is £40,000. It represents about 85% of the anticipated costs. I order F to pay that sum.

At the start of the hearing M sought £254,898 to the private FDR. These included the costs from 30 September 2025 to the date of this hearing, costs to a first appointment and then costs to a private FDR. I have not fixed a first appointment and so the costs reduce by £63,648 to £191,250. It was submitted on M’s behalf that these costs should be increased by £10,000 to reflect the costs of Ms Hughes’s statement and attendance at court. I am not persuaded to add in those figures. There may be additional costs after the pFDR to prepare for the hearing before me in February. I do not think I need to make any allowance for such costs as they can be sought at the hearing before me, if needed.

Mr Howard KC submitted that I should accept these figures at face value as F’s own predictions for costs to pFDR were about £170,000. I do not intend to approach this claim by reference to that fact alone. I intend to approach it on the same basis that I have just approached costs for the section 8 proceedings. I consider that a reasonable sum is £160,000, which represents about 85% of the sums sought. This may be less than F’s prediction for his own costs but he will be enquiring into M’s means. I cannot see any reason why M should make any enquiries into F’s means. I have made directions which permit M to raise a questionnaire but, as I said in the hearing, I cannot imagine why she should need to do so. I therefore order F to pay £160,000 towards these costs.

M seeks interim maintenance of £16,365 per month or £196,380 per annum until 31 December 2025 and £24,786 per month or £297,432 per annum thereafter and for F to pay nursery fees. Attached to M’s statement was a budget which put her future expenses at £304,848 per annum. She produced an updated budget which put future expenses from 1 January 2026 at £297,430 per annum and interim expenses at £196,375 per annum. F says that he should pay £5,000 per month or £60,000 per annum and agrees he should pay nursery fees including associated costs such as uniforms. I have listed this case for trial in March 2026 and so whatever order I make will run for about five months only, subject to backdating.

There is a minor dispute between the parties about whether or not extras on the school bill should be agreed. I rule they must. If this proves unworkable, I can revisit the question at trial.

The chief difference between M’s interim budget, which is said to run to the end of the year, and her future budget, which runs from the beginning of next year, relates to the costs of the property in which she currently lives with her parents. She says that her parents are moving out and for their own personal reasons they need to sell their current home or rent it to M. She says her target for housing provision for her and X is that home. At trial she will ask me to order F to purchase the property from her parents and settle it on X with reversion to F. This may or may not be a sensible solution to X’s housing needs.

I am not going to proceed at this interim hearing on the basis that F should be paying for rent on that property nor for M to be paying the whole of the outgoings on the property from January 2026. I consider it very unlikely that M’s parents will cause her to leave her current home before the trial or expect her to meet all the costs on it. I may be wrong but that is how I intend to approach her interim claim. In other words, I intend to limit my consideration to what she describes as her interim budget of £16,365 per month or £196,380 per annum. Even that budget is not a proper interim budget addressed to this interim application. It includes nanny costs of £55,000, whereas it would appear that the current nanny costs are a fraction of this sum. It includes £27,450 for holidays and weekends away. That may or may not be an appropriate annual figure but it certainly does not reflect the likely pro-rated expenditure from now to trial.

I do not intend to conduct a red pen exercise on the budget. It is, as almost always in these cases, overblown. I do, however, think it appropriate that M should be contributing towards the running costs of the property in which she lives. Her budget assumes that she will pay 1/3 of the costs. This seems to me appropriate. I also bear in mind that F is very wealthy and no doubt lives a very lavish lifestyle. Doing the best I can, I find that M’s appropriate interim budget, taking into account expenditure directly related to X and expenditure indirectly linked to X (sometimes referred to as a carer’s allowance and sometimes as a household expenditure child support award) is £125,000 per annum. I set against this her income of £50,000 net per annum. I therefore consider that the sum F should pay is the shortfall of £75,000 per annum or £6,250 per month. I will, of course, revisit this figure at trial. This is very much a figure to meet this urgent claim for the next 5 months or so. I will back date this provision to 1 September 2025, to be paid monthly in advance from that date i.e. F must pay £12,500 in arrears immediately and the next payment of £6,250 on 1 November 2025.

So to summarise, my decision is that F should pay:

As to the payment of £290,000, referable to legal costs, M seeks an order that this be paid by 21 October 2025. This is in my view unrealistic, however wealthy F may be. The payment should be made by 18 November 2025.

M seeks a costs order against F for this hearing on the indemnity basis. I was somewhat surprised by both elements of this application. Included in the sums sought at this hearing were the full of costs of this hearing. I have made provision for those costs albeit I have reduced the quantum. I was told at the hearing that there are no without prejudice offers which would admissible on a costs application. I do not intend to make any further provision for costs than I have already done. There will be no order for costs.

That is my judgment.