Navigating Difficult Property Matters in Family Law – a recorded half-day online conference

Duration: 2.5 Hours

Hear from the experts at this online lunchtime conference. You can watch it on your computer or on your portable electronic device from anywhere.

The conference will be based on our highly successful video webinar technology: there'll be a chairperson and presentations.

One registration can be shared by colleagues within the same firm utilising the same login.

THE PROGRAM

Session 1: A Fair Share: Financial Resources and Property Settlements

The term ‘financial resource’ is a moving feast and has been interpreted widely by the Courts. This session provides an update on the Courts’ latest approaches and examines some of the more challenging issues involving financial resources. It covers:

• Defining what is a financial resource – thinking beyond property and income
• What do you ask the other party to produce?
• Section 75(2) of the Family Law Act and future financial benefit – what’s in and what’s out
• Dealing with “not known” values
• Lessons from recent cases

Session 2: Understanding Contributions – A Short and Long Term Perspective

This session looks at financial and non-financial contributions in short and long term relationships and provides an up to the minute update on the Court’s approach to contributions. It includes:

• Initial contributions – revisiting Pierce v Pierce (1999) and Fields v Smith (2015)
• What are the differing approaches on initial contribution?
• Impact of subsequent losses during marriage on initial contribution
• Post separation contributions – how are these taken into account?
• Big money cases – are they in a spate category?
• Inheritances and windfall gains – how are they treated?
• Special contributions and their impact on property settlement
• Is there a process of weighting contributions?
• Quantifying the homemaker contribution
• Can legal fees be added back into asset pool
• Case update

Session 3: Section 90K and the Enforcement of Financial Agreements

Section 90K of the Family Law Act sets out a number of grounds upon which a financial agreement may be set aside. Chief amongst these is a “material change in circumstances” arising from some aspect of the care, welfare and development of a child of the marriage. Sounds simple in theory, but section 90K can be difficult to apply in practice. This session examines the following:

• Does the financial agreement take into account the possibility of a young couple having a child?
• How should the change in circumstances of a child being brought into the relationship to be dealt with in the agreement?
• Understanding the court’s approach to Section 90K
• Satisfying the ‘hardship’ requirement
• Impact of COVID-19: will changes in personal circumstances or the economy result in the agreement being set aside or varied?
• Case update