ABSTRACT
However, it may be wrong to continue to insist that ancillary relief is as hopelessly disordered at the present time as these comments suggest. There is in fact a pattern of sorts which can be discerned in the latest decisions of the courts on ancillary relief disputes. The judiciary appears to have devised a working model for such ancillary relief decisions under the Matrimonial Causes Act which with careful reading does emerge from the reports, and the really burning issue at present appears instead to be the severely disordered state of the law in relation to cohabitants’ property disputes since these continue to be decided under legislation which was never intended for their purposes and under the Civil Procedure Rules in the Chancery Division of the High Court (or the Chancery Lists of the County Courts) rather than under the Family Procedure Rules (FPR) 2010 and in the Family Division or the Divorce County Courts.
