Who gets what?

Posted by: BarbnChris
03/03/10 at 11:42 am

My partner is going through an extremely hostile divorce. He had to leave because he was being physically and emotionally abused to the point police were involved and he is on a vulnerable adults register! He had to leave because he has three children and they were witnessing this abuse and the family life was one big war zone. The family house was my partner's home years before he married. They have been married 20 years now and have 3children 16, 11 and 8 yr old. My partner wants the children to stay in the family home. The son (11 yr old) is autistic and change causes him stress etc.My partner also has an autism related condition although only mildly. He holds down a job with social services working 20 hrs a week in mental health care. His salary is approx £500 take home a month. His wife is totally on benefits, saying she has no intention of working even part time as it is 'her husband's duty' to maintain her. She receives all the usual benefits and DLA for the son and carer's allowance too. My partner gets no benefits. He lives with me. He had nowhere else to go as his wife has destroyed most of his social relationships/friends, through harassing them to the point of calling police to her! He has no family other than his children. They have a mortgage on the property which is interest only at the moment. The mortgage is due to be paid in 2 years time but, prior to separating last year, they cashed in the endowments with a view to paying the cash off the mortgage and then remortgaging at the lower amount on a repayment mortgage. However, before this could be done, they separated and the wife cleaned out the joint account to the tune of in excess of £13,000. £11000 of this was supposed to be paid off the mortgage but she has put it all into an account in her sole name and is refusing to part with it.

My partner was living a lot of the time in his car and unable to carry out his telephone time keeping to his pay office, as a result, he was unpaid for nearly two months, so he had no money whatsoever during that time. I had to support him and myself during that time. I then lost my job in January this year, and we now live on his £500 less CSA payment of £75 a month, and my jobseekers allowance. My house outgoings plus medical costs are c£390 a month. We don't appear to be entitled to any benefits so this is our living costs = c£285 which has to pay for food, petrol,car expenses and clothing etc.

What I want to know is, how does my partner stand regarding his property? She refuses to work even though she is 45 and perfectly able. The autistic son goes to regular school so she could work part time if she chose. The oldest daughter is 16 and I believe she will receive £30 a week to go to college!

My partner has only taken his hobby (competitive cycling) possessions and his personal documents ie driving licence and birth cert etc from the family home. He is not taking any other furniture, tv's, joint possessions. He has the car  (c£1300)because he needs it to continue his job. He has a frozen, small pension, she has a pension too. He wants to retain his 50% share of the property but he will not ask for this until the usual circumstances ie she remarries/co-habits or the children finish full time education. Then the house will either be sold or she can buy my partner's share.

Is this reasonable? Does he have to give up everything he has worked for so she can laze about all day? (even though she is home all day she gets her 70 yr old mother to do housework for her!). She is a spendaholic who shops all day and had run up massive overdrafts during the marriage which caused my partner distress and worry and he had to work 80 hour weeks to try and keep up with expenditure. He maintained his sport through recycling his bikes via ebay and through his winnings as he is very successful. He has paid off the overdraft and excesses on the household accounts prior to taking his name off them, so she has started with a clean sheet!

Why should he be penalised when he has been beaten up, abused, worked all hours, had to come home from work and carry out a list of chores she had set him etc? He has 5 suicide attemps in the past 2 years on record, he is on anti-depressants. He misses his children desperately, as he has been unable to see them in 3 months because she insists on attending too and he cannot be near her for his own safety. His 'condition' means he doesn't cope too well with major upheaval and I am constantly having to watch his moods as he sinks into deep depressions over his children.

Now someone has said he will lose his house to her too. He feels his whole life is being taken away from him and he has worked so hard for his family.

I own my own house with no mortgage. Can you tell me if this will affect him in any way? We are not planning on marrying. I divorced my abusive husband 5 years ago and know how my partner feels. We met on a forum for abused people!

We feel very isolated and alone and it seems she is going to be able to take everything away from him. I fear what this will do to his mental state.