One Year On From Standish: Why Judges Still Can't Agree What "Matrimonial Property" Means for Your Divorce
If you're going through a financial remedy case and you've read anything about "sharing" your assets on divorce, you've probably come across the word matrimonialisation. It sounds technical, but it matters enormously to how much of your wealth ends up on the table to be divided.
A year after the Supreme Court's landmark decision in Standish v Standish, the judges of England and Wales still can't agree on exactly what that decision means in practice. Here's what's going on, and why it matters if you're negotiating or heading to a final hearing.
The basic idea
Courts start from the principle that "matrimonial property" (broadly, assets built up during the marriage through joint effort) should normally be shared equally. "Non-matrimonial property" (things like inheritance, or assets you owned long before you married) is usually kept out of the sharing pot altogether.
Matrimonialisation is what happens when something that started out as non-matrimonial gets folded into the marriage over time. Think of an inheritance used to buy the family home, or a pre-marriage business that both spouses worked in and grew together for twenty years. At some point, the court may decide that asset has become matrimonial property too.
The Supreme Court's Standish decision confirmed this concept is still good law. What it didn't fully settle is the question that actually decides most cases: once something is found to be matrimonialised, does it then have to be split 50/50, or can the court still take its original non-matrimonial source into account and depart from equality?
Two judges, two answers
Since Standish, first instance judges have split on exactly this point.
In one camp, Cusworth J (in LP v MP) has taken the view that the Supreme Court's guidance didn't really change the earlier Court of Appeal position, which was that even a matrimonialised asset can justify an unequal split if its non-matrimonial origin remains relevant on the facts.
In the other camp, Garrido J (in BC v BC (No 2)) has taken a firmer line: once an asset is matrimonialised, it goes into the pot with everything else and is shared equally, full stop, unless some separate factor like needs justifies a different outcome. On his reading, there's no halfway house where a matrimonialised asset can still be nudged away from equality just because of where it originally came from.
Both approaches were argued by senior judges reading the exact same Supreme Court paragraph. That tells you how unresolved this really is.
Why this matters if you're a litigant in person
If you're negotiating your own financial settlement, or preparing for a final hearing without a solicitor, this uncertainty is exactly the kind of thing that can get lost in translation. It's easy to walk into a case believing "my inheritance is definitely mine to keep" or "everything gets split down the middle no matter what," when the honest answer right now is: it depends which judge you get, and how strong your evidence is about the history of the asset.
This is also why the government's ongoing "Fairer End to Relationships" consultation matters. It's looking at whether Parliament should step in with a clearer statutory definition of matrimonial and non-matrimonial property, precisely because judges are currently reaching different conclusions on similar facts.
What to take away
If part of your case involves an asset that started outside the marriage but has been used, mixed, or relied on during it, this is not a footnote. It's often the single biggest factor in how your settlement lands. Getting good advice on how the courts in your case are likely to approach that asset, and gathering the right evidence early about its history, can make a real difference to the outcome.
If you'd like help understanding how this might apply to your situation, get in touch with Divorce Navigator.