The findings made by the Court
can sometimes seem counter to the headline facts of a case. In a recent
decision in the Federal Circuit Court known as Benedict & Peake, after a trial which took four days, the Court
found that a defacto relationship between the two parties did not exist for the
purposes of the Family Law Act. This
is despite the Court being satisfied that the two parties were the parents of a
child (now aged over 18), the parties jointly owned property, the parties had
lived at the same address for many years, and that the parties had worked
together for the same business. On the face of it, you would imagine that these
facts would lead to a conclusion that a defacto relationship did exist.
However, on a very close examination of the fine detail the Court came to the
conclusion that, so far as the Family Law
Act is concerned, a defacto relationship was not in existence and therefore
a property settlement, as applied for by the woman, could not be ordered by the
Court.
