Buttrose J (delivering oral judgment):

The object of this application, which is for alimony pendente lite, on which we have been engaged for the last three days is to provide the respondent wife with an income suitable to her position until the suit is heard. I have approached the matter in the first instance without having regard to the maximum amount which may be awarded under the Ordinance, namely, one-fifth of the husband's average nett income etc. or to the usual proportions adopted in such cases. I have considered the problem independently of these questions at the outset with a view to arriving at a decision as to what I conceive to be a reasonable and just amount to award the respondent by way of alimony pendente lite.

Having done so, I have then considered that figure in the light of the maximum amount I can award and the usual proportions adopted. I am aware that the usual proportion which is adopted, is one-fifth which is considered to be a suitable allowance or in the case of substantial incomes one-eighth. Where however the income is very large, it is, I think, the practice not to have regard to the question of proportion so much as to fix a sum which appears to be adequate having regard to the wife's position in life and necessities and not minutely to go into the figures, which in this case I do not propose to do. I must fix an amount which would be sufficient to maintain the respondent in the rank and position of life which she has hitherto occupied or putting it in another way, I must award such a sum as will supply the respondent with the necessaries, comforts and advantages incidental to her station in life. I bear in mind in this case the petitioner is a millionaire and that he and the respondent have lived their married life in keeping with that status at Mallaig, the matrimonial home where the respondent has continued to reside after the petitioner left in February 1960.

I have considered the means both of the petitioner and the respondent and also the income tax position. As a result of the figures with which I have been supplied by the industry of Counsel and their advisers and which appear in the evidence as exhibits, I consider that a nett sum in the vicinity of $2,500 to $3,000 a month would be a proper award in this case by way of alimony pendente lite. I should like Counsel to work out what is the gross amount required to return a nett figure of not less than $2,750 a month in the hands of the respondent which is to include her own income, and I will make a formal order accordingly of payment of such gross amount by the petitioner to the respondent by way of alimony pending suit. I think I have perhaps been over generous in this matter but if I have erred, I prefer to do so on the side of generosity rather than parsimony.

On the question of costs, I think, in this case the proper order to make is that the respondent must have her costs of this application and the Registrar will be given the appropriate directions in the final Order to be drawn up and agreed by Counsel and submitted for my approval on Tuesday next 23 May. There will be liberty to apply.

Order accordingly.