29 May 2024
Having considered the petitioner's statement of costs and the respondent's objections, the court summarily assessed the petitioner's costs at HK$60,000 and ordered the respondent to pay forthwith.
27 Mar 2023
The Court upheld the trial judge’s adverse inference from the husband’s deficient, piecemeal disclosure and accepted the use of his earlier Form E values plus a revised valuation of the Lamma Property to compute total matrimonial assets; given the wife’s lack of resources and the children’s foreseeable needs and the husband’s non-compliance with MPS orders, the appropriate remedy was to order transfer of the Lamma Property to the wife on nil consideration subject to the Director of Legal Aid's first charge and the wife's undertaking to meet the children’s reasonable needs, to discharge outsta…
23 Jun 2022
The court exercised its discretion to refuse overly broad and disproportionate disclosure requests: bank statements from 1 January 2016 and a blanket requirement to account for all transactions over HK$10,000 were disallowed as oppressive and not justified by the evidence; limited disclosure obligations consistent with Form E and provision of missing pages and available cheque copies were required; given H's past involvement in the two companies H must swear an affidavit about whether specified company documents were or are in his possession, custody or power; leave to appeal was refused on t…
29 Mar 2021
The defendant deliberately misrepresented and failed to disclose material assets and his true financial position during negotiations; that non-disclosure was material and induced the plaintiff to take loans and consent to terms she would not otherwise have accepted; accordingly the Consent Order was set aside and a hearing de novo in the Family Court of the plaintiff's application for ancillary relief was ordered.
10 Jul 2020
Because the Husband's disclosure was deficient and he has high earning capacity, the court applied a broad-brush assessment of immediate needs, fixed the Wife's and child's immediate needs at HK$54,800 per month, deducted an allowance for the Wife's earning capacity of HK$15,000, found a net need of HK$39,800 and ordered the Husband to pay HK$39,800 per month from 15 July 2020; backdating was refused and no order as to costs was made.
22 Jan 2020
Court held that substantial and particularized evidence raised by the wife created a prima facie basis to order discovery beyond Form E and beyond the usual three‑year window for specified categories because the flow of funds, chain of payments for alleged PRC expenses, and booking of loans and family payments in company accounts were directly relevant and necessary to value company shareholdings, determine actual income and borrowing capacity and to test the husband's PRC expense defence; accordingly many disputed questions were allowed in limited form and procedural orders for a revised que…
5 Sept 2019
Leave to appeal was refused because the 2nd Applicant failed to demonstrate a reasonable prospect of success: there was insufficient prima facie evidence of concealment or dissipations to justify extended discovery of bank statements; the Table A request failed to specify documentary items requiring an O.24 r.7 affidavit; the 12‑month Form E period is not a fixed statutory minimum and sufficiency is fact dependent; and the obligation to seek joinder for beneficial ownership rested on the applicant, not the respondent.
27 Feb 2018
Petitioner had partial success because respondent made additional relevant disclosures after the summons; however significant parts of the summons (notably paras 2 and 3) were oppressive, imprecise or unjustified while the second questionnaire's questions were largely reasonable; balancing these factors and exercising discretion under Order 62 the correct costs order was that petitioner pay half the costs of the summons and there be no order as to costs for the other half, with standard certification and taxation provisions; same order for costs of the arguments as an order nisi.
31 Oct 2016
The application for a SJE to value S (the 'shell' or the husband's shareholdings) was refused because the wife had effectively shifted her case to seek valuation of the husband's shareholdings while the summons sought the shell; moreover S is an active company (not a shell) so a shell valuation is meaningless, and the application was made too late such that appointment and report preparation would prejudice the imminent trial and be impracticable.
15 Apr 2016
The High Court adjourned the action sine die because the contested questions about the origin of the purchase funds and the enforceability of the 2011 agreement are ancillary relief issues more appropriately resolved in the Family Court where three rounds of Form Es and ancillary relief claims are pending; the Family Court retains jurisdiction despite post-decree delay.