A wife challenging a 2008 pre-nuptial agreement in financial remedy proceedings against her husband had her grounds considered at a preliminary hearing, in a judgment given by Mr Justice Peel on 23 September 2026.
Key facts
- Who: Spouses in financial remedy proceedings where one relies on a pre-nuptial agreement and the other challenges it.
- From: Judgment of 23 September 2026
- Source: EC v EC [2026] EWFC 275
The Family Court, sitting at the Royal Courts of Justice, gave judgment before Mr Justice Peel on 23 September 2026 in [2026] EWFC 275. The parties are anonymised as EC and the judgment was delivered in private.
Background
The wife began financial remedy proceedings against the husband by Form A dated 1 August 2025. The couple signed a three-page pre-nuptial agreement (PNA) on 30 October 2008 and married on 27 December 2008. They separated in mid 2025, after a marriage of about 16½ years. It was the husband's second marriage and the wife's third. He is 81 and she is 73. They still live under the same roof.
Most of the assets were built up by the husband before the marriage, through property and a holding company. He puts the net assets at about £42m. The wife believes about £50m is more accurate.
The question
At a directions hearing on 15 April 2026 the judge listed a preliminary hearing, held on 27 to 29 July 2026. The issues were whether the PNA is valid or has been vitiated, whether its weight should be reduced, what it means, whether the parties fully appreciated its implications, and its impact on the wider case.
The husband relies on the PNA. The wife says it should be disregarded entirely. Her grounds are undue influence or inappropriate pressure, lack of independent legal advice, lack of understanding of the implications, misrepresentation of assets, lack of financial disclosure or mistake, and failure to meet needs. The judge said the last ground is better considered at the later disposal hearing.
The court's approach
The judge described a preliminary hearing on a PNA as a legitimate case management decision, but a relatively unusual one. Normally, he said, it is quicker and less expensive to list a final hearing covering all the section 25 factors. He made an exception because court time had become free and an expert valuation would have delayed a full hearing.
He said he was not suggesting this will generally be the appropriate way forward, and suspected that in cases before him it will be the exception rather than the rule. Where findings on a PNA are made at a preliminary stage, the court must still survey the section 25 criteria in the round, and the same judge should deal with both stages.
On the law, he set out the propositions he had summarised in AH v BH [2024] EWFC 125, drawn from Radmacher v Granatino [2010] UKSC 42. These include that the court should give effect to a nuptial agreement freely entered into by each party with a full appreciation of its implications, unless in the circumstances prevailing it would not be fair to hold them to it. He also cited Helliwell v Entwistle [2025] EWCA Civ 1055, where the Court of Appeal held a PNA was vitiated by deliberate, fraudulent non-disclosure.
On the facts, the judge said he was sceptical that the wife has any meaningful sharing claim even if the PNA were disregarded. He noted that her role was limited to smaller companies, and that on any view her direct contribution to the businesses was limited to a minority of them. He accepted that no valuation evidence had yet been obtained and that the figures were the husband's estimates.
What this means for couples in disputes over pre-nuptial agreements
This judgment reflects the facts of one case. It shows that a court may, in a suitable case, decide questions about a PNA at a preliminary hearing, but the judge made clear this will not generally be the usual route. Anyone relying on or challenging a PNA should get advice on how the court is likely to manage their own case.
Sources
- EC v EC [2026] EWFC 275, Family Court, 23 September 2026