Eight years paying the mortgage alone helped her to 75%

Ms Whait and Mr Western began living together in 1998 and married in 2005. In 2002 they bought the block on which their home was built. They had two daughters. He ran his own business and was the main earner, and she cared for the girls and did the business's books. The business closed in early 2010, and they separated at the end of October that year.

He paid the mortgage until April 2011, when he was injured at work. From July 2011 she made the repayments alone, cutting the debt from about $175,000 to $108,692 by trial. Her super grew from about $31,000 to $115,781. From 2016 the girls lived with her full-time. Each also received a lump sum after separation: he nearly $191,000 in workers compensation, she nearly $200,000 from her father's estate. By trial almost all of both had been spent. The judge found he had wasted most of his payout, and that some of her spending, on an overseas holiday and a party, was extravagant.

Both agreed she should keep the home and its mortgage. The question was what, if anything, she should pay him. He asked for 40% of the net pool; she proposed that each simply keep what they had. The home was worth $445,000 and the pool, with super, $480,087.

Chief Judge Sutherland found their contributions equal up to separation, but said the years since weighed heavily in her favour: the mortgage she had paid down, the super she had built and her care of the girls. Contributions were assessed at 70% to her. A further 5% was added for her continuing care and support of the children, and for his waste of the compensation money. The result was 75% to her and 25% to him.

Under the orders the judge proposed, she would keep the home and the mortgage and pay him $78,284, and $22,330 of her super would be split to him. She would end with about $360,000 and he with about $120,000. Her separate claim to cut his past child support was treated as abandoned for lack of evidence.