The Incorporated Trustees of Great Calling Ministries Worldwide v Auguster Omonigho Irabor & Anor

When a judgment creditor seeks enforcement against property relevant to financial remedy proceedings, the court must consider all the circumstances and balance the creditor’s interests against the needs of the spouse and any minor children. The creditor’s interests should be respected unless overriding them is necessary to make appropriate provision. A deferred sale or charge may provide the fairest balance, but the court may exceptionally invade the equity where the creditor’s conduct, the nature of the debt and the family’s needs justify that course.

An appellate court should not interfere with a trial judge’s factual conclusions or discretionary assessment unless the decision was plainly wrong or rationally insupportable. A judgment must be read as a whole. An imperfect explanation or lack of detailed arithmetic does not itself justify appellate intervention.

The church, an intervener in financial remedy proceedings between a husband and wife, appealed against an order requiring the husband to pay the wife a £750,000 lump sum and making related costs orders. The church had advanced substantial, unsecured and interest-free loans to the husband, secured by an interim charging order over the former matrimonial home.

A preliminary issue judge had found that the loans were genuine but exceptionally soft, with no realistic expectation of repayment causing prejudice to the husband. The recorder treated the case as exceptional and prioritised the wife’s and children’s housing needs over the church’s immediate enforcement claim. The appeal concerned res judicata and estoppel, the assessment of the wife’s needs, the balance between creditor and family interests, and whether a deferred Mesher-type order should have been considered.

1. Appeal dismissed, subject to costs adjustment. The wife gave an undertaking not to enforce the costs orders made in addition to the lump sum, because those costs had been double counted.
2. The res judicata and estoppel arguments were sterile. The recorder had reached his conclusion on the facts before him and had considered all the circumstances under section 25 of the Matrimonial Causes Act and section 1(5) of the Charging Orders Act 1979.
3. The applicable exercise required a balance between the judgment creditor’s interests and the wife’s and children’s needs. The creditor’s interests were to be respected except to the extent that it was necessary to override them to make appropriate provision. A Mesher order could sometimes achieve that balance, while outright transfer free of the charge required exceptional circumstances, as explained in Harman v Glencross [1986] 1 All ER 545 and Kremen v Agrest [2013] 2 FLR 187.
4. This was an exceptional case. The loans were unsecured, interest-free and highly uncommercial; the church had produced no accounts, had failed to provide relevant disclosure, and had not advanced a need-based case for immediate repayment. The husband and church were, for practical purposes, aligned. The recorder was therefore entitled to invade the equity in the former matrimonial home to the extent necessary to meet the wife’s and children’s needs.
5. The recorder was entitled to assess needs generously, including provision to clear the wife’s student loan and other debt. The housing evidence supported a five-bedroom home, and the award was not obviously significantly in excess of the wife’s needs. The appellate court could not substitute its own discretion for that of the trial judge.
6. The absence of consideration of a Mesher order did not invalidate the decision because the argument had not been raised below. The church would still recover substantial sums, although enforcement would be delayed.
7. The approach in Volpi v Volpi [2022] 4 WLR 48 applied: an appeal court should not interfere with factual findings unless they were plainly wrong, and should read the judgment as a whole without narrow textual analysis.

1. High Court (Family Division): appeal heard with permission granted by Mostyn J against the order of Recorder Willetts dated 25 May 2023; appeal dismissed subject to the wife’s undertaking concerning enforcement of costs.
2. Recorder Willetts: ordered the husband to pay the wife £750,000, made costs orders, and discharged an interim charging order over the former matrimonial home.