Taylor and Taylor

The proceedings concerned an application for property alteration orders commenced by Mr Taylor, the Applicant, on 10 July 2015. Following Mr Taylor's death in November 2015, his estate sought to maintain the proceedings pursuant to subsection 79(8) of the *Family Law Act 1975* (Cth). The Respondent Wife, who suffers from a progressive degenerative cognitive impairment and resides in a nursing home, sought the dismissal of the Applicant's Initiating Application.

The legal issues before the Court were whether it was "just and equitable" to make an order altering the existing property interests of the parties, as required by subsection 79(2) of the Act, and whether the conditions for continuing the proceedings under subsection 79(8) were met. Specifically, the Court had to determine if it would have made an order had the Applicant not died and if it remained appropriate to make such an order.

The Court's reasoning was guided by the High Court's decision in *Stanford v Stanford* (2012) 247 CLR 108. The Court noted that the "just and equitable" requirement under subsection 79(2) is not to be conflated with other aspects of property proceedings. Applying the principles from *Stanford*, the Court found that the bare fact of separation, particularly when involuntary, does not demonstrate that it is just and equitable to alter property interests. Furthermore, the Court held that parties' rights are determined by law, not by non-legal considerations such as "moral" claims. In this case, the Applicant's own evidence indicated that the parties had not separated and that he had no unmet financial needs. The Court concluded that these circumstances, coupled with the Applicant's death and the fact that any order would benefit his children rather than himself, meant that the Applicant's estate could not satisfy the Court that it was or would have been just and equitable to make property orders.

The Court ordered that the Application filed on 10 July 2015 be dismissed. All extant applications were dismissed, and the matter was finalised and removed from the docket.