Report No. 71

Chapter 6

The Requirement of Living Apart

6.1. Living apart.-

We may now deal with the yardstick to be applied by the courts in drawing an inference of an irretrievable breakdown of marriage. The yardstick would have to be factual and tangible, and not abstract or one pertaining purely to a state of mind. Accordingly, in most countries it has usually been considered desirable to give some guidance to the court as to how irretrievable breakdown is to be evidenced. For this purpose, the legislative provision allowing divorce on the ground of irretrievable breakdown of marriage is usually made subject, inter alia, to the condition that there must be proof that the parties have lived apart for a specified period.