I reported yesterday about how I thought McCartney got away lightly with his divorce settlement. It seems that his ‘escape’, if you can call it that, may well set a precedent for future cases, according to FT.com.

As virtually all McCartney’s assets had been derived before the marriage began, the court did not acknowledge the principle of sharing, whereby each spouse’s contribution to the marriage is usually recognised by an equal split of assets. McCartney had achieved and would continue to achieve his success because of his contribution through The Beatles.

Usually all assets from a marriage, whether they were acquired before or during the marriage, are regarded as being jointly owned. Therefore Heather Mills could have expected to walk away with a £200,000,000 payout from the settlement. This obviously would have been grossly unfair as Paul McCartney had spent the best part of his life building his fortune, and entertaining millions in the progress. For someone to come along at the eleventh hour and deprive him of that would be unjust; but that is the way divorce works.

For example, I was told during my divorce settlement that even a Hi-Fi unit I had received for my 17th birthday was considered a matrimonial asset, and as such was claimed by ex-wife, even though I owned the item almost 10 years before I even met her.

Divorce can be really petty, and unless it’s handled in an amicable way can cost both parties a substantial amount of money, time and stress.

I applaud McCartney for standing firm on his divorce settlement and only hope that what happened with him does indeed set a precedent for divorces to come. Heather Mills had no more right to the money he earned from being with the Beatles than my ex-wife had to my decade old Hi-Fi system.

Well done Paul.

Clive Bellmore