The Cheating Spouse

If you are hoping that you will not be obligated pay spousal support to your wife because she cheated on you and then left you, the answer is that under the law as it currently stands, surprisingly, cheating will likely not make a difference! Generally, the tests for determining whether a spouse is entitled to support under our provincial legislation or under the federal legislation don’t consider whose fault it was that the relationship ended and what either party did to end it. In fact, the Divorce Act, the federal statute which applies to spousal support for married couples, specifically states that a court shall not consider “spousal misconduct” in relation to the marriage when deciding whether a person should receive spousal support.

What this means is that under the law, most of the time it won’t matter which spouse ended the marriage or relationship or why, the whys and wherefores are not factors that will be considered by a court when they decide whether or not your wife, or anyone else, is entitled to spousal support. I say ‘most of the time’ because in family law, there are always individual circumstances that will affect the outcomes of cases, because family law is a very fact driven area of law. This is why, particularly in family law, it is so important to see a lawyer about your situation.