Just Stop Oil and Labour donor Dale Vince has claimed that he has won his court battle with ex-wife Kate Vince following the pair’s divorce.
Ms Vince was awarded more than £40million by a High Court judge after the pair had previously disagreed over how finances should be divided at a hearing last month.
However, the energy mogul’s lawyer has said she is ‘delighted’ the court recognised Dale’s wishes that Mrs Vince should receive less than half the assets.
Davina Katz, Senior Partner of Katz Partners LLP who represented Mr Vince, said: ‘Throughout these proceedings Mrs Vince sought 50 per cent of the assets despite the fact that Dale had worked very hard for many years before they met, building Ecotricity.
‘I am delighted for Dale that the court has recognised this and agreed with him that fairness dictates Mrs Vince should receive less than half the assets.
‘Mrs Vince was seeking a settlement of over £60million and has been awarded £41.8million, which is a great deal less than Dale had offered her from the outset, before this matter came to Court.’
This came after Ms Vince’s lawyer Sarah Jane Lenihan, of Dawson Cornwell, said: ‘We are very grateful to the court for the fair and equitable award granted.
‘It is only right that Ms Vince has received an award which reflects her extensive contributions throughout the marriage, which the judge acknowledged, during which Mr Vince built the majority of his fortune.’
Speaking before the London court, Ms Vince’s legal team claimed that her ex-husband had been giving away their matrimonial assets, of which she should be entitled to half.
This giving away included a sizeable £5.46million worth of donations to the Labour Party between April 2022 and May 2024.
However, Mr Vince argued that this increase in donations and other spending was due to a rise in the value of his business and had ‘nothing at all to do with’ the ongoing legal feud with his ex-wife.
In a ruling on Friday, Mr Justice Cusworth ordered Mr Vince to pay his ex-wife a total of £43.51million, including interest.
The High Court judge ruled that this sum could be paid in three installments, one of £13.94million, the next of £14.49million and a final payment of £15.08million.
Mr Justice Cusworth added that the first payment must be made by April 30, 2025, with the additional two lump sums to follow annually.
The settlement was described by the judge as ‘an appropriate outcome for these parties’, which when factoring in the value of non-business assets would leave Ms Vince with £45.64million.
In his 20-page ruling on Friday, Mr Justice Cusworth said: ‘I consider that the wife should receive 50% of the marital element of the value in the businesses, and not less’.
Following the judgment, Mr Vince said: ‘Today’s judgment is a total vindication of my approach to this case from the very beginning’.
Lawyers representing Ms Vince stated: ‘We are very grateful to the court for the fair and equitable award granted to Ms Vince.
‘It is only right that Ms Vince has received an award which reflects her extensive contributions throughout the marriage, which the judge acknowledged, during which Mr Vince built the majority of his fortune’.
During proceedings, the date of the former couple’s separation was argued, with Mr Vince alleging it occurred in 2021.
However, Ms Vince claimed that the pair continued ‘a physical and emotional relationship’ up until February 2022.
Mr Justice Cusworth said: ‘The parties’ separation took place at some point after a conversation between them in late March 2021, when the husband evidently told the wife that he no longer loved her and believed that the relationship had broken down’.
He added: ‘However, it is also true that for the rest of that year, and until February 2022, they continued to be married, to live effectively under the same roof as a domestic unit, and also on occasions continued their physically intimate relationship’.
The judge also went on to state despite Mr Vince’s purchasing of a houseboat towards the end of 2022, that ‘he must have known his wife’s feelings were not so clear, and by continuing to sleep with her he would only have encouraged her in the hope that their marriage might be restored’.
During the ruling before the Royal Courts of Justice, Ms Vince’s legal team alleged that Mr Vince had been giving away their matrimonial assets in a ‘wanton and reckless’ manner.
In addition to the £5.46million pound donations to the Labour Party, Mr Vince also pledged £100,000 to the Cheltenham Muslim Association and £8.4million to his own Green Britain Foundation which includes under its umbrella Forest Green Rovers FC, the National League football club he owns.
Mr Vince refuted the claims of Ms Vince’s legal team though, stating that he had chosen to financially support the Labour Party as he viewed the general election as an opportunity for a government who wanted to pursue net-zero policies.
Arguing that his donations were ‘imperative’, Mr Vince said: ‘I thought it was not just the right thing to do, but imperative, to step into that gap and help Labour get out of the gap.
Referencing the donations made to Labour, the judge said they ‘can be seen to have been timed to precede the recent general election’ and were at a time when Mr Vince’s company’s ‘coffers had been filled up’.
Mr Justice Cusworth added: ‘It was therefore both foreseeable and hardly inexplicable that the company should choose to make a specific large donation at that time.
‘I am satisfied that the husband’s motivation in endorsing that transaction was political, and not related to these proceedings’.
Ms Vince also gave evidence before the court in which she said that over the course of their marriage, she had supported the mission of Mr Vince’s company which was not being run with the chief goal of financial success, but rather with the aim of creating a more sustainable Britain.
Mr Vince also told the court that whilst he had come close to selling his business between 2021 and 2022, that he did not want to sell what he referred to as ‘his life’s work’ due to the divorce.
The 63-year-old had previously weighed up a possible sale as he thought he may need the money to pay for his divorce and also due to his aspirations of becoming a politician and the potential conflict of interest the business may pose.
However, the sale did not go ahead for a number of reasons, including that Mr Vince ‘reconnected’ with the business.
Mr Justice Cusworth said: ‘In this case I consider that a fair approach will be to determine the marital period as a proportion of the whole period of the business’s existence to date.
‘That proportion of current value should be considered matrimonial’.
Speaking after the judgment, Mr Vince said: ‘Today’s judgment is a total vindication of my approach to this case from the very beginning’.
He added: ‘Today my ex-wife walks away from court with £12million less than I first offered her four years ago.
‘Along with her legal team she has wasted years of time, not just our own – that of the court, and some £6million in fees’.
