McCartney divorce deal talks to resume

Paul McCartney and Heather Mills will return to court today to continue thrashing out a divorce settlement.

There was no sign of an agreement having been reached last night after the first of a scheduled five days at the High Court.

McCartney left with a polite but firm “No comment” a few moments ahead of his estranged wife, who is said to be representing herself.

What happened behind closed doors yesterday could have been the greatest divorce court drama in British legal history as the ex-model fought for her share of the former Beatle’s estimated £825m (€1.1bn) fortune.

However, the only information from Court 34 of the Royal Courts of Justice in The Strand, central London, was written on the door – Private No Admittance.

The windows were also covered to prevent anyone from seeing through the doors.

McCartney and Mills, who lost part of a leg in a road accident in 1993, will be battling over money and access to their four-year-old daughter Beatrice after a marriage that lasted less than four years.

They married in June 2002, four years after Paul’s first wife Linda, whom he married in 1969, died of breast cancer.

McCartney is at risk of now facing the biggest payout in British legal history.

However, unless one of them takes issue with the settlement being hammered out behind closed doors in the Family Division of the High Court and goes to the Court of Appeal, the figures and details may never be known to the outside world.

There has been speculation among divorce experts, based on recent big money cases, that the settlement could reach £60m (€80.5m).

This would exceed the record £48m (€64.4m) businessman John Charman was told by the courts to pay his former wife in May last year.

Lawyers agree there are many imponderables which could limit Miss Mills’s payout, including the shortness of the marriage and the fact that the bulk of McCartney’s fortune was amassed long before the couple met – she is just 40 while he will be 66 this year.

Their daughter’s future will also figure large in the negotiations.

The hearing, before Mr Justice Bennett, concerns the financial aspects of the divorce.