Farmers call for pre-nups to be legally recognised
RTÉ’s farming programme, Ear to the Ground, has revealed that the rise in divorce in rural Ireland has sparked the new trend among landowners.
While pre-nuptial agreements have always been thought to be reserved for the rich and famous, they are now becoming a prerequisite to marriage even for those who are not fabulously wealthy.
Kilkenny farmer, William Holohan, who is engaged to be married, told the programme he has been behind a campaign to have pre-nuptial agreements recognised by Irish law in order to speed up the hand-over of family farms through the generations.
He said: “If pre-nups were there it would actually increase the transfer of land to younger farmers and to the next generation that want to get working.”
Figures released by the CSO last year revealed that almost 90,000 Irish people were divorced since it was introduced into law in 1996.
Ear to the Ground reveals that pre-nuptial agreements are not legally binding in Ireland and Britain, but it has been proposed to recognise them in divorce settlements.
Mr Holohan said there is a real fear among farmers that their land could be split down the middle in the case of marital breakdown due to the rising numbers of divorced farmers.
“It is stalling land mobility in Ireland because there is a fear in the background of parents who have built up the business of farming and if the marriage separates, and we all hope that no marriage will separate, but if it does that the business will be split. It’s half the income coming into that person compared to what they are used to and what was built up for generations and what they were hoping to have for the rest of their lives.
“It is a safeguard. We have to move with the times and not stay in the Stone Age.”
Although the agreements are often criticised as unromantic, he says it is simply a case of discussing the sensitive topic before walking down the aisle.
“You have to get it down on paper and get it fool-proof. It will be tricky but if there is trust on both sides of their relationship there won’t be any bother about it.”
His understanding fiancée Máiréad Whitty, who will tie the knot with William next year, said a pre-nuptial agreement is very important. “It is associated with what you see in the films where there is an older rich man marrying a younger less well-off woman but I think it is very serious for our generation, the fact that there is marriage breakdown and separations.
“If there was something there which was legally enforced it might aid succession in a sense where the younger farmer might be able to take over the farm earlier. Instead of waiting until he is a mature man where perhaps a bereavement occurs in a family.”
She also said Irish brides are also looking to protect the assets they bring to the marriage.
Law lecturer at Griffith College Cork, Paul Pierse, said the law is unclear around pre- nuptial agreements in Ireland.
* Ear to the Ground airs on RTÉ One tonight at 8.30pm.
