To feel bad for Helen Flanagan here?

We don't have common law marriage in the UK, people are either married or not, just to be clear I mean civil partnerships too when I say married. He has obligations to his children and to support them, but she can't expect to have the same standard of living now they have parted ways. Not unless she provides it.

Meh, I don’t. She has 3 kids so doesn’t need a 6 bedroom house and he’s offered to sort her out with a 4 bedroom one. It’s his house legally, he wants to sell it so has the right to. She should have married him if she wanted more rights like this.

Also really won’t harm her to work. It’s good for the mental health. I’m sure the jobs she’s taking on aren’t minimum wage cleaning jobs or anything. She just means she’s doing OF or going on programmes she deems beneath her. She always struck me as quite snobbish, a lot like her character on corrie was years ago.

As a parent who is temporarily unemployed, being a stay at home parent is not a job in the slightest.

This is a guy who was on 1.7M/year earlier in his career, and is currently still a v high earner.

Right and when you take into account taxes (football players are PAYE) and agent fees you can more than HALF that amount for a start.

Scott and Helen broke up four years ago so were together while he was earning the bigger bucks, now deduct all the money spent on the fancy cars, designer clothes / shoes / handbags and luxury holidays from that total; it’s not inconceivable to think they spent the majority of which he earned.

Since the split he’s being paying for the house she’s in, all the bills, private school fees and maintenance PLUS whatever his living expenses are. Now that the youngest is in school, he’s proposing to buy her a four bedroom house which is one bedroom each for the children plus carry on paying private school fees which for 3 children is a significant amount all through secondary school.

He’s also 36 now and his career is coming to an end, even if they were still together they’d have to look into tightening their belts / her going back to work / getting other streams of income because with their spending (all captured on instagram for prosperity) I don’t imagine they saved up enough to see them through retirement; my guess is he’ll be using the money he’s freeing up to make some investments / build passive income.

Nope! It sound perfectly reasonable to me. 🤷‍♀️

I am aware it’s not a popular opinion but I’d like to change that 🤭

What! You would like to change 75yrs progress of women’s rights to be “put in a house and kept there.”

Give me strength! 🤬

This article states it’s an 8 bedroom house, that she earned over 75k last year & she states she likes moving & being in one place too long.

Why can’t she work at M&S?

That’s not the case when the children are under school age. Then the SAHM is providing childcare during the working week that the working parent would otherwise have to outsource.

It’s a 6 bed house but must be a cheap area because it was on the market for under £1M. This is a guy who was on 1.7M/year earlier in his career, and is currently still a v high earner. It wouldn’t kill him to just let them stay where they are settled. It’s not like he’s gifting it to them, he can reclaim and sell when the children are grown up. I realise he has no legal obligation, but it would be a kind thing to do. If they’d been married, he’d be far worse off.

Erm I do. My mum helps with a bit of childcare after school but, other than that, everything is down to me. I don’t have a cleaner or any paid help. I do it all, like a hell of a lot of other people in my situation do. I have barely any time to myself, unlike SAHMs when the kids are at school. Tell me again how I don’t do as full a job as a SAHM? My kids are amazing and I’d do it all again in a heartbeat btw, I’m not complaining, just proud of myself.

How come she's in a play then?
She must have found childcare for that, it's not family friendly.

Why should he fund lifestyle when they aren't together. His job is to provide for the kids.

Is the OP actually Helen Flanagan? I've skim read, but it seems possible.

Exactly she can’t rely solely on him to take care of them all he’s a footballer they aren’t well known for having long careers. She is going to have to put on her big girl pants and get a job. If she wanted more protection she should’ve got married there’s a reason why there are courts for married couples and not for
boyfriend and girlfriend, she needs to keep their private business out of the media and lay off calling the person footing the bill for her house a dickhead because at the minute that dickhead is holding all the cards and she put herself in a very precarious position.

This made me chuckle

If they’re doing this children’s act thing for a house and no maintenance isn’t the house almost just in lieu of maintenance? OP is saying it’s wrong for him to stop paying maintenance but isn’t this essentially her just getting all her maintenance up front.

Obviously becomes an issue if she has absolutely zero income and can’t afford other monthly expenditure but on the whole isn’t it swings and roundabouts.

Life changes. Relationships change. There's no reason she can't work.

Having kids shouldn't make you dependent for life.

People must learn to adjust when needs must.

Just like every other couple under the sun it should be 50% mum & 50% dad.

Fair is fair.

Why is going to work like sent to the stocks?

So effing WHAT???
Millions of women around the world go to work each day. They don’t bitch about it.

And they’d be absolutely mortified if they learned that somebody was taking up for them online & making a huge deal about it without asking first.

Have you thought that perhaps she doesn’t WANT you defending her, @mumofoneAloneandwell??

no not a de facto wife just a girlfriend I’m afraid there are no laws or courts for the nearly married. what career she only did corrie. He isn’t responsible to take care of her just his kids and paying for the roof over their heads is part of taking care of his kids.

So presumably a man who does the childcare when the kids are young is entitled to financial support from his female ex partner for as long as he likes then OP? Thought not.

As for “great mum”. She has a 10 year old girl and she’s bleating in the press about her sex life and how much she hates the kids’ dad and how he’s a dickhead. Will be lovely for her daughter having the piss ripped out of her by classmates at school I’m sure.

She’s a thick narcissist and needs to grow up and get a job.

Oh for the love of Mike. Her and Una Healy, what absolute chumps they have been. And if they didn't want to get married why the christ get engaged?

No not in England there’s no ‘common law’ or de facto.

She was unwise to make decisions to her financial detriment. He never had any financial responsibility to her legally.

England have an opt in system. Want legal rights you enter into a legal contract either a marriage or civil partnership. They could have sorted it for under £200 at local register office. Presumably one or both didn’t want to marry/civil partnership (I’d guess him)

What can she do? Support herself as an adult. As he’s a higher earner take court action under pt1 of children’s act 1989 to try and ensure he makes adequate provision for the children. But ultimately a court will decide what is reasonable. A 6 bed house and being supported for next 14 years as a sahm to school age healthy children won’t be seen as reasonable.

That's bollocks. She was not his wife, de facto or otherwise. Nor is he responsible for her. All he actually has to do is pay CM.