The appellant wife appealed a Court of Appeal decision that reduced her share of matrimonial property by applying the 'Capital Base Theory'.
The trial judge had ordered an equal division of the net family assets, which included a large farming operation built from the respondent husband's pre-marital assets.
The Supreme Court of Canada allowed the appeal, holding that the Capital Base Theory is incompatible with the Saskatchewan Matrimonial Property Act's presumption of equal distribution and its specific rules for valuing pre-marital exemptions.
The Court restored the trial judge's equal division but upheld the Court of Appeal's reduction of the interest rate on the wife's lump sum payment to 5 per cent under the federal Interest Act.
