It may no longer represent good law, since the decisions of Stack v Dowden and Jones v Kernott.

She succeeded in 1966 in getting a divorce on grounds of his adultery, with a maintenance order but later reduced to 1s a year, and she brought an action that she would be entitled to an equitable interest in the home.

The majority of the Court of Appeal held that Mrs Gissing was entitled to an equitable interest in the home.

It comes to this: where a couple, by their joint efforts, get a house and furniture, intending it to be a continuing provision for them for their joint lives, it is a prima facie inference from their conduct that the house and furniture is a "family asset" in which each is entitled to an equal share.

Edmund Davies LJ dissented, denouncing the ‘palm tree justice’ of the majority.

For such conduct is no less consistent with a common intention to share the day-to-day expenses of the household, while each spouse retains a separate interest in capital assets acquired with their own moneys or obtained by inheritance or gift.