Goncharova & Goncharov (No 3) [2025] FedCFamC1F 497 (22 July 2025)

1. Upon receiving the material set out in Order 1, or the timeline for submissions is passed, the wife's Application in a Proceeding filed 24 December 2024 be determined in chambers.

1. If either party fails to comply with the timeframes set out in Order 1, the matter will be considered on an undefended basis.

1. Chambers will provide the husband with a copy of s 117 of the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth), as was in force at the time of trial and costs application.

Note: The form of the order is subject to the entry in the Court's records.

Note: This copy of the Court's Reasons for judgment may be subject to review to remedy minor typographical or grammatical errors (r 10.14(b) Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (Family Law) Rules 2021 (Cth)), or to record a variation to the order pursuant to r 10.13 Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (Family Law) Rules 2021 (Cth).

Part XIVB of the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) makes it an offence, except in very limited circumstances, to publish an account of proceedings that identify persons, associated persons, or witnesses involved in family law proceedings.

IT IS NOTED that publication of this judgment by this Court under the pseudonym Goncharova & Goncharov has been approved pursuant to subsection 114Q(2) of the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth).

1. On 26 November 2024, I published Reasons and orders in relation to the parties' property dispute.
2. By way of background, I repeat this from the judgment of Goncharova & Goncharov (No 2) [2024] FedCFamC1F 803 at [2]- [5]:
   1. The parties commenced cohabitation on marriage in [Country B] [in] 2004. Both parties have [degrees] from a State Institute of Technology in [Country B]. The parties' two children are [Mr K], born 2004 ("[Mr K]") and [L], born 2011 ("[L]") ("the children").
   2. The parties lived in [Country B] from marriage in 2004 until they migrated to Australia on the wife's skilled migration Visa in [late] 2014.
   3. Thereafter, the parties purchased an unencumbered home in [Suburb E], NSW, for $1,775,000 [in] 2016. It now has an agreed value of $2,385,000. The source of the funding for the purchase is hotly in dispute.
   4. The parties separated in [late] 2019 and were divorced [in] 2022.
3. As for the property dispute, in short, the husband sort orders that after a 15 year relationship, two children and five years post-separation, the wife receive what she had by way of earlier property orders and an earlier lump sum spouse maintenance order, some add backs sought by the husband, bank accounts of $3,379 and less than $20,000 in superannuation.
4. The husband sought to wash through the matrimonial pool apparent loans of almost $4.137 million allegedly from his parents (and a smaller amount from his brother), leaving a pool, on his case of -$486,786 (NB a negative pool) and $45,335 total in superannuation.
5. He did not seek any orders for his parents or brother to be paid a cent.
6. The wife challenged the veracity of the loans, amongst other dealings. It was common ground she had not signed a single document the husband sought to rely upon to establish matrimonial liabilities, including a loan said to be with his brother post-separation.
7. The wife contended for a non-superannuation pool of $4,539,687 and the agreed $45,335 in superannuation. She said the pool ought be adjusted 60 percent to her and the balance to the husband.
8. There were other disputes between the parties, the scope of which and their resolutions can be found in the first instance judgment Goncharova & Goncharov (No 2) [2024] FedCFamC1F 803 at [11]- [16] and [56].
9. Ultimately for the reasons given at the time. I found the pool to be just over $4.58 million as the wife contended, and that she receive 55 percent of the pool and the balance to the husband. That saw her receiving the property at Suburb E and some cash in accounts [plus her superannuation entitlement]. The husband retained his properties in Country B.

1. On 24 December 2024, the wife brought an Application in a Proceeding for her costs.
2. Also on 24 December 2024, the husband filed a Notice of Appeal and then an Amended Notice of Appeal dated 26 March 2025.
3. I brought the matter before me on 20 January 2025 to hear from the parties whether I should hear the costs application before or after the determination of the appeal. The wife's solicitor and the husband's then solicitor asked the Court to defer hearing the costs application until the appeal was resolved. That is what occurred.
4. That was a consent order with, and I again highlight, the husband's solicitors saying that the wife's costs application be deferred for determination after the appeal. With the consent of both parties, I also made the following Order:
   1. In the event that the respondent husband's appeal is dismissed, then, within 14 days of same, the parties will provide chambers by email via (associate.justicebrasch@fcfcoa.gov.au) with a proposed minute of directions for the hearing of the applicant wife's costs Application setting out:
      1. The date by which the applicant wife will file her particularised affidavit;
      2. The date by which the respondent husband will file his Response to the costs Application and supporting affidavit; and

c. A date for the filing of written submissions.

1. I will refer to this as "the timetable order". I made other orders about hearing the wife's costs application.
2. Put short, the wife's costs application of December 2024 is unresolved. I deal with the husband's novel arguments about this a little later in these reasons.

1. On 19 June 2025, the Appeal Division of the Court handed down its decision.
2. As is clear from those Appeal Reasons, many of the grounds were abandoned on the morning of the hearing. One ground about procedural unfairness was not made out.
3. The husband though had a "pyrrhic victory" with respect to a discrete issue concerning the date of a currency conversion with respect to the valuation of some properties in Country B that had been valued several years ago using the Country B Reserve Bank official exchange rate at the time of the valuations.
4. I use the word "pyrrhic" by reference to what the Appeal Division said of the outcome in Goncharov & Goncharova [2025] FedCFamC1A 107 at [48]- [50]:

Adopting the revised figures, the property pool is reduced by AUD $154,818.62, which represents 3.5 per cent of the property pool. The outcome for the husband is that he will retain the sum of $70,959.14 in the CBA account.

The costs incurred by the husband in the appeal as disclosed in his costs notice were $77,760.56. The wife's costs incurred on appeal were $34,980.

The additional funds the husband retains from the appeal are entirely absorbed by the legal costs he has incurred, and on one view, the exercise was nothing more than a pyrrhic victory.

Efforts to agree a new timetable for material and submissions on costs

1. The wife's solicitors, to their credit, tried to comply with the spirit of the timetable order. The wife's affidavit filed 8 July 2025 set out her efforts to reach agreement with the husband and his then solicitors, but she received no responses other than being told he [the husband] would self-act and was sent an unfiled Notice of Ceasing to Act from the husband's solicitors. The husband's solicitors also did not do the wife's solicitors the professional courtesy of taking or returning her calls.
2. The husband has since filed an affidavit and does not dispute any of these issues.
3. The wife then has been put to the expense of filing an Application in a Proceeding, dated 8 July 2025, with the affidavit to which reference was just made, setting out a proposed new schedule for material.
4. I made the following orders on 9 July 2025:
   1. The husband is to file and serve a Response to an Application in a Proceeding and supporting affidavit in relation to the wife's Application in a Proceeding filed 8 July 2025 by no later than 4.00 pm on 16 July 2025.
   2. In the event the respondent husband fails to comply with Order 1, the orders set out in the wife's Application in a Proceeding filed 8 July 2025 will be considered in chambers and listing orders made consistent with the timeframes set out in that application.

1. The husband filed a Response to an Application in a Proceeding and an affidavit on 15 July 2025, and his solicitors filed their Notice of Ceasing to Act on 16 July 2025.

1. The wife proposed that in relation to her Application in a Proceeding with respect to costs filed on December 2024:
   • The applicant wife file and serve her affidavit by 4:30pm on 14 August 2025.
   • The respondent husband file and serve his response and supporting affidavit by 4:30pm on 28 August 2025.
   • That each party file and serve their written submissions by 4:30pm on 11 September 2025.
2. The husband sought the application be dismissed and I will return to his arguments regarding same. However, if a timetable was required, he proposed:
   • The applicant wife file and serve her affidavit by 4:30pm on 15 September 2025.
   • The respondent husband file and serve his response and supporting affidavit by 4:30pm on 15 October 2025.
   • That each party file and serve their written submissions by 4:30pm on 17 November 2025.
3. I turn to the husband's dismissal submissions.
4. The husband had an interesting argument that because the original timetable order referred to his appeal being dismissed, and because the appeal was not dismissed, that meant "there are no court orders in place and no grounds on which the application can be revived".
5. It is clear that the timetable order of January 2025 was not disturbed on appeal.
6. I asked the husband numerous times if he could take me to an order either of this Court or of the Appeal Division which dismissed the wife's Application in a Proceeding dated 24 December 2024.
7. He could not.
8. Rather, he changed the topic on most occasions but ultimately could not point to any order that had dismissed that Application in a Proceeding.
9. The husband's argument about the timetable order and the word "dismissed" is a novel construction and one that cannot be accepted. All the timetable order did (itself a procedural order) was set a schedule for the hearing of cost submissions if the appeal was dismissed. That meant the parties were relieved from attending court to do so.
10. If the appeal however was upheld, the costs application remained on foot, but it would be for the parties to [decide] how, or if, it ought proceed. For example, if the appeal had been upheld and the matter remitted it would have been open to the wife to discontinue her costs application. As said, there is no order that the husband could identify or indeed I could find that dismissed the wife's Application in a Proceeding filed 24 December 2024 for costs.

A new timetable for material and submissions on costs

1. Clearly, the wife's application for costs remains unresolved.
2. Indeed, the husband sought orders in the alternate for a different timetable for the filing of submissions in relation to the costs application.
3. The justiciable controversy that is represented by the wife's application for costs has yet to be quelled. As was said in Aitken & Aitken[1] citing the High Court in Wilson and Ors v Minister of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island Affairs[2] at [11]:

The function of the federal judicial branch is the quelling of justiciable controversies, whether between citizens (individual or corporate), between citizens and executive government (in civil and criminal matters) and between the various polities in the federation.

(Emphasis per original)

1. I return to the time frames.
2. Interestingly, the husband proposed the wife have longer to file her material than she sought.
3. In support of his extended timeframe, the husband deposed he was going on holidays from 11 August 2025 to 1 September 2025 and will be in a different time zone. I was told by the wife's solicitor that she has called three times for any documents that would support that and has received no response. I asked the husband what proof he had to support that he would be out of the country from 11 August 2025 to 1 September 2025. He gave rather convoluted answers including:
   • he did not actually have tickets;
   • there is a high level of probabilities he will be going; and
   • his family was arranging the tickets.
4. He certainly did not like the idea of an order that by close of business tomorrow he provide documents that substantiate what he said in his affidavit.
5. The husband made the point that the mother's solicitor had not put on proof that she was overseas [on holidays], but she is appearing before me right now.
6. It is also somewhat of a nonsense for the husband to say she had not put on proof that she was away [overseas and that] suited her [proposed] timetable, when the husband himself on his timetable proposed the wife have longer time to file anyway. In any event, I return to the husband's contention that he said he will be away on a trip organised by his family when he does not have tickets and can provide no proof that he will actually be overseas.
7. Respectfully, I do not understand how either the time zone or being on holidays necessitates the extended time frame he seeks to file. Indeed, not having to work means he will not have the distraction or calls on his time with work. It also must be observed that the wife's solicitors appeared this afternoon despite being overseas on holidays herself.
8. The husband's proposal sees the wife filing two weeks after his return from leave and then he file a month after that.
9. It is 22 July 2025 today and that would mean, on his case, he would not file until 15 October 2025 and then another month for submissions.
10. It has to be born in mind that this Application for costs has been on foot since December 2024. On the husband's timetable it would not see a resolution for approximately 12 months.
11. I conclude that without the competing need to work and file material at the same time means the husband can prepare and file his material sooner rather than later. I hasten to add the fact of working is not a weighty consideration when setting timelines for the efficient disposal of a matter.
12. The husband also deposed that he was self-representing. He had the benefit of lawyers until last week. At trial, he impressed me as a smart person with a superb command of English and savvy business skills. He can join the many litigants in this court who act for themselves.
13. It has long been held that legal representation: [3]

is a privilege, not a right and there are many people in this community who have to proceed on the basis that they have to do the best they can obviously with the assistance of the court.

1. This is a matter that has been in the system too long and the parties need finality. I cannot see how extending out a timetable for a matter as simple as costs to effectively the end of the year as the husband proposes is in anyway complying with the obligations on parties set out in s 67 and 68 of the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia Act 2021 (Cth) ("the Act"), or r 1.04 of the Federal Circuit And Family Court Of Australia (Family Law) Rules 2021 (Cth) which is to "facilitate the just resolution of disputes according to law and as quickly, inexpensively and efficiently as possible".
2. I had contemplated and discussed with the husband making an order that by close of business tomorrow, he put on proof that he will be overseas. His answers were less than satisfactory, including:
   • He does not actually have tickets;
   • It is a high probability he will be going; and
   • It is all being arranged for him by other people.
3. In those circumstances I am not going to require he put on any such proof. I have given my reasons as to why he has ample time between now and the timeframe that the wife proposes (and has had ample time for consideration since December 2024) to file whatever material he needs to with respect to the costs.
4. For those reasons I propose to make the timetable orders set out by the wife.
5. I will make a further order by consent that once the material is filed, the wife's costs application will be considered in Chambers. I will also order that if either party fails to comply with the timetable set out therein, the matter will be considered on an undefended basis.
6. Chambers will provide the husband with a copy of s 117 of the Act [which was the costs provision in force at the time of trial and filing of the costs application].

I certify that the preceding fifty-six (56) numbered paragraphs are a true copy of the Ex Tempore Reasons for Judgment of the Honourable Justice Brasch.

[1] [2023] FedCFamC1A 69; (2023) FLC 94-142 at [32]- [33],

[2] [1996] HCA 18; (1996) 189 CLR 1.

[3] Calder & Andrews [2016] FamCA 54 at [3].