Facts
The parties A.A. (husband) and B.A. (wife) married in 2018 and are parents of their common daughter C.A., born in 2018. On 21 October 2020, B.A. filed a divorce protection petition with the Cantonal Court of SocRA, requesting that the daughter be placed under her care, that the marital home be assigned to her and that A.A. be ordered to pay her and the daughter monthly maintenance of at least CHF 9,821.80.
The Cantonal Court of SocRA ruled on 14 October 2020 as follows: C.A. was placed under the mother’s care, the father’s visitation rights were regulated, and A.A. was ordered to pay a monthly maintenance contribution of CHF 7,462 (plus family allowance) for C.A. from 14 October 2020. Of this amount, CHF 2,311 (plus family allowance) was allocated to cash maintenance and CHF 5,151 to care maintenance. The marital home was assigned for the exclusive use of B.A. and C.A.
On appeal by A.A., the Higher Court of the Canton of SocRA changed the care arrangement to alternating care and reallocated the care shares. For the period from 14 October 2020 until B.A.’s move out of the marital home (at the latest until 30 June 2022), it set maintenance as follows: cash maintenance CHF 2,430 (plus family allowance), care maintenance CHF 3,250 and spousal maintenance CHF 1,830. For the period thereafter (from 1 July 2022), cash maintenance was set at CHF 2,110 (plus family allowance), care maintenance at CHF 2,410 and spousal maintenance at CHF 2,600.
A.A. filed a complaint with the Federal Supreme Court and objected to the obligation to pay spousal maintenance to B.A. He also requested that the cash maintenance for C.A. in the second phase (from 1 July 2022) be set at CHF 1,510 (plus family allowance). In the alternative, he requested that the matter be remitted to the lower court. B.A. requested that the complaint be dismissed insofar as it was admissible. The lower court declined to submit a statement.
Considerations
The Federal Supreme Court examined whether the Higher Court of the Canton of SocRA, by reducing the care maintenance and using the freed-up funds for spousal maintenance, had arbitrarily violated the principle of party disposition (Art. 58 para. 1 CPC). The principle of party disposition states that the court may not award a party more or something different than requested, nor less than the opposing party has acknowledged. In appellate proceedings, the principle of party disposition prohibits the appellate instance from exceeding the relief sought by the appellant and altering the first-instance judgment to the appellant’s detriment, unless the opposing party has filed a cross-appeal (prohibition of reformatio in peius).
The Federal Supreme Court found that the principle of party disposition applies to spousal maintenance in divorce protection proceedings, whereas child maintenance is governed by the principle of official investigation. The court is therefore not empowered to award a spouse more maintenance ex officio than requested. However, the appellate instance may, within the framework of the two-stage calculation method with surplus distribution, take into account the findings on child maintenance in the dispute over spousal maintenance. This applies in particular if the appellate instance obliges the parent liable for maintenance to pay a total amount of maintenance contributions that is significantly higher than the…