Ja: More on the Spousal Rights Act

Since this law is gender neutral, one assumes that two men living together, or two women doing the same, would be beneficiaries. But that story is for another day, ayah!

Here's anecdotal evidence of how women were disadvantaged in these common-law relationships. What's related here hold across the Caribbean.

Lorna Williams, a St. Andrew based computer specialist agrees. She has very intimate knowledge about the heartache and the pocket crunch encountered when a long-term relationship dissipates.

Williams, a 31-year-old mother of three, remembers vividly the morning when her father kicked her mother out of the home they shared for 14 years. "He was a wild man, and he had several women in the district. She made the mistake of going to him about it and he kicked her out," said Williams. She says the relationship between her father and his three children including herself became strained.

"Mommy got nothing from him and when he died, he left everything in the will to his new wife. We, the children, supported mommy, even now we support her and the house that they both lived in and she cleaned for the 17 years they were together, that other woman lives in it today," said Williams.

"It is about time, that Jamaica deal wid this thing properly," said Corlett Donaldson, 36-year-old nurse. Donaldson said that she felt the unfortunate effects of the old law. "I was with the man for nine years, from I was 21 until I was 30, and the relationship was no longer working. We lived together for five years. I left with my clothes and photographs." Donaldson says that the man told her that was all she was worth.

"Now a woman gets what she is worth. Because we contribute to our relationships every Jamaican woman does, whether financially or emotionally," said Donaldson.

Read the rest of the article to see how determinations of shares and valuations of property are made. See this site for a look at the bill itself.

Arthur! Manning! You guys listening to Jamaica on this?