What is the test for terminating a maintenance order based upon a former wife’s remarriage?

Lowe v. Lowe dealt with the wife’s remarriage and the headnote reads: “Thus an application to terminate a maintenance order based upon a former wife’s remarriage must be dealt with on its merits, without any presumption by way of public policy that maintenance should cease.”

Carmichael v. Carmichael is authority for the proposition that entering into a common law relationship will terminate spousal maintenance. See Proudfoot, J., at page 125: “It still remains in my opinion, contrary to public policy. It is wrong to force a former husband to support a previous wife when a new husband or spouse is in the picture.”

In Barnard v. Barnard, the wife was living in a common law relationship. The court granted her three years’ maintenance and the court took into consideration the fact that she was living common law.