You’ve made the difficult decision to end your marriage and want to speak to a divorce lawyer. You may be nervous about the first call with your divorce lawyer or simply not know where to start. This blog will help you prepare and make the most of the conversation with…
As a family law solicitor, I have many frustrations; solicitors on the other side who don’t return my calls, the inability to secure a preferred barrister for a hearing because they are already booked and even the odd client who doesn’t take my advice and hinders their case. The most…
There’s been a lot of talk in the last week about so called ‘divorce week’ at the start of January – the busiest week of the year for us divorce solicitors. Personally, I don’t think this is something to highlight. It’s like cheering when your team loses at football. This…
Divorce isn’t easy for anyone involved. The husband and wife, kids, grandparents, friends. Everyone will be affected in different ways. The key thing is to navigate the process and negotiations in as calm a sea as possible. In my experience, dads can often feel like they get the rawest deal…
We’re happy cohabiting, why bother getting married? Like millions of others our Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, and his partner, Carrie Symonds, have chosen to live together rather than get married. In fact, I read that around 3.4 million people in the UK now live together as cohabitees rather than getting…
Divorcing couples with children often find reaching an agreement about the care of their children after divorce or separation pretty difficult. Those who cannot reach an agreement amicably find themselves asking the family court to decide. Either party can make an application for what is known as a child arrangements…
What is a special guardianship order? A Special Guardianship order is one that members of a child’s family may consider where the child or children are being cared for permanently by family members other than their parents. This could apply for example to grandparents, aunts or uncles. There are a…
Since the early 1990s Child Support Agency (CSA) (now called the Child Maintenance Service (CMS)) has dealt with financial support for children. This means that in the majority of cases the court cannot decide how much child support is payable. However, where one or other parent lives outside England or…
It costs the British economy approximately £71.1m per year according to the NHS. The personal cost is immeasurable. Its victims make up an estimated 70% of those out of work. Stress. We’ve all heard of it and at some point during our lives (probably more than we’d care to admit)…
The last few months have been strange, to say the least. With seemingly mixed understanding of the danger outside, the Government asked us to stay inside as much as possible and closed businesses and schools. Whilst key and essential workers carried on the majority of people were either furloughed or…
ADR seems to be a new buzz word in family law at the moment. Alternative Dispute Resolution has been mentioned much in context of family mediation, as mediation is an example of ADR. However, an alternative route to mediation is collaborative divorce. I’ve talked about collaborative family law a number…