£4,000 is a heck of a lot of money for photocopying, even if you’d budgeted for it.  At 10p a sheet, that’s 40,000 sheets of paper, although of course if more…

Family breakdown is the ‘most complained about area of law’, according to a new report out today. Excessive charges, poor service and customers who unfairly blamed lawyers for the outcome more…

Over some 30 years as a policy wonk, I have attended a fair number of report launches.  Some have been good, a few have been bad, but most have simply more…

We are used to hearing the terms ‘privacy’ and ‘confidentiality’. The intention is to protect the dignity of people who find themselves at the heart of cases. But at what more…

The Family Justice Review, the Courts Bill and Mr Justice Ryder’s response on behalf of the judiciary offers a once in a lifetime opportunity to modernise the family law system. more…

The long awaited report from Mr Justice Ryder was published yesterday – see here. For me the headline proposal from is the creation of a unified family court. For those more…

Children were suffering as a result of family cases taking too long to go through court, the Lord Chief Justice said yesterday. Lord Judge, introducing a new report following on more…

You’ve heard the adage that ‘prevention is better than the cure’. In the case of domestic abuse clearly that must ring true. Anyone who works with those at risk of more…

The Crown Prosecution Service last year prosecuted 91,000 cases involving violence against women and girls, up from 75,000 cases three years before, and convictions rose by 29% over the same more…

Amid continuing uncertainty around the Government’s Modern Workplaces proposals for reform of maternity and paternity rights at work, and continuing media reports of an increase in the number of pregnant more…

The day before district judge Richard Chapman talks to the JusticeGap is a typically frantic day at Telford County Court. On his list, there were 12 ‘Children Act’ cases featuring more…

A High Court judge yesterday blamed a ‘Hello magazine’ culture to marriage for fuelling a dramatic rise in divorce.  Sir Paul Coleridge, who sits in the Family Division, speaking on more…

The use of expert witnesses in family proceedings has raised controversy over many years. Concerns have been various: experts using the courts to promote views not shared by peers (copper more…

The Ministry of Justice yesterday tabled two amendments to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill. On domestic violence: Ministers have promised to ‘put it beyond doubt that more…

In the last 12 months or so, those of us involved in supporting families going through divorce and separation have been onlookers to any number of government announcements: Mediation will more…

The Government has announced plans to rewrite the law relating to legal disputes about children following their parents’ separation to create a legal presumption of shared parenting. This is in more…

Ministers have backed a ‘presumption of shared parenting’ between fathers and mothers following a relationship breakdown, flying in the face of the views of an independent review of family justice. more…

The demonization of young women was leading to a failure to secure more convictions of suspected rapists, according to Alison Saunders, the head of the Crown Prosecution Service in London. more…

Courts will be put under a legal duty to ensure that both fathers and mothers are given access to children in divorce settlements, according to a report in the Daily more…

After six years of decline in the divorce figures, they are back on the rise again. The Office for National Statistics announced yesterday that divorces rose by almost 5% in more…

After six years of decline in the divorce figures, they are back on the rise again. The Office for National Statistics announced yesterday that divorces rose by almost 5% in more…

Our legal aid system, of which we have been rightly proud, is facing the most devastating cuts in its history. The Bill is making its way through Parliament. It has more…

There has been a lot in the press recently about the inordinate and unconscionable delays in the making of adoption orders, the decline in number of orders and their general more…

The Supreme Court yesterday ruled that a man from who split up from his partner nearly two decades ago is not entitled to half the value of the house they more…

My parents had an ‘interesting’ marriage. Sometimes they were so interested in each other and their own battles that my brothers and I retreated to, in Social Service terms, a more…

According to a survey by Citizens Advice and the family lawyers’ group Resolution, of almost 1,000 cases involving family break up over half (54%) needed to be referred to a more…

Family rights campaigners have expressed ‘serious concerns that not more was being proposed to avert care proceedings’, in their response to the Family Justice Review’s final report out today. Cathy more…

The government has pulled the plug on its national mediation helpline whilst pledging to move out-of-court initiatives ‘centre stage’. The helpline was axed as a result of a continuing decline in more…

And so to Parliament again to hear about the impact of legal aid cuts on victims of domestic violence in a report by that very British group, the Women’s Institute. more…

There are times in our professional lives when, no matter how experienced we are, we face ethical and moral dilemmas. Mine revolves around the right of a young person to more…

A hotel porter won a share of his ex-wife’s £500,000 National Lottery payout in what is reckoned to be the first divorce case involving the distribution of a lottery windfall. more…

The Supreme Court ruled that immigration rules introduced in 2008 to bar foreign spouses from entering the UK if either spouse is under 21 was a disproportionate interference with the more…

KIM EVANS: The relatively innocent fumblings of teenagers can ruin young lives. Last year I represented a 17-year old male who had been arrested for rape, quite possibly the worst more…

When I was growing up in the 1970s and 80s (ok 60s and 70s) it seemed as if the major worry for parents of teens was pregnancy. Unmarried motherhood and more…

IAN ROBERTSON: We  look at the Family Drugs and Alcohol Court in London and Drug with envy. It seems so sensible and humane and so at odds with the reality more…

It was revealed that the number of babies adopted in England fell to just 60 last year  - compared to 3,660 under one year olds in care – according to more…

Many of us involved in care proceedings in the provinces have looked at the Family Drugs and Alcohol Court in London and Drug in London with envy. They seem so more…

Barnardos recently highlighted the worrying drop in baby-adoptions to just 60 last year. This led to some debate about speeding up the system in recognition of the fact that once more…

‘David Cameron talked about the 120,000 most dysfunctional families in the country in the wake of the riots. Well, we are tackling some of them and with some success,’ says more…

Divorces in England and Wales are apparently being held up by couples sniping over supermarket penalty points and air miles as the recession bites, according to Manchester-based law firm Pannones. more…