I’ve started to watch The Café, a gentle new comedy set in Weston-Super-Mare. It’s written and produced by Ralf Little and Craig Cash, both of Royle Family fame, and it’s a pleasure to watch. They understand elderly people, who are treated with love and respect by the youngsters around them. The theme music, ‘Beyond the Sea’, is sung beautifully too.

My parents, who are getting on a bit now, like going to cafes. In recent years they have called me at our Harrogate office and I have joined them for a cup of tea or snack at Bettys or Harlow Carr Gardens. We have had time for a chat and then, for me, it has been back to work. In the mirror, I have watched them smile proudly, as parents do, as they have watched me leave.

In the months leading up to my mother’s recent hospitalisation, my parents were doing their best to cope with the ceaseless impact of her diabetes. It is truly a cruel disease from which there is no respite for the sufferer or the carer. My mum became increasingly dependent on my dad for help; my dad assisted her with all her personal needs as well as running their home, doing their shopping and maintaining a semblance of normal life. He was, as we all recognised, running himself into the ground and desperately in need of help.

Debilitating illness takes its toll on everyone. Ruby, a carer, was finally recruited to assist them – but only after a struggle because my dad, our family’s very own Hercules, was reluctant to accept that he shouldn’t and couldn’t be trying to cope on his own. Ruby is wonderful and, since coming into our family a year ago, she has done her very best. However it has been a difficult year for a couple as fiercely independent as my parents are, especially for my dad who believes that he, and only he, can ever look after my mum properly.

Even so, my parents would not give up their visits to cafes. So two became three and I began meeting my mum, dad and Ruby for tea. For most of us it is a great pleasure: a break in the day to have a cup of tea and relax. For my parents it has become something else: a battle to be won and a symbol of their determination to keep going.

I hated seeing them so different to the strong healthy parents I had known and loved. As autumn drew in, my mum had to be warmly dressed before they could go out to a café. She had to be helped to put on a jacket over her cardigan. She had to wear different shoes. It took ages. They had to go in the lift from their apartment down to the garage, with my mum in her wheelchair. Then the wheelchair had to be collapsed and loaded into the car boot, before they could get in. My dad would drive, with Ruby in the back of the car and my mum in the front.

Five minutes later when they reached their destination, the café at The Mansion in Leeds’ Roundhay Park, they had to find a parking spot nearby. The wheel chair had to be carried from the boot and carefully reassembled, with foot plates, and then wheeled round to my mum’s side of the car. With help, Mum would somehow get into the wheel chair and would then be wheeled to the nearby café. It all took ages. It was a struggle from the moment the decision – a simple one, for most – was made to “go out for a cup of tea”. It usually took an hour or more to get ready.

One day in early autumn I called my parents on my back from the Cheshire office, and learned they were about to go again to the Roundhay Park café for tea. So I arranged to meet them there. I arrived just as my mum was being wheeled inside.  How I wished I could turn back time!  How much would I have given to see them having a cup of tea, with my mum taking charge and pouring tea out of the teapot for me, her daughter? Instead the four of us tried to overlook disabilities, had our tea and laughed together.

For some reason, it all came back to me as I watched The Café yesterday. I was with my mum at Aunty Doo Doo’s , where my parents are now living. Mum was propped up on pillows in bed, all tucked up, pretty in pink and bright as a button. She was telling Ruby and me about her own, special method of pastry-making, which I definitely intend to try one day.

My dad was watching the television, sitting in a chair. As usual, he pretended he wasn’t interested in the conversation – but I noticed him listening to everything I said to my mum, and smiling as she described her pastry-making.

I’d had a hard day at work, and was due to head off for London. It was dark, bitterly cold and snowing. I suddenly thought: what would I give now, just to see my mum being pushed in her wheelchair in an autumnal Roundhay Park?  Could I have imagined ever having such thoughts in autumn, when things were different and instead I longed to see my parents walk into the cafe, and have my mum pour me a cup of tea?

I am learning much from my parents about accepting disability. Every day may be a struggle, but they are living their lives together, and they wouldn’t have it any other way. My parents are still themselves: full of inner strength, and determined to spend all the time they have in one another’s company. Right now they cannot struggle to a café five minutes from home, but I do not doubt that  they intend to do so again in the spring. In the meantime, they don’t complain. They remain together, the bedrock of our family. Long may my dear parents both stay that way.

Our parents have been staying at her home, following my mum’s recent stay in hospital.

The lovely Ruby, who is my mum’s devoted carer, is also staying there. So on Friday night the roll call was extensive: Aunty Doo Doo, her husband, their daughter and fiancé; his parents; our parents and Ruby; my brother and his family, us and their two dogs. What the future in- laws thought of us, in the midst of complete chaos, where we all had to pitch in I can’t begin to imagine.

“Did you ever see the movie Meet The Fockers?” I asked them at one point, thinking of the film in which Ben Stiller’s in-laws meet his wacky family. Although they had not, and this was their first visit to meet us, they took the madness in good part – even when my sister’s two little dogs burst through the French doors into the dining room and ran under the table to play with the guests’ legs. As we were leaving, my husband’s big feet sent the dogs’ water bowl in the hall flying and soaked the carpet. Abby and Jonny, madly in love, sailed through it all, oblivious. Jonny has turned out to be a perfect fit for the family. He’s seen us au naturel for some time now and never flinched. Long may he stay that way!

As for me, I was tired out. Last week was as hectic a week as I can remember. Our firm’s PR company, Tinderbox Media, leapt into action when the Kernott v Jones judgment was handed down on Wednesday. I was despatched to London and I appeared on BBC Breakfast the next morning, and also wrote a half-page editorial with advice for cohabiting couples, which appeared in The Daily Telegraph on Saturday.

There was no time for praise, or discussion at dinner. There was too much going on.  Mum fights a daily battle to keep going. She amazes me with her resilience and bravery: how does she manage to keep her spirits up? She and my dad sat and smiled through the chaotic dinner. They were clearly delighted to be surrounded by the family and the future in laws. Dad is nearly 80, but copes wonderfully and always has a brave face despite his fears and concerns.

He has himself become something of a “mini celebrity” recently. The photograph of him running with Sir Jimmy Savile (below) has appeared in a number of local newspapers, submitted by others who were also in the picture. He smiled when everyone teased him at dinner about being famous. I told the future in-laws about his brilliant marathon running career (Dad has run more than 50 marathons in his time) and they were clearly impressed.

The conversation turned to my hobby of going to spinning classes at the local gym. I told them my favourite lesson of the week was coming up on Sunday morning, with an instructor who is also trained in Thai boxing and gets the class cycling faster, harder and reaching higher levels than the rest. He is fantastic.

It’s funny how coincidences happen. As I was leaving the spinning class on Sunday, I thanked the instructor. Out of the blue he asked me how my father was. I have no idea how he knew the connection, perhaps he saw him in the Jimmy Savile photos in the press. Anyhow it turns out that 20 years ago, when a youngster he used to wash dad’s car. He lived with his mum behind the local pizza restaurant, and he recalled dad being “a real gentleman”. He said some great things about Dad and asked me to pass on his best wishes, although he thought that Dad would probably have forgotten him.

Forgotten him? Dad remembered him in a flash. “Nice lad”, he said. “They had it tough. He lost his father quite young. Very nice lad.” He said nothing more and didn’t need to. My dad is a very decent man.

So Jonny, what kind of family are you marrying into? Do you need to panic? I don’t think so.  Consider this from me, (one of its more mature members) to you. This weekend my dear father had, unspoken, taught me another important lesson in life about values that really count.

It’s very exciting to appear on TV, to appear in national newspapers and to receive positive comments afterwards, all in one week. But none of that can ever compare to acts of decency and kindness that survive in the hearts and memories of others for twenty years.

Thanks Dad.

Matthew Syed has written about Paternity Fraud in today’s Times:

“It hardly needs stating that this is scandalous. To put the interests of the child above the father’s right to know may sound benign but it is deeply pernicious. Imagine a man whose bank account is covertly robbed to pay for the upbringing of a child with whom he has no kinship. To inform the man of the fraud would clearly be contrary to the interests of the child. Would we really say that he should not be told?”

The feature cites cases of celebrities who have attempted to escape the consequences of their paternity. It quotes statistics which, at closer range, appear to be largely unproven. Mr Syed’s view about Paternity Fraud – or “PF”, as he calls it – is as follows:

“PF is unlike any other crime: it is a deception that reaches deep into our evolutionary selves. The urge to propagate one’s genes, to nurture one’s own flesh and blood, is the most basic of all impulses. A single DNA test might not merely unravel a lifetime of commitment; it could make a mockery of one’s raison d’être.”

I carefully read through this article several times, and tried to find the relevant statistical evidence to back up the claims about those millions of duped men across the planet. I found little. There are references made to a “current best estimate” and “unpublished data”, which apparently adds up to tens of thousands of men in this country and tens of millions worldwide. However hard data, to prove these claims beyond reasonable doubt, is not in evidence.

So is this issue as rampant and universal as Mr Syed would have us believe? He can only quote from one unpublished survey, which drew upon DNA samples from an unnamed number of “volunteer families” in the UK and identified an estimated Paternity Fraud rate of 7 per cent. Among a group of volunteer Ashkenazi Jews, the estimated Paternity Fraud rate was nil. The hysteria makes for good headlines, certainly, but is it founded in fact?

In the UK there were no restrictions on paternity tests until the Human Tissue Act 2004 came into force in September 2006. Section 45 states that it is an offence to possess without appropriate consent any human bodily material with the intent of analysing its DNA. Legally declared fathers have access to paternity testing under the new regulations, provided the parental DNA being tested is their own. They may not test other people’s DNA without their consent. Tests may however be ordered by courts when proof of paternity is required and the Ministry of Justice accredits bodies that can conduct this testing.

So should there ever be an unqualified and unregulated “right to know” as this journalist suggests, without recourse first of all to the courts to consider the whole matter in detail? I could not disagree more strongly.

The journalist argues for the rights of the father over the rights of the child. But that is not how the law relating to children is applied. The welfare of the (wholly innocent) child takes precedence and is paramount. Once a case comes to court I of course accept that honesty and the “right to know” is the most likely outcome, it being generally accepted that it is usually in the best interests of the child to know its origins.

But it isn’t a foregone conclusion and if there are cogent reasons, such as compelling psychiatric evidence that a child will be profoundly harmed by being told the truth, the court will have to weigh up the pros and cons and make a carefully considered order. They will always act on the fundamental basis that the welfare of the child is paramount and consider if the most serious long-term harm could be caused to a child who casually learns the truth of his or her parentage.

In any event, for all those tens of thousands of fathers who we are led to believe may be fretting about the paternity of their children, consider this: does it really matter whether a child is the biological offspring of his or her father? Does it really matter if a loving father and his child never find out? What harm is being done to the man, child or woman concerned – that is until they find out and the predictable fallout occurs? And yes, I have noted the practical arguments about possible, unintentional incest in the future– but is that barely a possibility, let alone a probability?

As a divorce lawyer who has acted for some 10,000 clients over the past 25 years, I wearied of the blame game long ago. I have spent my professional life advising many, many men and women who have been caught in the adultery trap. They are not monsters; they are human beings.

Nor do I believe that women who have had affairs are fundamentally wicked creatures who should be required to confess all, if they have become pregnant by one man and have decided to save their relationship by shielding a partner and child – and, in most cases, themselves – from the truth.

Human beings aren’t robots. Life happens to all of us. In the cases that I encounter, the truth has come out and the relationship has cracked beyond repair. In such cases the divorce won’t necessarily have been caused by the adulterous actions, but by the subsequent knowledge of those actions and the inability of both parties to move on.

In Webb v Chapman [2009] EWCA Civ 55 a father tried to sue his ex-wife for deceiving him over the paternity of her daughter. The couple divorced after a DNA test when the child was over 18 showed that the husband was not in fact the daughter’s genetic father. He unsuccessfully claimed damages against his ex-wife and her new partner at Bournemouth County Court and applied, unsuccessfully, to the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal against the ruling of the court below. Given all the hassle caused, I wonder, was it ultimately worth it?

The “right to know” is also acknowledged by Mr Syed to have wrought appalling effects on fathers who have found out the truth: “anger, angst and even metaphysical confusion”. He acknowledges that the ripple effect of knowing the truth has serious ramifications, not only for the man and woman, but also for the child. Not forgetting the siblings, the wider family, the biological father, the community and so on.

So here is a question to which I have no doubt you will all have different opinions. Can all that harm and all that trauma be justified simply because of the man’s “right to know”?

I don’t think it is. I don’t support the decision by Boots to sell paternity testing kits over the counter.  Experience has taught me, time and time again, that no good comes of opening Pandora’s Box. All over the world, people make mistakes.  Sometimes they come to regret those mistakes. But “knowing” at the expense of an innocent child and the wider families seems to me to be selfish beyond measure. Sometimes in society we consider our “rights” to be so sacrosanct, so precious and important, we become deliberately or unintentionally oblivious of the harm that “rights” can do to others.

As a pragmatist, a realist and someone who is firmly on the side of the wholly innocent child, I believe that the “right to know” should always come second. And as for selling paternity kits over the counter? They should be banned.

I told him how I had my own little boy, who could sometimes be very careless indeed.  I mentioned how my own little boy had once phoned me for help very late at night from London, because he had unfortunately dropped his flat keys down the lift shaft. As the boy tut-tutted, I went on to tell him that because I was 300 miles away at the time and it was the middle of the night, there was little I could do. I also pointed out that my little boy is a whole 20 years older than him!

“Well, I’m very careful with my padlock”, said the boy, while his mum laughed proudly.

Looking at this gorgeous little three-year-old, as he chatted away merrily, I wondered whether I’d go back 20 years if I could, and do it all over again. Back to the days of Ben and his cousins all growing up together, playing and having fun. Those were great years: the photo above has pride of place in my home, and makes everybody who sees it smile.

But you can’t turn back time. Instead, time rolls on and people grow older. That truth is beautifully captured in The Lion King, a magical show that the children loved to watch. They first saw it when they were all around six to eight years old, and it was probably the first time they ever had to think about the meaning of life, although as little children they couldn’t have understood it properly.

The “Circle of Life” is The Lion King’s best known song. As we adults know, that circle never, ever, stops. We can’t keep that wheel from turning: however hard we try it won’t stop, not even for a minute. Time never stands still or goes backwards. Millions of people are born onto the wheel and millions of people leave it. It is the way of Nature.

Those carefree cousins are now 20 years older. They have finished their education and are out in the wide world. They have started to live their own lives, make relationships and move onwards. Their grandmother is also 20 years older – and she is now very ill. She is fighting hard and is, as always, brave and uncomplaining. It is incredible how she handles it all. There is no bitterness. Her frail body may be betraying her, but her mind is still as sharp and as bright as ever. She keeps smiling!

In extremis last week, she responded to her devoted husband as he sang “Unforgettable” to her, quietly, over her hospital bed. She opened her weak eyes, looked up at him and smiled. Her watching children, every one of them heartbroken by the sight of this ever-loving couple, were in tears. And then amazingly, she rallied again overnight, as she has done in the past.

My sister, known to our family as “Aunty Doo Doo” from those early years when the children made it up and loved to keep saying it instead of her own name, has devoted herself to rebuilding our mum’s strength as best she can. Last week she was searching around for a wide-necked flask which would hold not only her own special chicken soup, made at night when she came home from the hospital, but homemade kreplach and knaidles too. Unhappy with nurses run off their feet and high levels of MRSA in our mother’s hospital ward, she has scooped up our beloved mother and our father as well into her personal care. She has taken them to her home and, if sheer willpower, round-the-clock dedication, chicken soup and good haimische food will once again get them both back on track together, she will do it. She has done it before.

It has now been two years since my mum was last very ill, with what was then the first terrible impact of type 1 diabetes. The young adult cousins, coming to terms with their grandmother’s increasingly debilitating illness, have responded selflessly. They are travelling from all over the country to visit and help. My brother knows how to supply the humour – and even Mum, tired as she is, can’t help but laugh. It’s a pleasure to see.

Thinking of how we are all coping in different ways, with the very heart of our family in turmoil, I have been thinking back more than 20 years ago –to when Aunty Doo Doo started “big school”, and I was a year ahead. On her first day I went to see how she was doing – and I found her in the sick room, crying. She wasn’t crying for herself, but for our mum and how she would cope without my sister at lunchtimes!

Aunty Doo Doo has never changed. She has always been the same. She has looked after her family, her parents, the young cousins, all of us, as only the most devoted daughter and family member ever could or would. Her parents, of course, set her that example. They did the same for their parents. And it’s because of our mum that my sister can now turn out the perfect Dutch apple pie (big or individual size), every variety of kuchen, darkest ginger cake, chocolate cake, strudel and double cream velvet cheesecake, besides the obligatory (and perfect) fish balls, holishkes, tsimmes and pot roasts.  Not forgetting that chicken soup filled with onions, carrots, thick knaidles and kreplach. In fact, when I think of my mum’s cooking, the most simple food always tasted delicious, especially her pastry – and it’s no wonder I was a chunky teenager! I loved her warm buttered scones and jam tarts that were just coming out of the oven when we came home from school…

Cooking is very much about love and passing it down the family. Aunty Doo Doo has learned it all from her and is continuing the tradition. Aunty Doo Doo’s daughters are learning from her in turn. Although I can claim no credit at all, my son Ben is also tremendous in the kitchen.  He may be careless with his door keys, but he is a diligent cook and he loves to cook for our family. Ben served lunch to all 18 of us, including my parents, at the Jewish New Year. His beaming face said it all.

As time relentlessly turns, we face what the future has in store for us. Our family is the same as every other family. We have our ups and downs and highs and lows. However because of the three-year-old boy in the changing room yesterday, the memories have come flooding back and I am filled with gratitude, respect and love for my family, with whom I am so privileged to travel the Circle of Life.

The questions might have seemed a little more humdrum, but they were equally important to us. Did we have enough dinnerware and cutlery? Enough cooking pans, tins and cookware generally? The answer was no, and after rushing out to get some we then began to think about what we intend to serve.

In our family we traditionally take turns to host everyone over New Year. So tomorrow night my sister will entertain a growing number of people around her table – eighteen at present, including new fiancés and husbands. My sister-in-law will take over with her fabulous cooking for lunch the following day. And finally it will be my turn to welcome the family on Friday.  I say my turn, but it is really Ben’s, as out of the three of us he is the only one who can cook! Fortunately, he is a great cook and loves entertaining.

Tomorrow evening the men in the family will go to synagogue for a short service to begin the New Year, after which we will all eat. The following two days involve everyone going to the synagogue for the New Year services, after which we all eat lunch at around 3pm. And how we eat! These coming days will see groaning tables and most people gaining at least a few extra pounds, because every hostess (or in our case, the host) will want to make sure their guests leave thoroughly well entertained, wined and dined.

Traditionally people wear new clothes to the synagogue and tend to sit chatting to nearby friends and family, despite the best efforts of those conducting the service to keep people’s minds focussed and quiet. It never happens. Women sit with other women, men with men, and the division which is supposed to keep people’s minds focussed actually achieves the precise opposite. It makes it that much easier to sit and catch-up with your neighbour about women’s stuff – and men do the same with their friends nearby. My husband attends Synagogue every Saturday and I’m convinced that one reason is to find out all the gossip from his friends. He says it’s fun and very relaxing. Possibly it is for him, as the rest of the week is spent with me!

The New Year synagogue service is very long, so some people don’t tend to get there until it is well underway. The downside is that you have to walk past the rest of the thousand-strong congregation to take your seat, all of whom do notice the time of your arrival.

Over the past few days my mind has been preoccupied as I’ve been mentally arranging my diary before I leave for the holiday. I’ve got so much work to do and the pre-holiday push meant it was all getting a bit frantic. But driving to the office in Harrogate this morning calmed me down, mainly because the scenery of the Yorkshire Dales and Vale of York seemed especially gorgeous. The weather is wonderful, with the sun lower in the sky and seeming to bathe everything in light. Autumn is arriving in a glory of rust and golden coloured leaves, which are set against the green fields and hills in the distance. Regardless of whether you believe in the creator as I do, it’s surely hard not to feel overwhelmed and by the beauty of the world we live in.

The Jewish New Year is a time for reflection: to remember your fragile mortality, think about how you have conducted yourself over the last year and in what ways you can improve yourself and do better. Although everyone will be chattering away in the synagogue, they will all uniformly fall silent and stand when the Shofar is blown. It is a ram’s horn – and when sounded it makes a noise like no other. It is a thin, almost still sound that manages to seem majestic at the same time.

And as people listen to it they are suddenly taken out of their comfort zone. No-one is important anymore, everyone is completely exposed. Rich or poor, man, woman or child – all are equal and humbled before the sound of the Shofar. I think the sound is unnerving. It is a sound designed to make you think, and it does. Not everyone listening to the Shofar this year will live to hear it next year, but for those who know they are unwell, or going through tough times, its sound reaches into your heart and brings comfort. The sound of the Shofar always helps to convince me that there is far more to the Universe than any one of us knows about.

I have learned through the ups and downs of my life that no-one ever “has it all”. It may seem that way to others, but no-one is untouched by life. We get given the most precious of gifts; we get to experience the true wonders of this world and the decent people who live in it. But at the same time we can also be hurt, or hurt others, and as a result we all suffer. Life often throws curve balls at us when we least expect them and there is little we can do about it – except deal with the situation in the best way we possibly can.

The New Year always brings these thoughts to my mind. It makes me realise that how we deal with the upsides and downsides of life determines the type of person we really are, and more importantly, shapes how the next generation will conduct themselves. They can only learn from the examples we set them. Ultimately, it isn’t the material things in life that will ever count. It is our responses to life, our reactions to that which every one of us experiences which counts. The most important task of our lives is surely to ensure the next generation possesses the highest values: taught to always show love, respect, compassion and tolerance. “Love thy Neighbour as thyself” is the central tenet of true Judaism. Regardless of faith, does anything else really matter?

Shana Tovah. A very happy, healthy and good New Year to all.

Image credit: “Shofar”, Marc Chagall.

A recent post –

It’s a fictitious scenario, with a puzzle at the end, which centres upon a rocky marriage. The wife is shying away from the truth. The husband is consumed with the guilt of an illicit affair. Their eldest child has guessed, and is threatening to reveal all.

I am asking you to give your opinion of the outcome. You don’t need to be a lawyer to take part and, although it’s a puzzle, there are no right or wrong answers. Why ‘Chocolate Box Family’? Because the best answer received before Monday 29 August will win a box of chocolates and a bottle of champagne!

Tom and Gwen are in their late 40s. They married 20 years ago after living together for three years. They have three children: William, 17, is about to begin a gap year. Sally, 14, attends a local private school. Rupert, 7, is also at private school.

The family live in the (fictional) town of Middleswich. Their comfortable, detached home is close to a commuter rail link to London. The house is worth about £950,000.

The house has a mortgage of £350,000. Tom purchased the property in his name 10 years ago, because he provided an additional deposit of £200,000. This was an inheritance from his late father, without which the house could not have been afforded. The mortgage is high because extra money was borrowed only recently on the mortgage, to pay for a large dining kitchen area and patio with a bedroom above.

Tom commutes daily to London, a 50-minute journey each way. His fare is paid by his employers. Tom works in corporate finance and has steadily progressed up the career ladder. He earns about £180,000 per annum gross, about £95,000 net. His pensions are now worth about £400,000. The perks of his job include free, private healthcare for all the family.

Tom and Gwen have managed to save about £100,000, in Gwen’s name for tax reasons.

Gwen used to be a high-flying corporate executive herself. When William was born she gave up her job by agreement. Every day she takes the children to their respective schools, in her rundown estate car. She co-ordinates the children’s after-school activities and helps them with their homework. She cooks, does the housework and looks after the family dogs. Three mornings a week, Gwen does voluntary work at the local hospice.

Gwen is dependent on Tom for the household income. She can’t imagine going back to her previous work. Technologically and professionally, she is years behind. Sometimes Gwen resents giving up the corporate life, but mostly she is content looking after their family and their home. She spends about £3,000 per month on herself, the children and some household expenses. Tom pays the mortgage and school fees direct.

Tom hates his daily commute, but for the last eight months he has enjoyed the company of another London commuter. Sonia is 38. A high-flyer, she is a married mother-of-two. Her husband is a musician. During the day he stays at home and cares for their young children. He talks of fame, but it has never happened and Sonia has become bored with him.

Somebody who does interest her is Tom. He is everything her husband is not. He is steady, dependable and a high earner. Very soon they are having drinks together after work and one thing leads to another and…

Tom comes to see you, for urgent advice about a divorce. He sits with his head in his hands, and tells you that he doesn’t know what to do. Sonia has made him feel alive again. He can’t stop thinking about her. He can’t imagine giving her up. Yet he admits that he still feels terrible about Gwen. He thinks of her more as a friend nowadays. She is too wrapped up in the children. She never bothers about how she looks. She cares more about the dogs than about him. It will break her heart to move house, he is sure, but he thinks it has to be done.

He is also sure that Gwen will be able to manage without him. Now that Rupert is at school until 3.30pm, couldn’t she go back to work and earn a decent living? Ideally Tom would like his £200,000 inheritance back and at least a half-share of the house, plus his pension. Gwen could keep her £100,000. He doesn’t mind paying generously for the children, but doesn’t see why he should share his inheritance or pay long-term maintenance to Gwen. It doesn’t seem fair.

The main reason he is here, he confesses, is that William saw him get off the train with Sonia. William, no fool, keeps asking embarrassing questions. He has informed Tom that if anything is going on with “that woman”, William will never speak to his father again. William is also threatening to tell Gwen, Sally and Rupert. He says that if he does so, they will all hate Tom forever.

Sonia is pushing Tom to leave. She says that if he does, so will she. She will leave her children with their house-husband father, and Tom and Sonia can move to an apartment in Central London.

Tom is in a panic. He needs to decide what to do and feels that it is all running away from him.

He tells you that Gwen is aware of a problem, but has convinced herself that his recent mood swings, absences overnight in London and general change of attitude are all caused by the pressure of the daily commute. In Tom’s words: “Typically, she thinks it’s better to say nothing and hope all will blow over”. Even when Gwen received a note through her letterbox from a local musician, alleging a relationship between Tom and his wife, she quickly tore it up and dismissed the incident as mischief-making.

So, what is YOUR advice for this family?

For example, can this marriage be saved and if so, how?

If the couple does divorce, what do you think would be a fair financial settlement and why? How should they best prepare the children?

What do you think?

Enter now, by leaving your comment below. Good luck!

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UPDATE: This competition has now closed.

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Image credit: ‘Composition X’ by Kandinsky.

After Getty returned to the USA, La Posta Vecchia became a hotel and this is my second visit. I could go on (and on!) about the peace and quiet, the food, the always friendly staff, the uninterrupted views of the sea, the terrace, the beach, the sumptuous furnishings, the garden… But what I love above all is being able to jump onto one of the bicycles and to make my way through the manicured grounds. I cycle past the organic vegetable gardens, past the grass tennis court, past the heliport where I once watched a Russian oligarch and his entourage land – and out through the imposing gate.

I like to cycle along the lengthy, tree-lined avenue, where I can join lots of happy Italian families, cycling slowly on their bikes, or jogging or walking to the sea. The pace of life is very slow, and everyone is relaxed and smiling. I remember childhood holidays spent in Italy with my family. Now I am here as an adult, a mum myself, cycling with other parents, children, grandparents and friends. There is ice cream, food, wine and good weather. A tiny train, filled with happy passengers, toots as it wends its way through the seaside streets, just as it did years ago when I was riding on it too.

On Sunday we visited Rome. Standing in the gardens of the Villa Borghese, we enjoyed the spectacular view. From there you can take in the nearby Spanish Steps, packed with tourists. The view stretches all the way to the Vatican City, where you can make out St Peter’s Square and its celebrated dome. There are so many churches, statues, fountains, squares, historic buildings and bridges, it takes your breath away. It is impossible not to be overawed by the beauty of this city.
Of course, Rome is known for more than its beauty. The unyielding, absolute power that went into creating the city, spanning thousands of years, is laid out for all visitors to see. The famous Roman motto SPQR is carved into ancient and modern buildings everywhere. The Latin reads Senatus Populus Que Romanus, which translates as The Senate and the People of Rome. Those letters remind everyone that Rome was the centre of power and success.
Looking out at the city, I was also reminded of its colder, more steely side, where several thousand  years of history, politics and religion all come together. Where once, life or death depended upon an upturned or downturned thumb. Where more recently, a Fascist dictator reigned  and is still remembered in the heart of many of the city’s most magnificent buildings. And where today the Pope, the head of one of the most powerful religions in the world, rules the Vatican: a state within a state, surrounded by some of the greatest works of art ever produced, venerated by millions around the world as the true representative of heaven on earth. Power produced the Rome of today, and some of that power remains.

So why was I musing upon power? Perhaps it was a little story, carried in the Sunday press, which I found sad and depressing. It centres upon a woman who complains about the use (or abuse?) of power as she sees it in her divorce. Her soon-to-be ex-husband is a high court judge. Is the system ranged against her? “I am being totally stitched up by the judiciary”, she is supposed to have said.

There is no doubt that her husband is a formidable opponent. The article has details of how the case is locked away in a special cabinet in the Principal Registry in London, protected from intrusive eyes, how he has has demanded various undertakings of the wife and how the case has been transferred out of Central London to Somerset. The husband is trying to stop his wife talking to the media, and his solicitor claims that an order “preventing information being released to the Press” has been obtained.

Apparently the wife has described this behaviour as “pathetic bullying”. On the other hand, I doubt that the husband sees it that way at all. I imagine that he finds the media attention tiresome and embarrassing. It seems to me that the only way to resolve that particular case, and for all the parties involved to return to normality, is to settle as quickly as possible on terms that are actually agreed, not imposed.

On another note, last week’s publication of a peculiar paper on media access and reporting in the family courts has also been playing on my thoughts. The Judicial Communications Office is “confident [the paper] will be of practical use to journalists, judges and practitioners alike”.  However I think it’s fair to say that much of the content is baffling to lawyers, given the complexity of the subject matter and content. Far from being empowering, the paper must surely be incomprehensible to many litigants in person. Clearly there is still some way to go before our legal system becomes more “open” to all.

Looking across Rome I fell to thinking that, even with the best of intentions, perhaps power can be used too easily – or just perceived to be used too easily – without an understanding of how crushing the results can be. Then again, perhaps the consequences are fully understood.

Power can be disturbing. As undoubtedly magnificent as Rome was, I couldn’t shake the knowledge that the city had been founded and fed upon power, and that its power had been cruelly exercised throughout history. Returning from the city to the sleepy seaside, where I could cycle invisibly among the throng of carefree holidaymakers once again, was a simple joy to treasure.

This is a very sensitive and difficult area for any family lawyer. Abuse is a common reason for the breakdown of a marriage. In such cases, both spouses may be happy and successful in public, but in private, living secret miserable lives: one the abuser, the other the abused. As Anna Moore points out, the abused spouse may also be the more successful of the two.

One spouse’s aggression, verbal and/or physical, causes serious erosion of self-confidence in the less dominant spouse. Over time the aggressor will become increasingly aggressive and abusive as his control increases over the weaker spouse. She is less likely to resist and fight back. She has less ability to fight as hard or for as long. It becomes a power game in which the aggressive spouse will always be stronger. (Please note that although the aggressor is male in this example, the aggressor is not necessarily a “he”. At least a third of victims are male.)

Constant abuse makes it very difficult to leave a marriage. Sometimes the abused spouse believes it to be impossible, because she is trapped in a vicious downward spiral. The less self-confident she becomes, the lower her self-esteem, the harder it is to make the decision to leave.

She may try to rationalise the decision: she is staying for the sake of the children. Or she fears he will fight her over the children – and she has no strength or appetite for the fight.  But is it healthy for children to be living in an abusive relationship? Are they not likely to repeat this behaviour themselves, if that is the example set by their parents?

I find that women in this situation are usually very sensitive. They prefer to avoid any conflict and can’t cope with naked aggression at close quarters, whether verbal or emotional. The aggressor spouse may not be perceived in public as aggressive.  He or she may be popular, the life and soul of the party, because the other side of that character is so carefully hidden.

In my experience, if the weaker spouse does manage to consult a lawyer, it is likely to be because her friend or relative has almost forced her to come out of concern for her wellbeing. It is then by no means certain she will proceed. The decision may prove too difficult even though, objectively, it makes sense.

As lawyers, part of our job in such a situation is to recognise it, to assist the client in alleviation of her signs of depression and to help with the restoration of her self-confidence and self-esteem. We may recommend to counselling or perhaps to her GP, who may prescribe a short course of non-addictive antidepressants to restore her mood.

If instructed, at first we will need to keep boosting the client in a positive way, helping her to come to terms with the need to make her own decisions about her private life with confidence – rather than believing she still has to have decisions made for her by a controlling spouse.

Within a relatively short period we will see changes. The client will begin to overcome her fears, start to think for herself, make her own decisions about her future and, eventually, give us instructions with increased confidence. Her health will noticeably improve, her appearance also. If she has lost or gained weight, it will return to normal. She will not only see her spouse for what he truly is, she will also be able to resist him and finally accept that the relationship is completely over.

She’s alpha at work but she’s bullied at home

High-achieving women are being abused by their partners but failing to get help, say experts. Anna Moore reports.

I have a friend, a contemporary, let’s call her Bea, whose career has rocketed ahead of mine and into another stratosphere. She’s an executive — and at work people kowtow to her, say what she wants to hear and laugh at her jokes, regardless of whether or not they’re funny.

At home, though, the picture is different. Bea commands no respect when she walks through her door. Her husband, who fits his own freelance career around their son’s school hours, is more often than not in a bad mood. This can mean that he will ignore Bea and remain upstairs in his office for the entire evening — that’s the preferable option. On other days he will greet Bea with a cutting comment, usually about her appearance: her clothes, her hair, her make-up, her weight. But Bea can handle that and file away any hurt feelings. Occasionally, though, he’ll fly at her.

“It could be that I’m late home,” says Bea, 42. “Or that Ocado had turned up in the middle of the day and I’d forgotten to say that it was coming. Once I hadn’t taken a letter he’d left for me to post on the way to work. He’ll have sulked and sulked and my key in the door is his cue to explode.” Over the past few years her raging husband has broken bowls, dented a door, blocked Bea’s path, pinned her against a wall and thrown items directly at her head (a clock, a bin, a phone.) We all know that most domestic violence remains hidden. It’s estimated that less than 40 per cent is reported to police. A shocking one client in three raises domestic abuse as an issue during Relate sessions. Often it’s not the kind that produces black eyes and a broken nose; it might be bullying, cruelty, gripping too hard while shouting too loud.

But it is not as if these women have no options and no place to go. Bea could pack her bags tomorrow, walk into a fully furnished penthouse and start divorce proceedings. Instead she brushes the behaviour away, excuses it. (Those who know a little of what goes on are used to hearing her dismiss it as sulks and tantrums, infantilising her husband and minimising any trauma.) So how can someone so successful in her working life, who is used to managing difficult people and making unpopular decisions, tolerate such blatant abuse at home?

The leading divorce lawyer and family law blogger Marilyn Stowe isn’t surprised. In fact, she has seen it many times. “These highly successful women who are independently wealthy come into my office and some have been putting on a bit of a façade for a very long time,” she says. “They have been in denial, pretending that everything is fine, when actually they’ve been worn down slowly but surely. When you start digging, you discover a very nasty relationship.” Continue reading at thetimes.co.uk»

After yesterday’s incident in Westminster, when Mrs Murdoch had split seconds to respond to a surprise attack on her husband, without training or advice or time to think about injuring herself, she proved her motives beyond words.

As one MP later told Mr Murdoch: “Your wife has a very good left hook”.

The dramatic scene played on television screens around the world. Today the newspapers are making light of the incident, calling her “Ninja Wendi”. For me, that incident was not light-hearted at all. Instead, it has unearthed some troubling memories from the past. I do not write about this subject often; in fact, the last mention of it that I can find on this blog was back in 2008, when I contributed to a Woman’s Aid calendar. However I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind over the past day or so, and it strikes me that I may not be the only person in this position.

In June 2003, a man walked into my husband’s law office in Leeds city centre and asked the receptionist if he could go through for a quick word.  My husband is a part time mental health judge and a legal aid lawyer, and is well-known and well-respected. The man sat down in my husband’s office and said that if questioned, he would flatly deny what he was about to say. Then he continued. He had heard that I was the intended target of some kind of “hit”. Possibly with guns, possibly a robbery. He didn’t know. But he said he liked my husband and didn’t want any harm to come to his wife. So he was warning him. Then he stood up, and walked out.

My husband was shocked. He called the police, who spoke to some of their “contacts” and obtained some confirmation that I really was a target. They didn’t know why, they didn’t know what was planned and they didn’t know when it would happen, but they came to warn me. I was, unsurprisingly, in a state of shock. I tried not to show it in front of the police though. I made light of the threat, and carried on as though everything was fine.

The police came again, to give me some advice about how best to respond if the threat was ever realised. They put various possible scenarios to me. I could be in my car, or in my home or at work. I could be out running, or out shopping. I should remain as alert as possible and try to anticipate the unexpected. I had to stop running in country areas. Never run alone. Always travel at different times to work. Learn and practice evasive driving techniques. Vary my routes to and from home. Keep changing my daily routine.

The police also sent a trained negotiator to teach me how best to react in a worst-case situation. We practiced various, imaginary scenarios – and I always did the wrong thing. He kept shouting at me, as an attacker would. I tried to fight back. I tried to protect my belongings. I looked my assailant in the eye. I wasn’t submissive. I reacted in the worst ways possible. I was then taught how to save myself by going against my instincts and doing the opposite of what I wanted to do. I had to think, stay calm and extinguish all my emotional reactions. Think. It could save my life.

Six months later, it happened: I was robbed in my office car park, by three masked men armed with a heavy iron bar. In some ways it was a relief: at least the fear and the worry were over. I did exactly what I had been trained to do and I am certain that by thinking and staying calm, I saved myself from serious injury or worse. I even went back to work the next day, badly bruised everywhere, just to show that I was okay. Outside I was fine, but inside I was a mess.

I am not the only person to have been the victim of a violent attack. A client’s daughter, also with a high profile in the area, was robbed at gunpoint of her jewellery as she waited in her son’s school car park, with a younger child in the back of the car. She kept calm. Since then she and her family have moved to the other side of the country, perhaps to escape the trauma of what happened. Me? I moved my office to Harrogate. And I kept going.

Even so, the trauma of that event resurfaces sometimes. In 2004, I was at a family law conference I helped to organise in Manchester. A tiny female government minister was speaking next to me when, out of nowhere, she was roughly grabbed by two Fathers4Justice supporters posing as lawyers, who handcuffed themselves to her. There was uproar.

It triggered memories of my own experience. After she was released by Special Branch officers, the minister took a few minutes to compose herself and then went on with her speech. Some people had reacted immediately, trying to protect the minister. I was one of them and I had flown at the men, completely forgetting my training! Some members of the audience had done nothing, but had sat and watched.  A judge in the audience requested police protection to leave the conference.

I told no one of the shock I was feeling except the chairman, Professor Chris Barton of  Staffordshire University who found me on my own in the auditorium when everyone had gone for lunch, quietly trying to compose myself. He was brilliant.

I write of those events because when I watched the attack on TV upon Rupert Murdoch, I watched the shock, anger and horror on the face of his son James, as he leapt up towards his elderly father. I watched Rupert Murdoch’s wife fly at the attacker, uncaring of her own safety. She lashed out and threw herself on him, to protect her husband. Mrs Murdoch did everything her instincts told her to do – everything that I know for certain was wrong. Viewed from a different perspective, everything she did was right.

Then, once the attacker was whisked away by police, I watched them all carry on with their performance as though nothing had happened. That 80-year-old man, without his jacket, could have suffered far worse than a “shaving foam pie”. However he just kept going as though nothing had happened. The examining committee, bound up with their sense of power, just kept going. Mrs Murdoch, back in control, wore her face like a mask. She had no choice.

The event brought back all my own bad memories, as vivid as they ever were, even though I thought they had gone. Politics and “Hackgate” aside, I wonder how the Murdochs are feeling now? They have had time to think. There has been time for events to catch up with them. They have been able to consider what might have been. Fortunately nobody was hurt. But I do not doubt that the shock will affect them all for some time yet. We are humans, not robots.

I am no fan of The Centre For Social Justice, but Harry and I share some common ground. We both support marriage. Like him, I also support efforts to save marriage – although by the time I become involved, it is often too late. At the Oxford Union, although I was happy to argue that the institution of marriage was “outdated”, I didn’t argue that there is no point to marriage.

Recently, however, I’ve started to move away from my usual position. Seeing new clients recently, I have noticed that a high proportion of our new instructions are from clients who have already been married at least once before, and who are determined to end a second or a third marriage.

We already know that a second marriage is slightly more likely to fail than a first marriage. Even so, the proportion of instructions is significantly higher than usual.

Is this a coincidence? Or has the recession hit such couples particularly hard? Many of these clients have told me of depleted asset values, higher debts, failed businesses and so on. Perhaps the economic downturn has affected the prospects of marriages which, statistically, have always had a higher failure rate. Perhaps these marriages would have ended anyway.

I have begun to wonder: is a second marriage genuinely worthwhile? Or should couples be advised against second marriages, partly because of the increased probability of divorce, but also because of the potentially serious fallout if the marriage does fail?

In my experience, the recipe for the breakdown of a second marriage is often as follows:

• The parties have children from a first marriage, and perhaps grandchildren too.
• They had not known one another for any great length of time before getting married.
• They have high expectations for the marriage and for their new partner, which remain unfulfilled.
• Within a short time, each party realises that the second marriage was a huge mistake.

In some cases, the breakdown of the marriage is prompted by guilt: at least one of the spouses has left a partner to start again. That guilt, coupled with a desire to be with children who may have rejected them and are now growing up without them, can sound a death knell for a marriage. Too much bad blood. Too much blame. Too much baggage.

Some second marriages break down because the gilt on the gingerbread wears off faster than it did the first time around. Once the courtship is over and the ring is on the finger, spouses stop playing the roles of Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere.

It also strikes me that in many cases, the parties are less dedicated to working through their problems than they might have been the first time around.

Perhaps they are bruised by past experiences, and are quicker to accept that leopards don’t change their spots, or that the marriage has indeed broken down irretrievably. Either way, they certainly seem to instruct lawyers more briskly than “first marriage” couples. Hence I am seeing broken second or even third marriages, for which the marriage duration has been that much shorter.

It gets worse.

When a second marriage breaks down, the consequences can be more acute than the parties suppose. After all, if it’s a relatively short marriage, then surely the financial settlement can’t be that bad?

Unfortunately, as I’ve explained previously, it really can be that bad. The parties are older, and their reasonable needs must be fully considered and provided for. Marriage turns two people into a legal partnership. Assets are up for division and, where needs must, assets acquired before the marriage cannot be fully ring fenced. Divorce can often require the wealthier party to make provision for the poorer party, for the rest of that person’s life. This can mean provision of a mortgage-free home and maintenance or a lump sum, sufficient to last a lifetime.

Clients are aghast when they learn that following a short marriage of say, five years, they may have to pay what they consider to be a disproportionately high settlement. In a lot of cases, clients have spent their lives prudently accruing wealth and, until the marriage, almost all had been destined for their children and grandchildren.

In many cases, a second marriage has seemed to me, an objective bystander to be an almost bizarre, and clearly avoidable, mistake.

So would I recommend marriage the second time around… ever?

I’m not so sure that I would. A marriage founded upon guilt, or upon unrealistic expectations, can founder. Once the romance has worn off, what is left?

Taking a detached, legal perspective, it is true that there are tax breaks from which older couples can benefit if they marry. These can include inheritance tax and capital gains tax exemptions. But are these enough to offset the risk?

Some of you will think that a prenuptial agreement is the answer. Again, I am not so sure. Lawyers pitted against prenups will keep getting cleverer and cleverer, no matter how the law may change. It’s their job. Older and wiser, bitten once… Surely it is better to have the freedom to walk away, than to have to test the validity of a prenup, making reasonable provision by will for a former partner to avoid a claim on an estate?

Could it be that older couples, brought up to believe that marriage is the “gold standard”, are now discovering (again) that it isn’t?