Some recent, and surprising, court decisions from offshore jurisdictions, namely Bermuda and Jersey, demonstrate the fluctuating levels of cooperation that the English family courts can expect to receive in divorce cases.

In English divorces when there are offshore assets, often held in offshore trusts, it is common for wives to meet with resistance when they try to find out information about those assets or trusts from their husband.

One way of remedying this is by issuing Letters of Request. These are letters from an English court to the appropriate authority (usually a court) in the other jurisdiction requesting information about the assets or trusts held in that country. The letter is written by your solicitors, who then apply to the English court for its approval and to request that it is sent. The English court can, and frequently does, amend the content of the letter.

After receiving the letter the authority in that other jurisdiction can choose to do three things: Continue reading »

Divorce cases that involve disagreements about children are often described as “difficult”. Emotions run high; at a local level the judiciary may have to fall upon its own judgement when asked to choose one suitable option above others. Bitterness, heartache and large legal bills can result. Is there another way? I think so.

The majority of children cases relate to the practical arrangements of what happens to their children following the breakdown of a marriage or parental relationship.  As Head of the Children’s Department at Stowe Family Law, I have been involved in a number of cases in which one or both parents have asked the court to intervene.  Sometimes there are issues that concern child protection; other cases feature styles of parenting that are no longer considered acceptable after a relationship’s failure.  The majority of cases concern the practical arrangements and the frequency and duration of the time each parent spends with the children.  It is this latter category that has caused me growing concern over the past few years.

The pressures under which the local judiciary operates have not helped. A case scheduled for its first, second or even third appearance may only be listed for a quarter of an hour.  Judges are asked to make rigorous, reasoned decisions quickly – and yet some of these cases feature complexities that stretch back years.  There may not be time to facilitate a fragile agreement when everyone feels so rushed.

The other difficulty is that too much pressure is placed on parents to sort out their own problems. In some cases, this is simply too much to ask.

My solution?

Continue reading »

As family lawyers, we talk a lot about needs when we advise our clients. We talk of capital needs for housing, transport and to redeem liabilities and income needs to meet ongoing annual and monthly expenditure. Needs are trump cards for arguing for a departure from an equal division of capital for a wife with children who cannot otherwise re-house, even if it means taking inherited assets away from the beneficiary in some cases. Needs apply equally to income as to capital, and are an important concept in family law.

Within ancillary relief proceedings, each party will give full and frank disclosure of their financial situation. As part and parcel of that disclosure process, each party must also complete a budget sheet, setting out what they say they need to meet their outgoings. We provide all Stowe Family Law clients with a budget sheet at the outset of the proceedings, so that they can consider their own needs early on.

I thought of this as I read an article over the weekend in the Saturday Telegraph Magazine, about a family who had been asked to account for every penny that they had spent in a month. The point of the article was to highlight whether we are in fact aware of what we spend, even in the current recession driven economy. The couple in question were successful, with an income of £150,000 per annum, an income that most people would consider enormous, yet they were still spending more than they earned. Continue reading »

I have already written about the Court of Appeal’s recent decision in the Marco Pierre White case. Divorce, Full Disclosure and Marco Pierre White looked at the Hildebrand Rules and at what can happen when clients take matters into their own hands. Hildebrand Documents and Marco Pierre White examined the judgment in detail. Frances Gibb, Legal Editor of The Times, contacted me about this significant ruling to ask about its implications for family law practitioners. The story appears on page three of today’s newspaper:

Marco Pierre White challenge could change divorce battles for ever

Take one celebrity chef, separate him from his wife, sprinkle with allegations of intercepted letters, simmer and serve with a landmark ruling.

Marco Pierre White, the former Michelin-starred chef and television presenter, is pursuing his estranged wife’s lawyers in a test case that could change for ever the way that divorce battles are fought. Family lawyers warn that the chef’s lawsuit could end the practice by spouses of turning detective to unearth evidence.

White recently won a landmark ruling that enables him to proceed against Withers, the City law firm that was acting for his estranged wife, Mati, over the interception and seizure of his personal papers. The action is expected to come to trial this year and has already prompted enquiries from clients who think that they may be able to lodge similar claims.

Lawyers say that any spouse who wants to do her own detective work because she suspects that her husband is lying about his finances will lose a crucial weapon if White wins the case. They are calling for urgent guidelines so that they and their clients know where they stand. Continue reading»

New Year’s Eve and another year, indeed a decade, is almost over.

How has this year been for you? If it has been anything like mine, it has been a rollercoaster. It has passed by very quickly and, looking back, there have been some real highs. There was the faster than expected development of our Cheshire office, our acquisition of a London office set to open next year, and five of our cases included in the Law Reports. I also appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour, debating against Baroness Deech on possible changes to the law on cohabitation.

 There have also been some lows: my surgery and a long slow recovery from its complications, getting used to major lifestyle changes and a dash to Israel to deal with a family emergency. I’m no different to anyone else: we all have our ups and downs, our highs and lows.

I have chosen to share many of those very personal up and down moments with my readers, because this blog isn’t just about family law and how it works in practice. It is also about connecting with other people, sharing feelings and emotions, and going through good times and bad together. Continue reading »

As noted in my previous post about Hildebrand Documents, the recent ruling of the Court of Appeal in the Marco Pierre White case alarmed me. I would like to look at the judgment in detail.

I must warn you in advance: this is a lengthy post. However if you are a family law practitioner in England and Wales, are you aware of this judgment’s implications?

It appears to be the case that, even if you have advised a client in accordance with accepted Hildebrand practice in the family law courts, you could still potentially be liable to the opposing spouse in civil law.

I have previously described my experience of a Hildebrand case and the decision that I was called upon to make in a matter of minutes. Would I inspect the three boxes of documents that my client had delivered to our offices, even though I believed that she had obtained the documents illicitly? With the alarm bells ringing, I decided not to do so. Instead, I chose caution.

Lawyers can find themselves sued for damages if documentation taken secretly by their client is copied and used in court, and the client’s spouse takes exception to this. Admittedly such a case may not get off the ground because damage may be too minimal, but in theory at least, lawyers could be liable.

In my case I had every reason to suspect that the Hildebrand Rules, as they are known, had been breached by my client. The generally acceptable defence available under Hildebrand would therefore not apply to her or to me. We could both have been sanctioned and sued by her husband and by his company, which was an entirely separate entity.

Now it may be the case that the generally acceptable defence under Hildebrand does not protect legal practitioners or their clients in any such case at all.   Continue reading »

I am in Chicago this week; I was delighted to address the lawyers at Schiller DuCanto & Fleck LLP, the largest family law firm in the USA.

The city is buzzing: in a few days’ time Oprah will close the famous Michigan Avenue – the “Magnificent Mile” of top stores – and launch her next series from outside the Wrigley Building. The Black Eyed Peas will be in concert with her!  Next month, Chicago will learn if it has succeeded in its bid to host the 2016 Olympic Games.

I am fond of Chicago and find it difficult to do it justice when describing it. Situated on Lake Michigan, its architecture is stunning. The buildings are set off by the vast lake and the river that flows through the city. The views are overwhelming.

As for the artwork in this city: it is spellbinding. Want to see that quintessential American painting, American Gothic? It is here. So too is the best collection of French Impressionists in the world, displayed in room after room at the Art Institute of Chicago.

I took a trolleybus down to Chicago’s South Side, to visit the areas where blues music has a home and to see the relatively modest home where a black American law lecturer and his family lived – before he became President of the USA and left for the White House.

Schiller DuCanto & Fleck is situated on the top floor of a skyscraper on LaSalle Street, which doubles as Gotham City in the Batman films, and its offices provide amazing views across the city. The firm is headed by renowned American “superlawyer” Donald Schiller.

I didn’t know what to expect when I visited, but I needn’t have been concerned. Continue reading »

The Mature Times asked me to write about divorce and grandparents’ rights. My article also offers advice to grandparents who are caught up in such a situation and are concerned that they may lose contact with their grandchildren.

On family breakdown the bulk of attention will, of course, focus upon the couple and their children. However grandparents are also an important part of family life.

When I was growing up, my grandparents were my closest confidantes. My grandmother would buy me books and records; later, when I was living in France, letters filled with wise counsel would arrive almost daily.

As a maturing teenager, I could discuss with my grandparents all sorts of things that I didn’t feel I could tell my parents. I adored my grandparents and benefited from their unconditional love. They were there when needed and could be trusted to keep my secrets. My grandfather had a sweet stall at Leeds Market. As a teenager I worked alongside him; thanks to him, I learned how to deal with people. He was unfailingly friendly to everyone; several years after he died, a Leeds judge who attended his synagogue wrote to tell me how much he had liked and admired him. My grandfather made his boiled sweets in a little factory. Life in that factory and on that market stall was very tough, and the cold weather undoubtedly shortened my grandmother’s life. She suffered from pleurisy and died aged 61, when I was very young.

My other grandmother was my best friend. She came from a different background: when she was young she used to “take the waters” at Harrogate with her grandmother. Well-educated, she was one of the first women journalists in Leeds. During the war she worked in a munitions factory and lost a finger in an accident, but she never mentioned it or complained. My grandmother was a remarkable woman whose life story would make a quite a novel! I used to meet her for lunch once a week in Leeds; she always wore a silk scarf with great elegance.

It is difficult to imagine my childhood and my early adulthood without my beloved grandparents at my side. On my dressing table I keep a treasured photograph of them, taken when I graduated from Leeds University.

It is a sad fact that in some cases, relationships with grandchildren can be fractured or faded by divorce. In a worst case scenario, grandparents may seek contact orders through the courts; it is preferable, however, to resolve issues amicably. Continue reading »

I wanted to put my last post, about the Centre for Social Justice’s plans for cohabiting couples, into a factual and legal context. The couple I am about to describe never gave a thought to the nightmare “what if” scenario that exists for modern day cohabitants. Their experience is a salutary example to the millions of other couples who are “non-people” in the eyes of the law because they are not married.

The case, Webster v Webster (2009) 1FLR 1240 was heard on 13 January 2009 before His Honour Judge Behrens in my home city of Leeds.

I have decided to write about it precisely because it is an “everyday” case, not a glamorous one at all. The facts are unremarkable. The man and woman lived together for 27 years and had two children. Their family home was registered in the man’s name only. The man also had three children from a previous marriage.

Like most couples, both parties worked. He earned far more than she did, but both contributed fully to the household expenses. Then, aged 54, the man unexpectedly and suddenly died from a heart attack. He died ‘intestate’, meaning that he left no will.

For the woman this was a disaster – not only emotionally, but also legally. Had she been his wife she would have been entitled to inherit her share of the estate, automatically under the intestacy laws. Continue reading »

 A recent headline in The Daily Mail read: Husband who became a millionaire AFTER divorce not obliged to give ex wife more money, judges rule. This was the Walkden case, heard in the Court of Appeal, which was described by one of the barristers involved as “the flip side of the decision of this court in Myerson v Myerson“. I don’t agree with that description.

Newspapers reported that the judgment in this case was academic, because the parties had already reached a further financial compromise before the ruling in the Court of Appeal was made. In fact, I believe the judgment has important implications for all parties and their lawyers. This is because the safety net to set aside court orders has all but been removed. Although it is not my practice to comment publicly on my clients’ cases, I intend to make an exception referring only to facts which are in the public domain. I would stress that the advice and client examples I give thereafter are not connected with that case.

Continue reading »