March 2, 2018 1 comment
A week in family law The Arctic weather conditions across the country may have grabbed the headlines this week, but there were also a few significant family law news stories… First up, a mother is facing having to pay a costs bill approaching £20,000, after successfully challenging an order made in care proceedings relating to…
February 7, 2018 13 comments
A Cheshire husband has been found guilty of harassing his estranged wife by contacting her directly rather than going through a solicitor. The 45 year-old businessman, from Knutsford, moved out of the couple’s home in 2015 after a ten year marriage, and divorce proceedings followed. The couple had known each other since their school days,…
October 18, 2017 1 comment
The general rule on costs in English law is that the loser should pay the winner’s costs (lawyers refer to this rule as ‘costs follow the event’). However, that rule does not usually apply to family proceedings, in particular proceedings relating to children, because it is not considered appropriate to discourage family litigants from going…
October 13, 2017 0 comments
A week in family law The Court of Appeal has overturned a ‘top up’ award to a Russian wife who agreed to a divorce settlement in Russia in 2009, under which she received the sum of £5.1 million. The wife applied for the ‘top up’ to the High Court in London In 2014, and was…
May 10, 2017 3 comments
An estranged couple has been criticised for the “crazy” amount of money they have spent on legal bills during their divorce. In a dispute over assets valued at £10 million, the couple have already spent a combined total of £1.5 million on legal fees alone. At the High Court, Mr Justice Holman expressed dismay that…
March 20, 2017 0 comments
An ongoing financial dispute between a divorced couple has now run longer than the pair were married. The former husband was a commodities broker with homes in Ibiza and Verbier, Switzerland, while the wife was a model. Now both in their early thirties, the couple met in 2010 and lived a “hedonistic” life until they…
February 22, 2017 0 comments
Sometimes when you set out to write about a case it has so many aspects to it that you wonder quite where to start. AF v MF & Others is one such case. AF v MF & Others was a financial remedies case heard by Mr Justice Moor over ten days last October. That hearing…
January 5, 2017 2 comments
The legal fees racked up during a former Premier League football player’s divorce were “excessive and wholly disproportionate to the issues”, a High Court judge has declared. The unnamed French athlete and his former wife incurred around £234,000 in legal costs between them over the course of their financial dispute. The footballer owed his solicitors…
January 4, 2017 0 comments
An NHS group must contribute to the costs incurred by a woman who applied for a legal declaration on behalf of her incapacitated mother, the High Court has ruled. In MR & SR & Another, Mr Justice Hayden had previously considered the case of ‘Mrs N’, a 68 year-old woman suffering from advanced multiple sclerosis….
September 15, 2016 0 comments
I have spoken approvingly about family arbitration on this blog many times before. Of course I’m biased being an arbitrator myself, but as all readers know this Yorkshirewoman is unafraid to give a blunt opinion, good or bad. My opinion of family arbitration has only been strengthened since the recent introduction of child arbitration. Let…
