You might think that no news is good news. And that since the Qualified Legal Representatives (‘QLR’) scheme has been in force for 8 months, the comparative invisibility of it must mean its all bedding in nicely. Actually, it’s just bedding in verrrrrry slowly. I am signed up to be a QLR, albeit for only a few courts local to me (more on why anon), because I think that its important that the scheme works, even if it is an inelegant solution to the problem at hand. But yesterday was the first time I’ve been asked if I could do a QLR case. Oddly, it wasn’t for a court I’d signed up for and rathe ..read more

Interesting example of how not to successfully apply for disclosure of information from the family court here, in Thames Valley Police v Ms F & Anor [2023] EWFC 28. A police force sought disclosure of material from family proceedings in the course of investigating threats to kill by one party which had been covertly recorded by some sort of phone hacking app by the other (the mother). The father had a criminal conviction for domestic violence against the mother, and the family court had concluded he was high risk. The police already knew most of this when they applied.   The judg ..read more

Many, many years ago I wrote a piece for Family Law Week about s91(14) Children Act. It’s still up on the FLW site here (yes, the picture is me in 2011). I have thought about updating it over the years, but until now I have never been sufficiently bored and it has never been sufficiently urgent. After all, whilst there have been various published judgments over the years since (mainly successful appeals against the making of such orders), they all refer back to and fall in line with Re P (A Child) [1999] EWCA Civ 1323, (which is even older than that amusing picture). The title of that 201 ..read more

I’m starting out with a modest and hopefully achievable goal : 1 Do SOME legal blogging. Not necessarily a lot. Just SOME (By which I mean attending court and observing hearings as a ‘legal blogger’ ie a lawyer attending in a quasi journalistic role, rather than simply any old person who blathers on about legal related stuff online) It’s so super hard to find the time to do this. Neither experience nor a strong sense of the potential benefit of doing legal blogging make it easy to squeeze a day out of my overloaded diary to do unpaid work miles away where everyone pulls faces at you when they ..read more

As is customary each December, I’ve had enough of the current year, and am ready to begin a fresh one in the hope that a new number will mean a new beginning. It won’t of course, but a change is as good as a rest, or something… Right now I’ve got the particular ‘ump with the expectations placed upon advocates to draft, agree and lodge complicated draft orders within unrealistic timescales. Some things never change, they only get more normalised. I have started to push back and explain fully and frankly just WHY I can’t get an order drafted by tomorrow at 4pm. Because I have other cases. Becaus ..read more

A quick little post to ponder this: I’ve seen a number of recent posts from lawyers which give anonymised case studies of family court cases concerning children, which (on the face of it) seem to go further than is permitted under Family Court privacy laws (by which I really mean s12 Administration of Justice Act 1960, taken in conjunction with the FPR). I’m not linking to those posts, partly because I don’t want to start a pile on to individuals, partly because I don’t want to accidentally compound any breach of privacy rules or confidentiality, and partly because I want to flag a more genera ..read more

There is stuff going on behind the scenes that is taking priority over blogging and what have you. I’ll get back to it soon enough, and maybe will write about some of it one day – but for now this is just a note to say I’m prioritising family (Trying for once to practice what I preach). And whilst I’m writing this note, I might as well also mention that I’m now over on Mastodon (@familoo.mas.to). So far I am finding it somewhat overburdened with kittens, content warnings and excruciating courtesy, all of which makes me perversely rather drawn to be mildly ornery – but I dare say I’ll find my c ..read more

This is a guest post by Nick Marston. Nick is a family arbitrator at St John’s Chambers, Bristol.   A few weeks ago I conducted an arbitration in a case concerning permission to remove four children permanently from the jurisdiction. Arbitrations involving issues concerning children are not usual in Bristol so I thought it might be interesting to set out some of my impressions after conducting this one.   The Applicant was the mother and the Respondent was the father. I am not going to say any more about the facts of the case save that both parties had cases with strengths and weakne ..read more

Accuracy matters. Lawyers are supposed to be precise. Contempt of court is serious. It therefore drives me bananas when I see the following at the top of a Children Act order: “The names of the family and the children are not to be disclosed in public without the court’s permission.” Really? Really?? Is this what we actually mean to say? That a child who wins a bravery award or a swimming gala or who rescues a cat from up a tree can’t be named as a jolly good fellow in their local newspaper just because they happen also to be involved in proceedings? Or a parent cannot post a picture of their ..read more

For various reasons its been challenging to find time to blog lately, but I thought this little how to guide would be quick to pop up, and that it might be of use to family lawyers and litigants who need to produce evidence of exchanges on WhatsApp. It can be very tiresome to have to screenshot and scroll through screeds of material, which increases page count, is difficult to follow and often features duplication or missed bits (intentionally or otherwise). Whilst this method won’t retrieve intentionally deleted messages as a phone download by an expert might, it can be useful, particularly w ..read more