Parenting Arrangements at Christmas Post Separation. Christmas is a time for joy, love and sharing. If this is your first Christmas post-separation, here’s a few tips to ensure your parenting arrangements at Christmas allow you nd your family a happy holiday season.   Parenting Arrangements at Christmas should allow you and your children to enjoy the festive season! Ensuring parenting arrangements at Christmas allows the festive season to remain a merry time for you and your kids, post-separation. Christmas pre-separation, its synonymous with excitement, happiness, and probably Santa. Chr ..read more

Varying Arrangements for Children Varying arrangements for children which will suit both the parties and the children until the children are 18 years of age can be a very difficult exercise. Doing this successfully relies upon parent’s knowledge of the children (and the other party!) and the experience of the lawyers and/or the Court. While we make orders that deal with every changed circumstance we can think of, life can have other plans. So what do you do if you find that the Orders that were so carefully crafted simply no longer work for you and the children? If you would like some practic ..read more

Life after Separation Life after separation and how that will look can be the great unknown, especially at a time when you may only be thinking about separating. Maybe this is your situation or maybe life after separation is very real for you right now. Are you about to separate or have you already separated from your former partner? It is going to be important that you make careful plans for both your children and for yourself. In this blog, our principal Lezah Gildea-Marega touches on arrangements that you can make for your children. Lezah also looks at the importance of your obtaining a l ..read more

Dividing Property on Separation Dividing property on separation is an important step for you to take. It is also something that, generally speaking, you should finalise as soon as possible. There are a number of reasons to do that. An obvious one is that finalising property division will help put you in a place where you can plan for yourself financially. More importantly, dividing property is one element that will help you to get on with life! However, a very important reason for dividing property as early as you can is that until you do that, with the benefit of first obtaining a court ord ..read more

Inheritance received during a relationship Inheritance received during a relationship? Find out how family law may treat it An inheritance received during a relationship can often become a major issue in reaching a family law property settlement. An inheritance received by one party to the relationship may be treated as a contribution made by that party. Any assets or cash received as an inheritance may however instead be quarantined from other assets to be divided between the parties and treated as available only to the party who received the inheritance. If this is the approach taken, it ma ..read more

The COVID-19 List which has been announced by the family courts is designed to fast track urgent COVID-19 applications. These are applications that are filed as a direct result of the impact of coronavirus (COVID-19). Contact our experienced Brisbane Family Lawyers or our North Brisbane family lawyers  if you would like some practical family law advice and regards options available to you. We can assist you in all areas of family law, including regards parenting arrangements as well as related COVID-19 issues, family law property settlement and maintenance claims. You are also welcome to ..read more

COVID-19 Parenting Orders COVID-19 Parenting Orders COVID-19 is leaving parents who have parenting orders in a difficult situation.  With the increasing number of restrictions on our activities and government urging us to remain home, some families are finding that their parenting arrangements may no longer be workable. Some of the many questions that arise concerning coronavirus and parenting orders include: Must I send my child to spend time with the other parent if I am worried that the other person may have COVID-19? If the other parent is showing symptoms of COVID-19, do I have to ..read more

Discrete Property List The discrete property list in the Federal Circuit Court of Australia is helping separated parties with a modest property pool who cannot reach agreement by consent. Seeking assistance from the family courts, particularly where the property pool is fairly modest, can be a lengthy process that is difficult for parties to work through. There are some instances though, where parties need the intervention of an order from the Court to make sure their matter keeps moving towards resolution. For parties in an increasing number of cities around Australia, the Federal Circui ..read more

Christmas Following Separation Christmas following separation can be a difficult time unless you have arrangements in place for your children. The first thing to know about parenting arrangements for Christmas or any time is that you do not have to have any formal agreement for parenting arrangements after you separate. Many people find it better though to have some agreement in writing for all parenting arrangements, including for Christmas following separation. A parenting plan will help you ensure that you and your former partner have agreed important arrangements such as the time th ..read more

Family Court Crisis Family Court Crisis and looking for ways to avoid it The crisis in the family court is all too apparent to people who involved in family law litigation. It can take some 6 weeks or longer after a person filed their application in the family court before obtaining their first court date. Long delays occur for parties to obtain trial dates (sometimes up to two years). The family court crisis continues to reveal itself as some parties, after being given a trial date/s, find that their matter is adjourned from those dates to later dates.  After the trial takes place, it ca ..read more