Children

Generally, the children are of the highest importance to both parents during separation, but unfortunately, all too often, the hurt and anxiety spills over on to them and the children can become an object to fight over.

There can even be further difficulties when a parent is threatened with a child being taken into the care of social services. Members of our family law department specialise in the arrangements for children, financial provision and adoption of children. The law is such that, generally, both parents are kept involved with the children and the parents are encouraged to agree contact arrangements between them. When parents can't agree, the courts intervene to decide issues in the best interests of the children, with their welfare being of paramount importance.

The most common Orders that the Court can make are as follows:-

- Residence orders
A court order determining who a child should live with. The court could order that a child should live with someone other than its parent. This carries parental responsibility for the length of the order.

- Contact orders
A court order directing that a child should or should not have specified contact with a particular person. Contact orders can impose conditions on the contact e.g. to take place at a particular venue or with someone else present.

- Specific issue order
An order determining a particular issue for a child which is in dispute between the responsible adults e.g. which school a child should attend, what religion they should be brought up in, whether or not they should have an operation, etc

- Prohibited Steps order
An order preventing someone doing a named thing in relation to a child e.g. an order to prevent the removal of a child from a particular person, or an order to prevent a child being removed from the country.

Divorce and Separation
Ancillary Relief