Chambers Blog

In family law, where a mother puts her child up for adoption the Adoption and Children Act 2002 requires that the court examine certain factors to ensure that the adoption would be in the child's best interests.

The recent case of Re C v XYX County Council concerned a 19 year old mother who had become pregnant after a one night stand. She had only discovered the pregnancy at a late stage and did not believe she could care for the child. She therefore left the child at hospital following its birth, indicating that she wished for it to be adopted.

In many cases the father or the mother's extended family would be the first point of call to care for the child. Here, the mother would not identify the father to social services or the court, nor would she disclose the pregnancy and birth to her family or allow them to be contacted. She identified reasons why she felt that her family would not provide suitable care.

At first instance it was held that social services were under an obligation to inform themselves of as much information about the background of the family and father as they were able.

On appeal it was held that such enquiries were only to be undertaken where they were in the best interests of the child, and this would only be so where they genuinely further the prospect of finding a long-term carer for the child without delay. In this case it was more important to look at the effect of delay in placing the child with a long term carer. There was therefore no requirement for social services or the court to inform the mother's family or indeed the actual father of the child, who remains unaware that he has a child at all.

Written by Joseph Neville and Rebecca Fitton-Brown, Barristers at New Walk Chambers, specialising in Family Law.

One complicated issue that can arise in ancillary relief proceedings upon divorce is where the marriage's only major asset is a business run by one of the parties. A business is a good example of an asset that often cannot be divided in two by the court, but this can result in injustice where there are no other assets to distribute. In the recent case of H v H [2008] EWHC 935 (Fam) the High Court considered this conundrum, and emphasised that it is useful in this case to look at periodical payments, tied if appropriate to the wealth generated by the business. This can provide a party with a de facto income stream from the business with less interruption to the business than a division of its assets.

Written by Rebecca Fitton-Brown, Barrister at New Walk Chambers, specialising in Family Law.

  The Public Law Outline has come into effect for care proceedings issued from the 1^st of April 2008. It replaces the Protocol for Judicial Case Management. The aim is to reduce delay in care proceedings by improving case management and identifying the issues as early as possible and also by improving communication and therefore, it is hoped, co-operation between the parties.

  Some of the new documents such as the Timetable for the Child (including care, health and education steps as well as legal steps) and the Case Management Record (improved filing system for the court) may be applied to pre-April care proceedings if considered appropriate.

 The present six stages have been replaced by four stages.

  Pre-application work is more extensive including a Letter Before Proceedings, early preparation of a Schedule of Proposed Findings, and filing of Supplementary Form PLO1 (containing a pre-proceedings checklist and record of case management documents filed) with the application.

 Cases are to be actively case-managed by one or two case management judges who will be appointed for each care case.

 "Early Final Hearing cases" are to be identified at the first hearing.

 Alternative dispute resolution is to be encouraged by the court wherever possible.

 Written by Rebecca Fitton-Brown, Barrister at New Walk Chambers, specialising in Family Law.