Family Law

Ireland has been left with "third world infrastructure" in the family courts and urgent investment is needed to prevent children and vulnerable people from paying the price, the Law Society of Ireland has said. Helen Coughlan, chair of the Law Society's family and child law committee, said the gener

An increasing number of cases involving allegations of parental alienation are coming before the Northern Ireland courts, a family lawyer has warned. Claire Edgar, family law partner at Francis Hanna & Co Solicitors, shared her experience as a practitioner at an online event organised by the Sou

Plans to modernise the civil and family justice system over the next year have been set out by Justice Minister Naomi Long. Speaking in Stormont this morning, Mrs Long said she would take forward changes before the next election to make the civil and family justice system "more accessible for citize

Family lawyers are experiencing a substantial increase in enquiries involving allegations of domestic violence and coercive control, comparable to the increase during the first Covid-19 lockdown, Irish Legal News has learned. Domestic violence charity Safe Ireland, which represents 39 front-line org

Ministers have launched a public consultation on the current treatment of child maintenance payments and the obligations of liable relatives within the social protection system. The six-week consultation launched by Social Protection Minister Heather Humphreys yesterday will also seek view on whethe

Family lawyers have welcomed the commencement of remote family court hearings this week. Mr Justice John Jordan, the judge in charge of the family list of the High Court, has published a notice setting out the court's approach to remote hearings from yesterday.

A man held up a judge, a barrister and his estranged wife with a fake pistol and a hoax pipe bomb during a “terrifying” siege in a Dublin court, his sentence hearing has been told. During a hearing in December 2018, Edmund Dunican, 47, told the court he had a “problem” with a

Family lawyers have paid tribute to Fermanagh social worker Nuala McLaughlin, who died from Covid-19 late last year. Originally from Tyrone, Ms McLaughlin was the principal social worker at the Western Health and Social Care Trust (WHSCT). She was just 43 years old when she passed away at the end of

A woman who wants to bring family law proceedings against her allegedly violent former partner has launched a High Court challenge over the Legal Aid Board's refusal to fund her action. The mother-of-two, who is reliant on social welfare payments, claims that her application for legal aid was turned

Remote hearings are not delivering effective access to justice in Northern Ireland's family courts, research by an Ulster University academic suggests. The new report by Professor Gráinne McKeever on the impact of Covid-19 on the family courts, based on interviews with practitioners and litig

Family lawyer Claire Edgar, partner at Francis Hanna & Co Solicitors, examines the issue of equality in divorce settlements. It is 20 years since the House of Lords handed down the seminal judgement of White v White, which decided that, when determining each spouse’s contribution to the ma

The High Court has granted a divorce and made a number of orders in relation to a family home, commenting that an abuse of privilege may have costs implications. Background

Parents whose children are subject of access orders should "try to agree what access can happen safely", the president of the District Court has said. In a statement issued on Saturday, Judge Colin Daly acknowledged that some parents "may be concerned that they cannot fulfil the terms of these order

Claire Edgar of Francis Hanna & Co Solicitors examines a recent case concerning the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction. The High Court in Belfast has recently handed down a decision in the Matter of K (a minor), a Hague Convention case in which Francis Hanna &

The Family Lawyers’ Association of Ireland (FLA) has established a committee of family law practitioners to scrutinise the government's proposals for family court reform. The sub-committee of four solicitors and four barristers, chaired by Dervla Browne SC, is now preparing a submission on the