Month: June 2019

Managed to get to watch the Second Reading on the Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Bill, with thanks to Bambos Charalambous MP. There was overwhelming support for the Bill, including very positive speeches from the government front bench (Lord Chancellor David Gauke, Minister Paul Maynard), the Labour (Richard Burgon, Yasmin Qureshi) and Liberal Democrat front benches (Wera Hobhouse) and current chair of the Justice Committee (Bob Neill). All the speeches are here

Great to see Bob Neill reading our Finding Fault briefing on the Bill (back row, smart suit!)

Straight onto Committee stage now.

Govt now moving quickly on reform of the divorce law. The Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Bill has been introduced by Lord Chancellor David Gauke. It is a simple and pragmatic reform – removing the problematic five facts and replacing them with a declaration of irretrievable breakdown and a minimum six month waiting period and with no defence. All proposals  are entirely in line with the evidence base from the Finding Fault and No Contest reports and our review of divorce law in similar notification or separation jurisdictions – see http://blogs.exeter.ac.uk/findingfault/findings-and-outputs/.