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25 May 2018
Issue: 7794 / Categories: Features , Civil way , Procedure & practice
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Civil way: 25 May 2018

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  • Worthless divorces.
  • Witness chat disaster.
  • First-class appeals.
  • Happy tune for whistlers.

FAMILY WAYS

Ooops The FD President issued interim guidance on 23 April 2018 on the procedural path to be followed by judges in relation to dummy decrees. A number of cases have been brought to his attention where decrees nisi and absolute have been granted notwithstanding that divorce petitions have been presented within one year of the marriage or before the expiration of the two year separation period under s 1(2)(d) or (e) of the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973. In the former situation, the decrees are null and void and the defect cannot be cured by petition amendment (and any financial remedy order will surely fall). A remarriage would be invalid and any children born of it would be illegitimate. In the latter case, the President suggests that the same consequences would follow except that ‘it may be possible, if the facts warrant it, to amend the petition to plead one of the grounds set out in ss 1(2)(a)

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

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NEWS
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NLJ this week: Divorce ‘nuclear weapon’ freezes assets but entangles outsiders
Freezing orders in divorce proceedings can unexpectedly ensnare third parties and disrupt businesses. In NLJ this week, Lucy James of Trowers & Hamlins explains how these orders—dubbed a ‘nuclear weapon’—preserve assets but can extend far beyond spouses to companies and business partners 
NLJ this week: What counts as ‘rent’? Court says labour alone won’t do
A Court of Appeal ruling has clarified that ‘rent’ must be monetary—excluding tenants paid in labour from statutory protection. In this week's NLJ, James Naylor explains Garraway v Phillips, where a tenant worked two days a week instead of paying rent
Your magistrates’ court needs you!
Thousands more magistrates are to be recruited, under a major shake-up to speed up and expand the hiring process
NLJ this week: Freed but failed—justice system leaves the innocent empty-handed
Three men wrongly imprisoned for a combined 77 years have been released—yet received ‘not a penny’ in compensation, exposing deep flaws in the justice system. Writing in NLJ this week, Dr Jon Robins reports on Justin Plummer, Oliver Campbell and Peter Sullivan, whose convictions collapsed amid discredited forensics, ‘oppressive’ police interviews and unreliable ‘cell confessions’
NLJ this week: Clarity on whistleblowing, settlements and tribunal limits
A quiet month for employment cases still delivers key legal clarifications. In his latest Employment Law Brief for NLJ, Ian Smith reports that whistleblowing protection remains intact even where disclosures are partly self-serving, provided the worker reasonably believes they serve the ‘public interest’ 
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