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Civil way: 28 March 2025

28 March 2025 / Stephen Gold
Issue: 8110 / Categories: Features , Procedure & practice , Civil way
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Hold tightly in family; LPA is 100; suing too high; hello Business Ombudsman; new consumer law; employment awards up.

FINANCIAL REMEDY EXPRESS

We already have financial remedy applications (principally for periodical payments only) on the fast track. Now we are about to experience ‘express’ unlimited remedies for relative tiddlers through a 12-month pilot introduced by new PD 36H with FPR PD update no 1 of 2025 as from 7 April 2025. But not in all family court locations. The pilot is rushing to 33 centres including Birmingham, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester and, inevitably, Crewe with its 12 railway platforms. Not London where life is slower. The pilot will be limited to contested cases where the combined total of the parties’ net assets, excluding pension rights or pension protection fund compensation entitlement, is or is likely to be less than £250,000—or so considered to be by the applicant in the application.

On issue, the court will list a first hearing, intended as the FDR, within 16 to 20 weeks with a time estimate of

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Carey Olsen—Kim Paiva

Carey Olsen—Kim Paiva

Group partner joins Guernsey banking and finance practice

Morgan Lewis—Kat Gibson

Morgan Lewis—Kat Gibson

London labour and employment team announces partner hire

Foot Anstey McKees—Chris Milligan & Michael Kelly

Foot Anstey McKees—Chris Milligan & Michael Kelly

Double partner appointment marks Belfast expansion

NEWS
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) has not done enough to protect the future sustainability of the legal aid market, MPs have warned
Writing in NLJ this week, NLJ columnist Dominic Regan surveys a landscape marked by leapfrog appeals, costs skirmishes and notable retirements. With an appeal in Mazur due to be heard next month, Regan notes that uncertainties remain over who will intervene, and hopes for the involvement of the Lady Chief Justice and the Master of the Rolls in deciding the all-important outcome
After the Southport murders and the misinformation that followed, contempt of court law has come under intense scrutiny. In this week's NLJ, Lawrence McNamara and Lauren Schaefer of the Law Commission unpack proposals aimed at restoring clarity without sacrificing fair trial rights
The latest Home Office figures confirm that stop and search remains both controversial and diminished. Writing in NLJ this week, Neil Parpworth of De Montfort University analyses data showing historically low use of s 1 PACE powers, with drugs searches dominating what remains
Boris Johnson’s 2019 attempt to shut down Parliament remains a constitutional cautionary tale. The move, framed as a routine exercise of the royal prerogative, was in truth an extraordinary effort to sideline Parliament at the height of the Brexit crisis. Writing in NLJ this week, Professor Graham Zellick KC dissects how prorogation was wrongly assumed to be beyond judicial scrutiny, only for the Supreme Court to intervene unanimously
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