A Practical Guide to Family Proceedings: Blomfield and Brooks

by District Judge Christopher Simmonds, Alexander Laing, Sophie Hill, Edward Bennett

Overview

This court practice guide enables you to avoid the most common pitfalls encountered across the spectrum of family proceedings, thereby speeding up litigation and avoiding unnecessary work and wasted costs orders.

It covers every aspect of the court process across family proceedings, from divorce and financial remedies to private law and public law children, injunctions and committals and appeals. The guidance is set out with clear references to source materials and is supplemented by forms and other practical information.

The work is a key staple widely referred to within the Family Court, Principal Registry of the Family Division, other district registries and county courts.

The 7th edition includes the following:

- Divorce reform
- Changes to Committal proceedings
- Domestic Abuse Act 2021 (inc PD 12J and Rule 3A)
- Presumption of diminished evidence and vulnerability of witnesses (PD 3AA)
- Jurisdiction issues
- Parental alienation

This title is included in Bloomsbury Professional's Family Law online service.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781526524317
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	11/30/2022
Series:	Bloomsbury Family Law
Edition description:	7th ed.
Pages:	1568
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 9.85(h) x 1.95(d)

About the Author

Christopher Simmonds has been a Family Circuit Judge since the 3rd April 2018 now sitting at Bournemouth. He was originally a District Judge appointed in 2010. He sat in the Principal Registry of the Family Division until his transfer to the Western Circuit in November 2015. His is the Lead Regional Judge for the Court of Protection (South West), a former Commissioner of the Judicial Appointments Commission and former Course Directors at the Judicial College (Family). Before being appointed he was a Solicitor and Partner in the firm of Davis Simmonds & Donaghey specialising in Public Law Proceedings and a member of the Children Panel. He has written numerous articles on family law to include section 38(6) Applications and Secure Accommodation Orders.

Alexander Laing is a barrister practising at Coram Chambers. Alex specialises in children and finance law, particularly cases with an international element. He is the current Family Law Awards: Junior Barrister of the Year (2020), which is the top category under KC, having been the only member of the Family Bar ever twice to have won the Family Law Awards: Young Barrister of the Year (2018 and 2016). Alex is the only lawyer to appear in the four UK Supreme Court cases about family law over the past two years, including the current Family Law Awards: Case of the Year (2020). He is the only 'Rising Star' at the UK bar for both finance and children in Legal 500, 2021 and was the most junior family barrister to be ranked in Chambers and Partners, 2020.

Sophie Hill is a barrister at Coram Chambers specialising in Financial Remedies work, Private Law Children matters, and Family Law Act cases. She has particular expertise in cases involving high net worth, complex ownership, businesses, foreign assets, jurisdictional issues and conduct issues. Sophie has always acted for parents, grandparents and guardians in private law children matters applying Practice Direction 12J involving features of parental alienation, domestic abuse and coercive control, and sexual abuse, dealing with Fact-findings and Final Hearings on a very regular basis. Sophie has experience of vulnerable clients, applying PD3AA and of working with intermediaries and BSL and SSL interpreters.

Edward Bennett is a barrister at Harcourt Chambers. Edward is a highly respected advocate with a growing reputation in family and court of protection work, particularly focusing on international disputes concerning children or vulnerable adults, or complex and sensitive issues such as serious medical treatment. He sits on the editorial board of the International Family Law Journal and was its General Editor from 2015 – 2020. In 2015, he was named Young Family Law Barrister of the Year at the Jordans (now Lexis Nexis) Family Law Awards.
Edward previously trained as a solicitor in the London and Prague offices of Allen & Overy. On qualification, he spent a year as the Judicial Assistant to the Rt. Hon. Lord Justice Lloyd in the Court of Appeal and a further year as Legal Adviser to the Head of International Family Justice for England & Wales, the Rt. Hon. Lord Justice Thorpe.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: The Divorce Petition
Chapter 2: Requirements on Issue of Divorce Application
Chapter 3: Procedure – From Issue of Divorce Application for Issue of Conditional Order
Chapter 4: Procedure - Amended, Supplemental and Further Applications
Chapter 5: Judicial Involvement Leading to a Conditional Order
Chapter 6: Final Order of Divorce
Chapter 7: Concluding Applications Other than by Final Order
Chapter 8: Other Matrimonial Decrees
Chapter 9: Declaratory Decrees
Chapter 10: Civil Partnership
Chapter 11: Applications for a Financial Order with Proceedings under the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 and the Civil Partnership Act 2004
Chapter 12: Other Financial Applications
Chapter 13: Children and Financial Applications
Chapter 14: Financial Applications Governed by the Civil Procedure Rules 1998
Chapter 15: Procedures for the Enforcement of Financial and Costs Orders
Chapter 16: Reciprocal Enforcement of Maintenance Orders
Chapter 17: Jurisdiction in Child Proceedings
Chapter 18: Children – Private Law Issues
Chapter 19: Enforcement of Children Act Orders
Chapter 20: Locating the Whereabouts of a Child
Chapter 21: Wardship and Child Abduction
Chapter 22: Public Law for the Private Law Practitioner
Chapter 23: Family Homes and Domestic Violence
Chapter 24: Emergency Applications
Chapter 25: Penal Notices, Undertakings and Committal Applications
Chapter 26: Court Bundles
Chapter 27: Expert Witnesses in Family Proceedings
Chapter 28: Vulnerable Witnesses in Family Proceedings
Chapter 29: Appeals
Chapter 30: The Court Record

Appendices