Knowledge and resources

Family Practice Conference 2023

Exploring out of court dispute resolution and how this can enhance your practice

Our Parenting After Parting Committee sat down with Sir James Munby to bring you a special two-part podcast.

YRes CONFERENCE 2022: This workshop shared experiences and top tips from representatives of the Family Justice Young People’s Board, and looked at how the Family Lawyers’ Charter encourages practitioners to work collaboratively and in a joined-up way

The Guides to Good Practice build on the Code of Practice by developing the ethos behind it into areas of practice. This guide focuses on referrals to contact centres and the best practice needed in these cases.

There are many supportive organisations out there and we can only include a selection here. We hope it helps you on your journey.

What is domestic abuse?

The government definition of domestic abuse is “any incident or pattern of incidents of controlling, coercive, threatening behaviour, violence or abuse between those aged 16 or over who are, or have been, intimate partners or family members regardless of gender or sexuality. The abuse can include, but is not limited to: psychological, physical, sexual, financial and emotional.”

Whatever route you choose to take to address your co-parenting issues you may come across ‘legal jargon’ which can appear unfamiliar and confusing. Set out below are some of the key definitions to help you along your way.

Bringing up children after separation is truly one of the hardest things. We want to share our stories with you in the hope that they might help you choose to keep persevering to bring up your children together as co-parents, even though you are no longer in a relationship together.

Becoming a separated parent is not something you may have anticipated. It is challenging in so many ways and can be very daunting.

In this workshop a panel of Alex Verdan QC, Charlotte Bradley and Dr Mark Berelowitz, chaired by Simon Blain, provided a fascinating and extremely useful insight into high-conflict parental disputes from their wide-ranging perspectives.

In the second of a two-part article on how grandparents can be brought into when parental issues have arisen, we focus here on public law proceedings and the details of child arrangements order and special guardianship orders.

A number of websites and apps help separated parents share information about their children’s needs and plan anything from diaries to mealtimes. Many also have built-in recording of conversations and tools to help reduce conflict in the co-parenting space. As these are now sometimes court-ordered, practitioners are advised to have at least a basic knowledge of what the different options offer.

The charity OnePlusOne has five decades of research into family breakdown and has developed models, programmes and publications that deliver. As lockdown-related family problems surge, the charity asks if the DD&S Bill might offer some glimmers of hope…

This article tries to answer some of the questions now faced by separated parents worried about how the current events and government advice will impact on their child arrangements – whether existing or sought. I have seen and read many social media comments about this topic. There seems to be a wide divergence of views from family lawyers up and down the country.

In these difficult times arrangements in nearly every aspect of life are changing rapidly. This will include living and contact arrangements for the children of separated parents. If possible, parents will need to work together to agree necessary changes.

In this podcast, Denise Ingamells, Head of London SPIPs at RCJ Advice, and Marc Etherington from Resolution’s Parenting After Parting Committee, discuss how the Separated Parents Information Programme works.

In this audio recording of their workshop, Gillian Bishop and Felicity Shedden, explore how parenting co-ordination supports parents in high conflict to implement final child arrangements orders or parenting agreements.

With the help of the Parenting after Parenting Committee we have put together this guidance to help you help clients who are separating parents