Early legal advice on child arrangements should be piloted as part of ambitious reforms that will help to resolve more disputes away from court, an influential thinktank has recommended.

A decade after the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act removed many areas of family legal advice from the scope of legal aid, Justice says the family courts are struggling to support and case manage a high proportion of litigants in person, who are faced with a ‘confusing and disaggregated’ landscape.

Latest quarterly statistics published by the government show that it took, on average, 46 weeks for private law cases to reach a final order - up six weeks from the same period last year.

In its latest working party report, Justice says access to early legal advice can correct ‘wholly unrealistic’ expectations of what courts can do, assess and discuss non-court options, and provide potential litigants with a basic understanding of their rights and obligations as well as their legal aid entitlements. The thinktank recommends publicly funded early legal advice on child arrangements should be piloted without delay.

Justice joins a growing line of powerful voices – including the Law Society and family law group Resolution – in recommending the reintroduction of early legal advice.

Justice says the pilot would build on the evidence based provided by the ‘Law for Life Affordable Advice’ pilot, which has shown that early specialist legal advice in relation family problems had a particularly successful impact on out-of-court resolution. The government should also consider how cross-governmental savings can be measured.

Should families need to go to court, they would be allocated a court team who would conduct an initial investigation about their circumstances, which could potentially identify a non-court process that would resolve the dispute or make referrals to support. For cases that continue in court, the case progression officer help ensure cases are ready in advance of judicial hearings.

Justice recommends a new duty on the court to provide children with the opportunity to participate in cases. Concerned by the lack of oversight that the court has after an order is made, Justice recommends an ‘enquiry’ after a period of time determined by the court to check the order is working.

The report makes a total of 43 recommendations.

Professor Gillian Douglas, chair of Justice’s working party, said the report makes ‘ambitious but realistic recommendations for policy-makers’. Justice chief executive Fiona Rutherford urged the government, courts and family justice professionals ‘to seize this opportunity for reform and to redesign the family justice system around the families who need it’.

 

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