Blog
Press Round-Up: Regulatory and Professional Discipline – May 2026
Jack Garden
9 October 2018
Islamic marriages – are you really married under English law?
For a marriage to be valid in English law, a civil registry marriage has to be performed. This gives married couples rights which non-married couples generally do not have. In addition, upon divorce, married couples can make applications to the court for financial claims for themselves and their children. A number of those opting for a religious ceremony choose not to complement it with a civil ceremony, leaving them in a vulnerable position legally on separation.
28 June 2018
International families and the price of child relocation without consent
The recent case of a British mother of three young children who was extradited from the United States to England to face criminal charges relating to child abduction and passport fraud serves as a stark reminder of the heartbreaking predicament that an international family can face upon the breakdown of a relationship.
22 May 2018
Less hide, more seek - divorce and financial transparency
It’s not only tax experts that need be alive to the new transparency requirement for company ownership in overseas territories, divorce lawyers will take a keen interest too.
New disclosure rules pushed through the House of Commons on 1 May 2018 will require British overseas territories, including the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and the British Virgin Islands, to publish company ownership registers by 31 December 2020.
15 May 2018
Surrogacy and Parental Orders – how far does the interpretation of “enduring family relationship” extend?
In a case involving a Parental Order (“PO”) application earlier this year, X (A Child) [2018] EWFC 15, which involved the surrogate child of a married couple in a platonic relationship, the President of the Family Division, Sir James Munby, again showed the flexibility the court is, sensibly, willing to give when making important decisions about the legal status of a child within its family.
20 April 2018
English Court of Appeal follows US case example in deciding earning capacity is not a matrimonial asset to be shared
London is often seen as “Divorce capital of the world“ by wealthy expats, usually the wives, wanting a generous divorce settlement, but this latest UK case shows there are limits. The English Court of Appeal issued an emphatic “No” in April 2018 to an attempt by a wife to argue that her husband’s earning capacity is capable of being a matrimonial asset, to which the sharing principle applies and in the product of which, as a result, she had a continuing entitlement to share.