Families are no longer as secure as they used to be. The process of divorce and separation can deeply affect children, as can exposure to new types of family structures. Children may feel stressed, frustrated and confused. When parents separate or divorce, children may: have difficulties … [Read more...]
DBS v SRG: Retroactive child support claims
20/20: Looking back over the last 20 years I was not short of choices when LawNow asked me to write about one of the most important family law cases in the last twenty years. After consulting with Sarah Dargatz, my fellow columnist on family law issues, I decided to talk about DBS v SRG, a … [Read more...]
From the Trenches of High-Conflict Family Litigation
Never have I ever: set out to engage in high-conflict family litigation. And when I say high-conflict, I mean cases where the parties can’t put their own emotions aside to make good decisions for themselves and their children. Somehow, though, it finds me. Time and again I have tried to minimize the … [Read more...]
Shared Custody Parenting: Income Tax Issues
Since the introduction of the Federal Child Support Guidelines (FCSG) in 1997, custody arrangements have affected child support obligations for Canadian parents. The greatest flexibility applies to “shared custody” situations. Under the FCSG, a child is in shared custody where each parent “exercises … [Read more...]
Alternatives to Court: Parenting Coordination
This is the last column in LawNow’s series on resolving family law disputes out of court. The other columns in this series include Sarah Dargatz’s articles on collaborative negotiation and mediation, and my article on arbitration. In this column, I’m going to talk about parenting coordination. This … [Read more...]
Alternatives to Court: Mediation
In the first column in this series, John-Paul Boyd introduced basic alternatives to resolving family law disputes in court. In the second column, I wrote about the Collaborative process. In the last issue, John-Paul Boyd explained arbitration. In this column, I’m going to talk about … [Read more...]
Alternatives to Court: Arbitration
In our first column in this series, I introduced the basic alternatives to resolving family law disputes in court – negotiation, mediation and arbitration – and talked about some of the surprising research on lawyers’ views about litigation. In the second column, Sarah Dargatz wrote about … [Read more...]
Alternatives to Court: The Collaborative Process
John-Paul Boyd explained why people might want to find an alternative to court to reach a resolution about their family law disputes in the November/December 2018 issue of LawNow. One alternative to court is the Collaborative process. Many processes, such a negotiation or mediation, can be … [Read more...]
Resolving Family Law Disputes: Alternatives to Court
When adults leave a serious relationship, they have a lot of decisions to make. Sometimes these are small decisions, about who can keep the dishes or the books, but more often they are big decisions. Things like where the children should mostly live, how their time will be divided, who should pay … [Read more...]
Domestic Violence and Family Law Disputes
Domestic violence – or family violence or intimate partner violence, call it what you will – is a serious problem in both intact and separated families. According to a 2013 report from Statistics Canada, there are 252.9 victims of domestic violence per 100,000 population, and domestic violence makes … [Read more...]