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Divorce/separation

Here you'll find divorce help and support from other Mners. For legal advice, you may find Advice Now guides useful.

Abuse within the legal system. Any support?

53 replies

Chillionice · 13/05/2023 08:06

Huge advice & support from a post I made on here 2 years ago was fundamental to giving me the strength to recognise and end a 15 year relationship and 11 year marriage to the father of my 3 children. I strongly suspect he has Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
Despite taking every bit of help I can access - private counselling, domestic violence involvement, my own solicitor, huge pastoral support for the children via CAMHS and their school, the legal system is pitted against mothers in my position.
I am stuck on a decree nisi. I am running out of money to fund the financial agreement process. The children (12, 13, 15) live with me and chose to stop their already negligible overnight visits to their father several months ago due to emotionally damaging behaviour on his part. Form E’s have been completed twice by myself but my husband has failed to complete a full version himself. Capital needs have been submitted as monthly costs, bank statements and payslips not supplied. He left his first solicitor, then spent £15k on a barrister. Bullying and aggression is evidenced in almost all of the correspondence I receive from his solicitor.
Offers have been submitted and a FDR hearing is set in 6 weeks time.
I can scrape together enough to get through the FDR but his conduct to date suggests it is likely his revised Form E will be incomplete once again and that he will drag this out to render me financially unable to continue.
I am horrified at the lack of support available to individuals in this situation. It seems to go against everything the legal system ought to represent. It makes an arena where financial abuse can actually be nurtured rather than stamped out.
Are there any resources available to me at this point?
Also, I would like to add my voice to any organisations or campaigns working for reform of the legal system. Are there any?
Whilst coercive control became an offence post 2015 the divorce process, family courts and legal system seem to foster and even provide an environment in which it is encouraged to run rife.

OP posts:
WholeHog · 01/02/2025 06:30

Jumping on with an idea... would it work if there was an official financial disclosure scheme, so a process that could be triggered in divorce, perhaps with a fee, where every FCA registered org provides the relevant info on accounts, mortgages, pensions, etc on both parties as at date of agreeing to divorce to the two named solicitors, or even to the litigants, within a set timeframe? And a similar requirement for companies and land registry? I guess it wouldn't solve everything for international high earners but for everyday people stuck needing basic info it could stop the whole thing being delayed? If it was a standard requirement banks etc could automate the process so not so onerous? A bit like how executors of wills can automatically notify multiple financial organisations of the death and have the right to request info regarding deceased's finances, but with an automatic disclosure of info. What have I missed?

LemonTT · 01/02/2025 08:05

WholeHog · 01/02/2025 06:30

Jumping on with an idea... would it work if there was an official financial disclosure scheme, so a process that could be triggered in divorce, perhaps with a fee, where every FCA registered org provides the relevant info on accounts, mortgages, pensions, etc on both parties as at date of agreeing to divorce to the two named solicitors, or even to the litigants, within a set timeframe? And a similar requirement for companies and land registry? I guess it wouldn't solve everything for international high earners but for everyday people stuck needing basic info it could stop the whole thing being delayed? If it was a standard requirement banks etc could automate the process so not so onerous? A bit like how executors of wills can automatically notify multiple financial organisations of the death and have the right to request info regarding deceased's finances, but with an automatic disclosure of info. What have I missed?

A whole host of laws that protect our personal information and data. It’s up to an individual to decide when it is or isn’t shared. Once you give “them” the ability to access and share it they can do what they want with it. The wording and safeguards to limit use for a purpose would be nearly impossible to draft and enact. You simply have a right conflicting with a right and civil liberties.

Most people don’t need or want this option. They have adult conversations about money because it is fundamental to the relationship. Marriage is about money not dresses and a big day with ceremonial vows that legally mean nothing.

imo our culture would be against this level of intrusion into our lives.

PearlViewer · 02/02/2025 09:37

If only it were that easy. A credit report can be a useful tool - as it should show individual accounts -
but doesn’t cover everything. I certainly believe the court should actually impose penalties for hiding assets and lying - in my experience they do not give one sh*t…

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