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Litigation Loans to fund divorce

220 replies

Highlandheath · 03/12/2018 11:27

Any views, experiences, recommendations please, or do these contribute to what Mostyn describes in JvJ as "gross leaching of costs" and solicitors charging for nothing but time?

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MissedTheBoatAgain · 25/12/2018 12:55

I am not in favour of legs aid for divorce as it may encourage people to keep on arguing and going further down the court route as it is not costing them anything?

Highlandheath · 29/12/2018 11:04

Boatneezer, did you buy your son Tiny Tim a turkey this year or did you write to him saying "daddy would buy you a turkey, but mummy has to do a variation request through the CMS, because I'm a total arse, and can't resist tormenting her even if it torments you... Happy Christmas!!" RE your legal aid comments, they are utter pants, legal aid is not for free, you have to pay it back: Paying the costs of your case
Legal aid might not cover all the costs of your case. You may have to:

Even if awarded legal aid those qualifying may have to pay some of the costs upfront and pay back some of the cost if you win money or property from your case
From the Gov Website:
Read about paying for legal aid.

The Legal Aid Agency (LAA) will make a charge or claim – known as the ‘statutory charge’ – on any money or property you win. If this is your home, payment can be deferred and the debt placed as a charge on your home (similar to a mortgage).

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Jack65 · 30/12/2018 22:15

As of 2012 persons only get LA for divorce cases involving dv with evidence, or proceedings by the local authority to take your child into care. For future reference, legal aid solicitors were very lucky if they were paid £60 an hour for legal aid work. By memory for a straightforward uncontested divorce we were paid £97 for the file irrespective of the amount of hours this took. Yes that is per file. So can you imagine trying to pay solicitors, secretaries, very expensive insurance, practising certificates, premises etc out of that. For certificated work, it worked out at less than £60 per hour again depending on the type of litigation. My point is that legal aid was only paid back if you owned a property, by way of a charge, or had money. And if you had money you rarely qualified. And, it was still considerably cheaper because privately you would pay 200 pounds plus an hour. My private rate was 250 an hour. Why did solicitors bother with legal aid work? Because believe it or not, we believe in justice for everyone, not just the wealthy, and me and my colleagues were happy to be paid a shit salary in return for helping people who desperately needed it. A huge majority of our clients would not pay anything at all which is why the conservative government introduced LASPO in 2012. And it is now no longer available except in circumstances I have stated above.

Highlandheath · 01/01/2019 13:00

Legal Aid is NOT available in divorce cases involving dv UNLESS the victim has less than £6k in assets, not cash, but assets, so anyone with any kind of equity in a property, or any kind of equity in anything does not qualify for legal aid no matter how little chance they have of realising their assets, short of making themselves homeless. If the combined value of car, cooker, fridge, tv, computer and your wedding ring amount to £6k you do not qualify, no matter how much you have been injured, tortured or abused....

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Xenia · 01/01/2019 13:05

Yes, that is probably right. A lot of husbands by the way hated that legal aid used to be available to their non earnig wives in the old days as they were not on high sums of income, say £30k so not really able to pay much for lawyers and their non earning spouse had legal aid. It is hard to achieve fairness. Perhaps that's not a bad thing- make divorce so awful we discourage people from doing it. I suppose I ensured the fairest system of all (ajnd plejnty of the higher earner in a coyple do what I did) - pay both sides' solicitors each month during the divorce.

Jack65 · 01/01/2019 19:01

Highland Heath you are talking such crap. Legal Aid does not take into account fridges, tvs, cookers or motor vehicles that are in use day to day. You are not outside of legal aid if you own a property if you are in receipt of income support and some other means tested benefits such as pension credit. Please anyone reading this who may require assistance from the legal aid scheme, there is a legal aid calculator which you can work through to see whether you can get assistance. Use the calculator and if you still need help contact the CLS who will advise further on eligibility. Do not take any notice of the information from Highland Heath. It is just wrong.

Highlandheath · 02/01/2019 08:32

I am not talking crap, you are! I have applied for legal aid several times, with the support of charities, and they have ALL said any property, including a car, or any assets mean that I do not qualify. You don't know what you are talking about jack, drop the insulting and aggressive tone, and do some research.

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Xenia · 02/01/2019 08:44

I don't do legal aid but it looks from this (if current)
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/757027/Guide_to_determining_controlled_work.pdf page 19 para 3 that household furniture is not counted unless of exceptional value and 5. says "Cars or other vehicles in regular use are generally treated as nil value for assessment purposes under Reg 31(b), unless they are of exceptional value (e.g. classic cars, luxury vehicles). "

www.gov.uk/guidance/civil-legal-aid-means-testing#overview

Most people in divorce cases do not get divorce (I think other than for domestic violence although it is mean tested and therefore sometimes available for mediation.

Hiddentruth · 02/01/2019 09:44

Catching up on this thread. @Highlandheath is essentially right in what is said.
Putting fridges aside...as am unsure on that tbh...but I too had every firm of solicitors instructed by me to either make the divorce petition or respond in finances to look at legal aid. I had all the evidence of the abusive relationship I needed to get out of. On paper I ticked all boxes but could not get it.

It was important to me that the divorce petition noted the abuse as the form it took also had a bearing on what was to come...I knew the pattern and how the behaviour would escalate so I did this to help myself and the court.

But as Highland says....it was hopeless due to equity in property. The solicitors all agreed I had the evidence to fulfil the requirements but the equity blocked it.

You may realise due to other threads my ex had a litigation loan he did not declare into proceedings...which lasted for over 2 years of unbelievable events in court and this proves my point entirely...that was the exact behaviour of a determined and clever abuser. Use others to do the dirty work and materially disadvantag me and reap his harm that way. His team litigated an unwinnable case which is an offence according to SRA.

@Xenia yes divorce is truly awful but is awful because the system has not done enough to limit harm. I consider wholeheartedly that I was abused both in the relationship and by the system when leaving it. I have lost 6 years of my life so far to the mess of it all.

Where abusive behaviours exist it is longer term more harmful not to escape that than to stay so the decision to leave a chronically abusive dynamic is laden with risk which, due to the nature of abusers can easily tip over into actual threat to life so this is a really serious issue.

I am dumbfounded that @Jack65 as a professional person comes on here and tells Highlandheath they are talking 'crap'. That is appalling. By any standards! Why the need for offensive language? Make your point in law.

Jack65 · 02/01/2019 11:54

I have you prat.

Hiddentruth · 02/01/2019 14:08

@ Jack65

With behaviour like that I expect you will go before disciplinary tribunals before too long. Reap what you sow....

Jack65 · 02/01/2019 17:58

Boo hoo Grin

Highlandheath · 02/01/2019 22:49

Jack's been at the Chardonnay again!

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Xenia · 03/01/2019 22:34

I would certainly support a state sponsored on line tool that most couples could use where you key in lots of relevant details to get an indicative figure of what each side should get and pay so they have their ballpark negotiation figure and also a default that unless both sides agree otherwise or the court says otherwise children spend half their time with each parent too. Although rough and read instruments like this may do some injustice the simplicity and speed of them might do more good than harm.

Highlandheath · 04/01/2019 10:08

Xenia that does already exist, and doesn't work for CMS! The problem is that while there is a reasonable, and responsible majority of parents, of either gender, who do pay, there is also a significant minority of people like Eboatneezer, who hide their assets and then blame the fact that they choose not to pay child maintenance to the mother of their children for the care of their children on the mother of their children. The number of paying parents who just don't pay is around 38%, and the amount of CMS arrears owed is over £4 billion and, those who don't pay? 92% are fathers.... As a result there are a lot of children who go without. My ex was very keen to see a lot of his children until he got his "nil" CMS assessment - he had a financial incentive to spend time with them, because the more time he spent with them the less CM he paid... Without that financial motivation to see the children he has cut it down hugely, the outcome is I have more childcare responsibilities, less money, and less time to work. The CMS are useless, and mens groups like F4J, FNF and VOTC have their own little group chats on how to avoid paying, like Boat they endlessly appeal decisions and while they are supposed to pay until the appeal is decided, they don't. Where abuse exists financial abuse also exists, and the abusive man will use financial abuse with the help of the courts and the CMS. Even among lawyers and Judges there's a ridiculous tendency to believe the lie that women accuse falsely for financial gain - despite this flying in the face of all the evidence and statistics. I think Mostyn's view that each phase of divorce in family law should be subject to a cap is justified, that the Courts should be able to establish Child Maintenance at the time of divorce if either couple wants that and that this should remain in place subject to an appeal through court, unless both parties agree to go through the CMS, at the moment court can set Child Maintenance, but the paying parent can then appeal that through the CMS after one year, and the minute the CMS become involved maintenance stops and the paying parent just launches endless appeals. This would also ease the load for the CMS to concentrate on the more needy. I'm working with a group at the moment, by the way, on a legal challenge by adult children of abusive men who have been forced into contact, and sometimes residency with their abusive fathers, despite clear evidence of abuse, and despite these young adults voicing repeatedly their desire to stay with the non abusive parent, and not see the abusive parent. How the courts and the Fathers groups have managed to flip the narrative so the child is not believed and is forced into contact and residency with a dangerous and damaging parent while the protective parent is accused of PAS, and penalised beggars belief. Sorry Xenia, but there is something approaching a collective blindness and insanity in the legal profession that is perpetuating damaging and deeply inequitable outcomes in the family courts. The narrowness of the social and racial background of Judges and Solicitors is a problem, and the tendency for the legal profession to circle wagons and defend their own interests is shocking.

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Highlandheath · 04/01/2019 10:19

On the last point, re forcing children into contact and sometimes residency with the abusive parent, there are two rights of women reports, The Child Homicide Reports, which detail how this attitude of the Law and the Courts in disbelieving women who try to protect their children from abusive men, and disbelieving children who voice their desire to remain with the none abusive parent, has lead to the deaths of some 50 children - those deaths should speak to the law of the suffering that many children are living through due to Family Court prejudice. There is also a report from last year, "What about my right not to be abused" carried out by Queen Mary College Law Dept, which carried out interviews with 75 abused women and detailed their experience of Family Law and the Family Courts. As with this thread, the response of family lawyers has been largely to discredit it, it's a decent report, but family lawyers received it with disbelief, apparently 75 women wasn't enough, just as, apparently 50 dead children isn't enough. When Family Law makes such a dangerous hash of protecting children from abuse, it should be understandable that family lawyers get scant respect on this thread, for the sheer mass of fuck ups, and money grubbing and - yes - outright corrupt behaviour their secretive cabal indulges in...

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Xenia · 04/01/2019 11:52

Most men are not abusive. So a default to 50% (which if that is the current law I was not aware of it) residence with each parent unless the parents agree otherwise (most parents agree contact not courts in practice) or the court orders otherwise seems more failr and makes it much easier for women to work full time and keep up their careers too so seems to be win win to me.

Of course if a woman or man abuses a child then there should not be unsupervised contact.

I agree that some people, male and female, can use the courts in family cases as a tool of control. In a sense by paying mmy ex 60% and then him not wanting even one night a year contact and him not paying a penny I have one of the simplest divorces in history - clean break, no maintenance by anyone to anyone and no disputes over where the children sleep and I pay for them 100%. That of course is the only way you can really hurt higher earner women on divorce if man and woman both work full time - by not helping with the children at all and not paying anything. if that was his deliberate aim it is certainly a peaceful result even if an unfair burden. Life can be unfair for most of us and we mostly just have to put up with it.

MissedTheBoatAgain · 11/01/2019 04:43

It is hard to achieve fairness

Hoorah for someone in Legal appreciating the unfairness of one partner not having to pay legal costs whilst the other one gets crippled.

My Ex applied for Legal aid as she had no UK assets in her own name and her solicitors would not enter into a Sears Tooth agreement. She thought that Legal Aid would enable her to keep ignoring courts decisions until she got her own way and if necessary go to; appeal, supreme court and eventually the European Courts. However, she was refused as I was prepared to pay ex's costs as advised by my solicitor.

Pissed ex off big time as she knew that any assistance I provided would be reflected in the final settlement. She ended up 35K worse off due to her decision to make the Divorce a contest. A fact that still makes me smile even though divorce was concluded in 2016.

Her latest strategy is to go to Tribunal over CMS on the basis that CMS have not calculated the figures correctly and that my HMRC Tax Return is false. Have been advised that appeal is almost certain to fail as Tribunal will look at HMRC Tax return and check CMS calculation.

Tax Returns are prepared by professional accountants and have never been questioned by HMRC. I pay my accounts 96 pounds per year for insurance to cover the costs of any challenges to the Tax Returns they have prepared and the total coverage is measured in 5 figures.

My accountants can't wait to go to the Tribunal and slaughter the Financial Expert that Ex has requested to be present.

Xenia · 11/01/2019 09:03

I know. It has been the advantage of removing legal aid - the "richer", but not very rich partner who didn't ever get it is not now unequal against the lower earner and like you I paid both side's legal fees which as you say come out of the joint pot anyway (all our money was in joint accounts just about).

I could have gone to teh CMS after a year and got some child support (he pays none) but decided not to bother as 25% of not much was hardly worth a fight over. Why anyone would date a man or woman who doesn't support his children is another matter but we manage okay.

It is very very hard to be fair in family law. Even King Solomon in the Bible struggled and in that case knew the real mother in a dispute over who was the mother would refuse to let the child be cut in to two pieces and instead let it go to the lying fake mother which helped him decide who was the mother. You cannot split children in two and most do not really want as teenagers to live in two places - which of us do - so they are very difficulot issues to resolve fairly unless the parents keep switching houses when it is their contact time and the teenagers get to stay put.

Highlandheath · 19/03/2019 17:41

Ressurecting this thread... Anyone who has had one of these litigation loans please PM me ASAP! That's all! HH

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