Internet Newsletter for Lawyers |
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Family law came late to the web. Whilst other lawyers were on their second or third generation sites, many family lawyers were learning where the "@" key was. We are still behind others in our usage and application. In part we have been led by clients. They want information, not sympathy and comfort. They want it free, and available at all times (especially Saturday nights when our website gets many pleas for help about unsatisfactory contact from fathers).
In part we are led by the younger generation of family lawyers, turning their backs on the touchy feely mentality and instead using the web as it should be, simply a business tool to do a better job, get better profits and better outcomes for clients. Those of us who remember the arrival of the web and still get excited by its possibilities need to learn from those in family law now for whom it is a normal part of working practice.
And so only recently have come the resources we need in family law. Those of us who were very early in the field have noticed even in the past year the competition of resources hotting up. It cannot come too soon.
The following can only be a personal view. As a private client (not legal aid) lawyer handing mostly finance work, there is an emphasis. This perhaps highlights the divisions in family law but is also another reason why family law was slow off the mark. Really good exposure on the web is expensive and often needs more than legal aid profits.
Resources start with e-libraries. The leading ones in our field are Butterworths (www.butterworths.co.uk) and Jordans (www.jordans.co.uk). Butterworths has the really big textbooks and precedents, Rayden and (surprisingly) Butterworths Family Law Service and Clarke, Hall and Morrison, Forms and Precedents, and the Family Court Reports (FCR). Jordans have cornered a good slice of the market with some really niche books, Duckworths, Emergency Remedies, precedents, the top Family Law Reports (FLR) and Family Law magazine. Both are easy to use and provide really good value for a large practice (and no books scattered around an office). Subscribing to both is expensive but is justified for bigger practices.
Westlaw UK (www.westlaw.co.uk) provides a similar service but it is somewhat limited for the family lawyer. They have WLR, All ER, European case law etc but rarely are these needed as most important cases are on FLR or FCR. Two other leading law publishing sites are Justis (www.justis.com) part of Context Ltd and Lawtel (www.lawtel.com) now part of Sweet and Maxwell. Each has a very extensive service of law reports, including some family case reports, statutes, statutory instruments and articles. They have international material. For family law practices within larger firms, this may be their best source of family materials. For smaller firms or specialist practices, a more specialist service may be better value.
Solicitors Family Law Association (www.sfla.co.uk) is the leading family lawyers association in the world, famously having changed the whole culture by its conciliatory Code of Practice in 1982. The site lists members but with rather inadequate information. It has the Code but not their Guides to Good Practice (which can be found on our own Family Law Consortium site - see below). However, the SFLA site does have press releases and valuable fact sheets for members of the public and lawyers as well as good information about the new CSA. The Law Society (www.lawsociety.org.uk) is disappointing on family law, being mainly recent press releases. Unfortunately it does not have the Protocol from which many solicitors now practice and which could then be downloaded to use in court documents, letters to clients etc.
Mediators arrived even later to the web. The UK College of Family Mediators (www.ukcfm.co.uk) which is as close as possible to a regulatory body lists mediator members by area although only by their practices, not names, a real omission. It has the mediation Form E and various Codes of Practice and policies. It lists training requirements, and since it does not train itself, it is able to do so objectively.
Families Need Fathers (www.fnf.org.uk) originally gained a (unfair?) reputation for being hotheads and sometimes irrational. Some of their members suffered badly at the hands of the courts, who were anxious to look after the best interests of children which often meant giving greater "rights" and provision to mothers, but who were also wives! They still suffer, as many men (and women) do, especially short term, on divorce but the organisation does really excellent work, pastorally and in guiding fathers as to their rights and entitlements, with information sheets, local support groups etc. There are good pieces on shared care, an issue which concerns many fathers. As many men find they do not have local support infrastructure in place on separation, unlike many women, such web help is crucial. It is a site to which many male clients can be well referred.
On the other "side", and galling for a long term Guardian reader to mention, the Daily Mail (www.femail.co.uk) provides excellent pastoral, agony aunt and practical advice to women on a range of relevant topics. There is even a panic button to escape for when the boss comes round! Sites such as Relate (www.relate.org.uk) could do with more self help advice. There is good information about the organisation but it is limited as a resource.
The Official Solicitor (www.offsol.demon.co.uk) has one of the top sites, describing his work, including amongst those under a disability, Court of Protection, children in litigation, medical consent and sterilisation with the recent cases reported, and of course child abduction. On this last, here are very good explanatory details and a questionnaire which must be completed by parents to be given to central authorities and other officials. It links naturally to Re-Unite (www.reunite.org) which is excellent. It has practical steps for parents fearing their child has been abducted, details of preventive action, who to contact, what to do about passports and with strong but pragmatic words to those about to abduct or having abducted their child.
Another very good site is the Association of Child Abuse Lawyers (www.childabuselawyers.com). They show their commendable code of practice, set out both general articles and law articles and explain to survivors of child abuse what to expect and seek when visiting a lawyer, how it will feel and the personal impact of the court process.
The guru of data on child abduction is William Hilton of Santa Clara, California, who years ago entered mythology as having every worldwide reported child abduction case on his site (www.hiltonhouse.com). It is still invaluable frequent reading and visiting for those in this area of work
Carelaw (www.carelaw.org.uk) for children in care is a brilliant packed with information, in simple terms that children and young people will want.
The Legal Services Commission (www.justask.org.uk) has a good area listing much sought information but then links to other sites, some of which do not provide the quality of the LSC site. It does however explain well the work of the Community Legal Services Fund. Legal aid, as it used to be known, has been replaced by a whole series of partnership providers of assistance in various forms, from conventional lawyers to other organisations as diverse as motoring organisations. The site lists their partners and what each organisation can do.
The National Association of Citizens Advice Bureaux (www.nacab.org.uk) also has invaluable advice on a range of family issues.
Work often has an international dimension. The leading organisation is the International Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers (www.iaml.org) which has started publishing lists of its 300 or so self elected members across the world.
Financial work often requires calculations. The CSA (www.csa.gov.uk) has details of its work but sadly no self calculator, a real missed opportunity. If they are not prepared to publish one to help the public calculate themselves how much is due, it rather defeats the purpose of removing this subject from the realm of professional advisers! The CGT indexation allowance is on Roger Horne's site (www.number7.demon.co.uk/cgt/allow.htm).
The Land Registry (www.landreg.gov.uk) describes its work, but alas there is no free online data about actual properties. Details of the increase in house prices over a period of years can be found at the Nationwide site (www.nationwide.co.uk). Checking on the sort of housing selected as suitable accommodation can be found (www.upmystreet.co.uk) in a disarming way which highlights age and wealth of local residents and average prices. One site (www.findaproperty.com) allows one to search for properties in different areas and get an idea of what is on the market and for how much, and also includes rental information, so very helpful in preparing for trial. Car prices can be checked at Parkers (www.parkers.co.uk).
Rates (www.rate.co.uk) will give one "rates" as the name suggests e.g. income tax rates, VAT rates, company car rates, NI rates, CGT rates and taxes on houses. It will also show reliefs and allowances going back to 1998 as well as foreign exchange rates. Useful for quick information.
The Financial Times (www.ft.com) is most useful and contains a very handy currency converter. It also has a share prices converter and lots of information showing the performance of shares and is useful for checking share prices stated in Form Es etc and for checking the average share price and performance over a period of time.
Companies House Direct (www.companieshouse.co.uk) provides a lot of free information such as the company number, address and its filing history. However, one has to pay to get Accounts, Annual Returns etc. This costs about £5 per "package" and is well worth it. One gets all kinds of useful financial information and history of a company and its members and directors etc. It is instantaneous and one does not have to wait for days as when one phones Companies House. The service is helpful in family law work when verifying information about a company or when trying to locate a company, its registered office and finding out who are its members and directors.
The Court Service (www.courtservice.gov.uk) provides useful quick information, rather than phoning, on daily court lists for the Family Division and PRFD, some practice directions and excellent information in relation to court fees for family proceedings. It also provides addresses, phone and fax numbers for the County Courts. One can down load many family Court forms. It provides some court judgments but the best place is the British and Irish Legal Information Institute (www.bailii.org) which has judgments of Court of Appeal and a few High Court cases. I still believe the bigger and more important cases should be reported more quickly publicly, to save "under the counter" copies of judgments floating around London for those of us lucky enough to be in the know. But it is better now than even a year ago when we were waiting for months for some key post White cases to go public.
The HMSO site (www.hmso.gov.uk) is useful for finding full text of recent legislation. The Lord Chancellor's Department (www.lcd.gov.uk) has a useful section on what's new in family and individual matters. This includes legislation, press notices, studies and reports, for example the report "Making Contact Work".
The Times (www.timesonline.co.uk) helps if one hasn't got backdated copies of the paper to hand. One needs to register and they give a password but this is free although articles cost £1 each with discounts for bulk use. Good for finding reports quickly or useful archived articles.
Equal Partners (www.equalpartners.co.uk) is a new but very go-ahead financial services practice in London whose site contains a massive amount of valuable information on financial products, a glossary of terms and explanations, best deals for loans, ISAs, deposits and calculations of investments, school fees policies and returns on lump sums. A good site for lawyers and clients.
With ever more couples living in various countries, it is essential to compare the costs of living e.g. to ascertain needs. The Economist Intelligence Unit (www.eiu.com) provides for comparisons of over 100 cities.
The European Union site (www.europa.eu.int) is valuable for the Brussels conventions. The Hague Conventions are also available (www.hcch.net).
Then there are lawyers. Many chambers fail to feature photos of their members - hey, there has to be some reasons to chose counsel rather than just rely on the clerk! Two very different ones are Mitre Court (www.1mcb.com) which lists all members (with mug shots) and also has excellent notes on Human Rights, calculations, recent cases etc, and secondly the personal site of Peter Duckworth (www.duckworthlaw.com) a leading family law barrister and also very IT aware and numerate which shows in his site with many calculations including the best one I have found for retail price index, with other information and good links.
Law Firms sites are still too often brochures on the web. Even the family law practices in big firms with budgets to die for sometimes produce poor sites - all singing and dancing but what for, exactly? An exception is the new Manches site (www.manches.com/family) which gives good information, at all levels of family law work, together with a good dictionary, clear flow charts of the procedures and helpful summaries of the law.
Two of us have since the beginning of the law on the web been pushing our respective sites, and with much objectively acclaimed success. Roger Bamber of Mills and Reeves, Cambridge has created a super site (www.divorce.co.uk), often updated and improved. There is a special section of the site on Pensions and also good information about mediation.
Modestly, I believe that The Family Law Consortium (www.tflc.co.uk) is another leading site, having recently been awarded joint top specialist law firm site. It has lots of information, including on how to get married (genuine, rather than just good for future business). It has a special section on White developments with up to date post White cases and comment. It has several pieces on the various Brussels Conventions and international elements of family law. It has the SFLA Code and several of its Good Practice Guidelines (which do not even appear on the SFLA site) as we were involved in writing some of them.
Further sites with fact sheets and details of family lawyers are (www.lawontheweb.co.uk), (www.divorce-online.co.uk) which includes the incredibly naff online vote of which of 4 royal couples dealt with their divorce in the most amicable way, (www.family-solicitors.co.uk) and Delia Venables' site (www.venables.co.uk). Divorce-online offers a comprehensive divorce purchase kit for £80 including forms, draft orders and agreements. It has met a lot of condemnation from the media and divorce lawyers but what is wrong simply in making forms available to the public? Our skill must lie in using the forms at the right time in the right way and to maximum advantage of the clients. If all we have is an ability to fill in forms, let me retire now to dive in the Caribbean now!!!
The Web has taught us what in fact we are needed for. It is not information. That is freely available. It is not calculations. They are to be found everywhere. It is not DIY help whether quasi counselling or helping to cope personally or for children. It is not remote and generalised advice via e-mail.
The web has in fact freed us up to do what has always been our chief role. To gain experience of people and relationships and to understand the wider operation of the law and so to bring our clients through the most traumatic period in their lives, with fair outcomes, intact self respect and functional children and with minimum of stress and costs. The resources for us and our clients are there on the web. It just now needs us to be better family lawyers at what we really are needed for and best able to do.
I am grateful to Nadine De Souza, Miranda Green and David Allison, my colleagues at The Family Law Consortium, for their help in the preparation of this article.
David Hodson is a specialist family law solicitor, mediator and family arbitrator, and partner in The Family Law Consortium (www.tflc.co.uk) Covent Garden, London. The practice combines solicitors, mediators, counsellors and family arbitrators. David specialises in middle/high net worth family finance cases, often with an international element. He can be contacted on dh@tflc.co.uk.
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