Significant changes to the Family Procedure Rules came into effect on the 29th April 2024 aiming to encourage parties to attend non-court dispute resolution to resolve disputes in private law children proceedings and in contested financial remedy proceedings.
What are the Family Procedure Rules?
The family procedure rules are a single set of rules governing the practice and procedure in family proceedings in the courts in England and Wales.
What are the changes?
Parties are now required to file and serve a form to set out their views on non-court dispute resolution.
In financial remedy proceedings, a failure (without good reason) to engage in NCDR may now result in costs consequences. Whilst the new rules do not give the courts the power to force parties to attend out of court dispute resolution, the court does have a duty to consider at all stages of the proceedings whether non-court dispute resolution is appropriate.
The rules enable the court to adjourn proceedings if the judge considers that non-court dispute resolution is appropriate. This will ensure parties have the time and the opportunity to attend a form of non-court dispute resolution.
What is non-court dispute resolution?
Typically, in family law proceedings, where appropriate, parties must attend mediation or an alternative non-court dispute resolution also referred to as alternative dispute resolution before applying to the courts.
The definition of ‘non-court dispute resolution’ (‘NCDR’) at FPR 2.3(1)(b) is widened to mean:
The methods of resolving a dispute other than through the court process, including but not limited to mediation, arbitration, evaluation by a neutral third party (such as a private Financial Dispute Resolution process) and collaborative law.
What does this mean for me?
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