family law essay

family law essay

The Importance of Family Law in Society

1. Introduction

Family law is the legal provision for all legal issues involving family relationships, like child custody, access, property, and money matters, etc. Legal issues usually begin with a breakdown of the relationship and continue if parents cannot agree on these issues. Family law is necessary to cater to these legal issues and provide an amicable settlement within families. It is an important legal provision as its aim is to protect the interest of children and to secure a fair settlement of disputes between family members. An effective family law also contributes to lessening social ills. An easily accessible and comprehensive justice system will be extremely beneficial for families who are facing difficult situations. For any family under stress, good and timely legal advice can be critical. This is usually the most cost-effective way to deal with problems that can be highly emotional or may involve children. Without the right type of advice, it is easy to make poor decisions. There are many different kinds of families with many different types of family problems. A visibly comprehensive system of family law can help prevent disputes from reaching the stage where the children become the primary victims and where the disputes cause irreparable damage to family relationships.

The society’s foundation rests on the family. There is no doubt that an inherent interdependence exists between the family and its individual members. The family, offering primary socialization to the young, continues to assure the care of children and the elderly, sick or handicapped who cannot care for themselves. Indeed, the family provides the individual with his or her most important emotional attachments and identity. Beyond this, household relations are primary in determining an infinite number of behaviors, attitudes, and self-perceptions essential to the individual’s social identity. It is only through the family that the individual can become a responsible social being, as the family is the foremost social group which one has both by birth and involuntarily. Given all these, there will undoubtedly be varied legal issues concerning families, creating the necessity for family law in society.

2. The Role of Family Law in Protecting Children’s Rights

A recent change relating to the welfare principle is the implementation of The Children and Adoption Act 2002, which later in the act changes the wording from the welfare principle to the paramountcy principle, leaving no doubt as to the importance of this factor when deciding the upbringing of a child and thus an increase in singling into what is best for the child to focusing on the influences the wishes of the child (if of intelligent age and understanding) in S.1(3) of the act. This is crucial in an attempt to get children involved in decisions which often affect their lives greatly in residence or in cases of particular abductions out of the country.

This change in rule signaled the movement of fathers’ rights and the changing role of the mother into the working environment, placing emphasis on the growing equality in gender in which society perceptions were well in advance of family law. In particular, father employment is regarded as a factor to plan a child living under the post-separation S. Rosso residence tests (considered later).

Before this act in 1975, children were, in effect, considered to be property and were even subject to be sold as part of an adoption process. That was a complex best removed from an age-old legal precedent that, as a general rule, a child under the age of 7 required no specific guardianship to receive. In effect, it had been seen as acceptable to eradicate the father from children’s lives at the age of 7. Due to growing social changes and advancements in psychology and understanding of child development, the paternal rights rule was finally abolished in 1987.

This is a place of significant importance. Young children are the most vulnerable in society, and it is family law that appears most often affecting the rights of the child. The 1989 Children Act was a considerable milestone in child law and indeed seemed to start an age of enlightenment into the minds of judges and lawmakers. Its focus was the welfare of the child, what was best for the child rather than on what was best for the parents.

3. The Impact of Family Law on Divorce and Separation Cases

Under s 90H(1), the Act specifies the situations to be thought of by a courtroom when determining whether or not to make a divorce order. Scott is more likely to be required to enroll the agreement with the Household Court when constructing a change software over it. Section 44(3) of the Household Legislation Act 1975 states that the courtroom should not have considered making the order unless it was given such data as was available about the provision, which may include up-to-date or future data on the date of the listening to. Under the purport of the prevailing legislation and taking into consideration the above judgments, there isn’t any doubt that the ability to eliminate the agreement without the necessity to supply the criteria in s seventy-nine will bring some relief to the celebration searching for to stave off the monetary one.

4. Ensuring Fairness and Equality in Family Law

The essence of fairness and equality is what undermines the importance of family law. Fairness is a very general and abstract concept. In general, it means that people receive their due. But what is ‘due’? There are two main theories of what people are entitled to. One is that people are entitled to an equal share of society’s resources unless there is a ‘relevant’ reason to the contrary. This is known as the substantive theory of fairness. The other theory is that a person is only entitled to be treated the same as others in the same situation. This is known as the formal theory of fairness. On the other hand, from the point of view of the people affected, fairness or justice is often felt to have been done if a legal decision reached in a dispute respects their dignity and autonomy, so long as it is consistent with giving due weight to the rights of others and the common good. The main focus of the people is related to child custody disputes that are often decided on irrelevant grounds and beliefs that a child is better off in the care of a wealthy mother than a caring, less wealthy father. Traditionally, equality would be described as everyone being treated the same. This is known as formal equality. Although this is the emphasis of section 8 of the Human Rights Act – Right to respect for private and family life… it is not enough. People being treated the same does not mean it is fair to everyone. True equality often denotes treating people differently in order to achieve the same result for everyone. This is known as substantive equality. An example being single-parent families living off a benefit. Logically, a solo mother should receive the same level of financial support as a solo mother but, this is often not the case today. She and her child are entitled to receive enough to ensure that they have a decent standard of living, thus, gaining equal access to resources.

5. The Evolution of Family Law and Future Challenges

The article reviews the evolution of family law regarding the changes in the conventional familial form and the influence of Romano-Germanic law. It asserts that these changes have been perpetuated by the general welfare and have ultimately weakened the family, and suggests that the current direction of family law will be detrimental to the family. The article breaks the changes down into 4 stages. The first being the intervention of private law rights and public law rules into the traditional exclusive jurisdiction that the family had. The next stage is said to be the abolishment of the notion that the family is a separate entity from the state and civil society. This is linked with the third stage where the welfare has shifted from being focused on the family to being a provision of individual benefits. The transition into the final stage is said to take the form of no-fault divorce laws and support for alternate family forms and according to the authors will lead to the complete deinstitutionalization of marriage. These changes in the direction of family law are said to have various consequences, all compromising the strength of the family and the special protections that it is accorded. It is said that the family has become less autonomous, more dependent on the state and civil society, it has lost the continuum of protection and is subject to the automatic application of public law principles, its function has been confused with alternate institutions and other roles, and finally, there has been a general lessening of the special treatments and protections that the family unit receives. This is said to be adverse to children who are the most vulnerable members of the family group.