- Target:
- 10, Downing Street, London SW1A 2AA
- Region:
- United Kingdom
In today’s modern society, the need for equality has never been as important as before. However in the case of divorce, there has been blatant negligence in keeping up to date with the times. Better suited to a society where men are the breadwinners and women the homemakers, current arrangements:
• Nullify the safety of pre-nuptial agreements, making it easier to marry for money rather than for love
• Favour the party with no/low income, ignoring the fact that assets should be shared 50:50 between both parties. This basically means that although both parties will in the end be most likely to be on equal financial footing (ignoring other factors), one of them will receive an unfair advantage in the divorce process. This is because as legal costs for those with Legal Aid are fixed at an unnaturally low rate, lawyers charge private clients (such as the breadwinner) often twice as much. Thus financial burden adds to the emotional burden of divorce.
• Add insult to injury. In ordinary legal cases the loser has to pay the legal costs of the other party. Therefore if the wife was the winning party, in the event that the wife gets a costs order against the losing party, the husband would have to pay the wife’s legal costs as well.
• Place little emphasis on the relationship between father and children in the case there are young children (who would often immediately live with the mother). In many cases, children are used as a bargaining counter as access to them is restricted. In some cases, mothers prevent fathers from access to their children altogether (http://www.wheresmydad.org.uk/).
These inequalities are a cause of concern for ALL those who might consider marriage in the future, those who are married as well as those concerned about equality and justice in our society.
We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to ensure greater equality in the event of divorce.
We would like the government to:
• Give legal standing to pre-nuptial agreements
• Ensure greater equality in divorce terms, using not only income as evidence of financial standing
• Ensure fairer terms with regard to Legal Aid – severe financial hardship for the breadwinner can result from being unable to work due to stress of the divorce
• Ensure fair prices for private clients relative to prices for those receiving legal aid and limit legal aid within reasonable boundaries
• • However, best of all would be if divorce could be avoided altogether. Relationship difficulties are common and should not be all and end all, especially when children are involved.
Therefore, we would especially like the divorce between man and wife with children to only be legal when the marriage is considered to have broken down, despite help from marriage counselling for 1 year. Both parties should apply for divorce and be consensual to divorce.
The Emphasise Equality in Divorce petition to 10, Downing Street, London SW1A 2AA was written by Anonymous and is in the category Gender Rights and Issues at GoPetition.