UK Divorce "What is involved" HOW TO ?

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A UK resident who has a relationship with a Philippine national but is already legally married to another UK EEC or Foreign national, if you are in this position what can you do ?

Well firstly lets look at your situation step by step, once we have done that I will then go on to explain your options.

Once having explained your options I will then take a rather sympathetic approach to UK Divorce, I will be taking you through UK Divorce, what are the grounds ? Is it fast track ? Some of the myths about it will be put to rest !, how much does it cost ? Will the state pay for it ? How long does it take ? What happens about children ? What happens to my property ? Assets ? When can I marry my Filipino fiancée ? for example, should I do it myself, or should I consult a solicitor ? you will undoubtedly have many questions, I hope to answer some of them for you, and guide you through the divorce minefield.

Sadly, UK Divorce is not as straight forward as some have been led to believe, every case is different, for some it is a quicker procedure, for others much longer, very often if children are involved and you have extensive financial assets and a property portfolio, often the process goes on and on forever, until financial agreements can be reached, very often the court is slanted very much in favour of a former wife, and even now in 2005 the courts have an antiquated viewpoint of division of property and assets, the courts in the UK have to deal with more divorce petitions now than at any other time, it is true that 1 in 4 marriages in UK ends in divorce, District judges are now used to seeing “He throws his socks on the floor, and leaves the toilet seat up, or he squeezes the toothpaste from the top rather than squeezing it from the bottom” these are just some of the grounds cited for a divorce in the UK today, or “She no longer will have sex with me” seems pretty typical of grounds cited by men in divorce cases.

The UK Legal system sometimes is very difficult for the petitioner or respondent to follow, firstly it has a habit of creating an adversarial approach to family law, you may have seen this mentioned during a recent Channel 4 documentary hosted by Sir Bob Geldof, The family law act in UK is in great need of reformation, it is an old act some 50 years old, or more, although having the benefit of some reforms, it is still basically an act that puts divorcing couples against each other, and where there are children involved in a divorce, the act is even worse, often creating a nation of divorced children, (you may have seen some of this mentioned and highlighted by the campaign group “F4J or Fathers for Justice” whilst I do not propose to highlight this group for you, it does give you an insight into why many men who are in process of divorce in the UK feeling rather aggrieved at the system to which they find themselves locked into.

The Culture of Divorce in the UK

As one who has been through this process in the last 9 months, I will start by giving you some very good advice, if I say to you, “There are no winners in divorce” “Only degrees of financial loss and embitterment” trust me that I know what I am talking about.

If you ever saw the movie “War of the Roses” starring Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner and Danny Devito, this is a good movie for you to watch first before you contemplate asking your wife for a divorce, the movie makes good viewing at least, to show you guys out there, what happens if you try to spring “I am in love with Mary Joy from Davao City, Philippines and I want a divorce”.

Oliver met Barbara when they were young, he was a rising lawyer, she a gymnast, Barbara put aside her dreams of career success to have a family with Oliver, whose law practice seemed to take off really well, they built everything together, house, family, 2 children, the usual high rising lifestyles, until one day, Barbara had enough of Oliver’s condescending ignorant treatment until she snapped and asked him for a divorce, even though he in this movie was the respondent, you will see he got a pretty rough ride in terms of bill for lawyers to represent him and his wife !!! Division of the family home, and the children, incidentally, the movie ends with them both trying to kill each other, I wouldn’t recommend you get to that stage, although trust me when I tell you, if you want to divorce your Western wife in favour of a Filipino, she almost certainly will want to kill you, but she can be much more subtle than that, it will almost certainly end up in you loosing everything, so before you take that big decision sit down and have a long hard think because UK Divorce and the legal system gets into every facet of your life, it will eat up every moment of your day, you wont be able to think about anything else, it will place a strain on your job or career, there will be endless letters from solicitors, affidavits, most containing unbelievable lies about you, there will be week after week of muck racking, there may be hate mail letters sent to you, divorce is and can be very bitter, especially if you are divorcing your wife for a Filipino, you have heard the term “A Woman scorned” well get used to it, because women can by nature become very vindictive and resort to the most unusual ways of making your life a living hell.

They may pester you on telephone morning noon and night, they may tell your parents, or employers everything about the situation, to cause you embarrassment, you can answer it, don’t answer it, you are much better though in my experience if you do not rise to the bait, your best response is always “No comment”, the British Legal system will encourage you throughout the divorce to have no formal contact with your wife, that is written contact or verbal contact, this can be sometimes very good advice, the minute you engage your wife in any friendly contact, it can in some circumstances be turned against you in court, everything you say, and everything you do can be mis interpreted into an offer of some kind, everything that happens, needs to be documented, even to the point of keeping a daily computer diary.

You may have to move out of the family home referred to in divorce as the “Matrimonial home”, you may receive a contact order to enable you to see your children, your wife may seek to flout the court, and any contact orders as a form of punishment for your dirty little deeds, she may also contact the Child Support Agency, and then you will have a steady but surely stream of letters from them, then there will be legal fees if you are working, this is often a sense of frustration and gives bitter feelings to men in the UK, on the one hand, because they are working, they will almost never receive any legal aid from the legal aid commission, but there wife, will have unlimited access to as much money as the legal aid commission will pay her solicitors, the worst thing you can encounter is a ex partner with a female solicitor, trust me they are like vultures, if you are trying to obtain a quickie divorce and your wife is aware of your desire to marry a Filipino, she will with the aid of her vulture like female solicitor use every avenue available to waste time, drag things out, and cause you maximum pain.

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Are you still interested ? Well read on.

So what should you do, do you do this yourself, or consult a solicitor.

Firstly if you ask your spouse for a divorce she is most likely to immediately seek the services of a solicitor, within 2-3 days you will be hit by a series of emergency court petitions, this may come as a complete shock, in many cases you might still be living in your own home with your wife, although it might be that your relationship is estranged, you might even have agreed to live in separate parts of your house if this allows, or you might think hahaha yes think, you are getting on ok, hmmm watch out, because Divorce solicitors for the Petitioner have a very useful way of putting you immediately on the back foot, you will find that emergency petitions before the court, can be set for a date just 2-3 days away, and you have no knowledge of them until 7pm one night around 2-3 days before, this in fact gives you very little or no time to prepare a solicitor, don’t worry it is done this way, to put you on the back foot, you must immediately drop what you are doing, and go and see a solicitor and explain that you have received emergency court papers, against you, most solicitors are used to this and providing you go to one that is not being represented by your wife, they will immediately arrange for a response.

What are the Grounds for Divorce ?

The grounds for divorce are not the same as the reasons to grant a divorce, let me explain further.

Grounds for divorce are the basis on which the petitioner petitions the district judge to consider granting a divorce, but the district judge must satisfy his or herself that the petitioner’s prayer to the court is that the

“Marriage has irretrievably broken down and that the petitioner cannot be expected to live with the respondent”

If the district judge sitting at the time your file is passed to the judges for consideration feels that the petitioner has shown sufficient grounds, and providing the district judge feels that a divorce in that case is warranted, then he or she will often agree to the divorce being granted as a divorce decree nisi.

Just to dispel some myths you might have, a divorce decree nisi is not a divorce in final, a decree nisi is the one of many stages on which you will find yourself in, it only means that the judge has decided that a divorce can be granted, however it effectively means you cannot re-marry, if you did so during this period, you would be guilty of bigamy, there is a period of some 6 weeks to go first and if the petitioner does not apply for a divorce decree absolute to be pronounced then a further 12 weeks must elapse before the respondent can apply in their own right, something I will talk about later.

So what happens when you ask for a divorce ?

This question often involves a period of heated exchanges between the wife and husband, but if one party is adamant they wish to divorce, even though you might feel as the man that you are going to get a divorce, you may not always be the petitioner, this is where the fun really starts.

You might decide that you want to get a divorce, these are the following grounds that are applicable to sufficient cause to allow a divorce petition before the court.

Unreasonable behaviour
Adultery
2 years separation and consent
5 years separation
Desertion

1. Unreasonable behaviour is the one most likely to be used in UK Divorces, this is because unreasonable behaviour cases are easier to prove and really almost anything can be deemed unreasonable provided the petitioner seeks to provide evidence of it, in the form of a statement of affidavit listing the unreasonable behaviour of the respondent and a prayer stating that “The marriage has irretrievably broken down, and the petitioner cannot be expected to live with the respondent” providing of course the respondent is not defending the divorce” it is almost likely that the judge will grant a divorce on the prayer of the petitioner, who seeks that the marriage be dissolved”.

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Defended Divorces in UK

Just a short note about defended divorces, they are extremely rare, due to costs and the unlikely chance that a Judge will force one party to stay in a marriage that they seek to get out of.

Some women or men who don’t want to be divorced for religious, or appearances reasons, may state initially that they will seek to defend a divorce, if this happens, it may only be a temporary course of action, for one thing, the costs of such a defence are enormous, this involves at least 1-2 days of trial in open court, and if unreasonable behaviour is cited, on both sides, I.e. there is a petition and cross petition in front of the court, the petitioner only has to prove 1 grounds for divorce and the Judge will almost certainly agree that a case has been made, thus the party wishing to defend the divorce may be left with the costs, resulting in thousands of pounds of legal bills, and lets face it, who wants to defend a divorce and stay married to someone who doesn’t want to be married to you anymore.

“I am defending a divorce often tends to be a knee jerk reaction when faced with a petition”.

Legal Separation as opposed to Divorce

Some female petitioners often are advised to issue legal separation petitions before the court, if they are reluctant to file for divorce, this is because to some women, divorce is not what they want, whilst at the same time they may wish to secure certain legal rights, and financial matters, I.e. maintenance, child support, and property rights, who should live in the family home, that sort of thing, however if a female issues a legal separation petition and you want to marry a Filipino, there is no point in agreeing to this, it means you are still legally married, you cannot re marry, and therefore a legal separation may suit her, but it is no good to you, your solicitor will no doubt advise you to issue a cross petition for divorce.

So now you are a little more familiar, are you still wanting to go ahead ?

What happens next ?

Firstly before I talk about the legal papers you will be served with, you might want to consider your financial situation.

Do you have a joint bank account with your wife ?

If so, my advice is simply this, do not make the mistakes I made, I would never wish any British guy to go through what I did, you must to protect your own interests, take the following action before you tell your wife, your solicitor or in fact just about anyone you can think of.

If you have money in a joint account with your wife, the thing to remember is this.

If either of you approach your bank and tell them there is a matrimonial dispute, they will immediately freeze all your money in that account, they will also freeze any switch, connect debit cards, and cancel all your credit cards with them, most branches of banks are familiar with this, some may not do it, others will, you will no longer have any access to that money without joint consent of each other, that means that if all your living money is in a joint account, you are basically…..well I wont use the word on this forum.

My advice is this, do not approach your own bank to open a individual account, you need to secretly approach another bank, open up an account with cards, transfer some money into that account, and keep it for emergencies, it will be some 2 months before you can get access to that money in the joint account, and then it may be only released once your solicitor has made a counter application to the judge, you may find that your wife gets most of it, so watch out, you have been warned.

Get another account with another bank, and keep the account secret, if your salary is paid into this account, get your employers to change your payment details and get it paid to this new account, especially if you intend to leave the matrimonial home.

This is good advice for you, next what happens with emergency legal applications to court, and what are they ?

If you ask your wife for a divorce and she is seeing that you are serious, you are likely to be hit over the next few days with the following petitions, that is of course after her solicitor has applied for emergency legal aid, to cover for the following petitions to court.

Petition to prevent and restrain you from Disposal of assets.
Petition for Judicial Separation.
Petition for non molestation order against her and your children
Petition for ancillary relief to include, periodical payments, lump sum payments, and pension rights.

By this time, once you read this your head is likely to be in a spin, for one thing, you will probably not understand why she should seek a non molestation order, very often this is a precautionary measure by solicitors acting for the petitioner, sometimes it might be the wife who has caused violence, it might be the husband, whichever, it always seems to slant in their favour, I would at this point ask you to do something which is very hard for you to do.

“Try and step out for a moment, take a deep breath, make yourself a cup of tea or coffee and just relax, that may not be easy, I know it wasn’t for me, but looking back, what you have to imagine is that you are not the person named in the petitions try and step back and look clearly and what is being asked of, then your next step is to take legal advice, seek out a solicitor and bring the emergency petitions with you.

Your solicitor will then take your instructions and act on your behalf, for one thing, all of the above applications will need to have an affidavit attached, this is a sworn statement of truth provided to the court, to provide the Judge hearing the case the information on whether to grant the petition and make orders accordingly.

What tends to happen, is that some of the more dramatic petitions such as matters of ancillary relief, non-molestation orders, etc, are dealt with by way of a verbal court undertaking.

This means that the Judge will state that, both parties, will in court swear an undertaking not to molest each other, this is a common way of dealing with a petition for a non molestation order, it effectively binds both parties to the same agreement, thus dealing with the application in the most cost effective way, as far as the ancillary relief is concerned, in many cases, this is just premature.

A Word of note.

Divorce and ancillary relief take totally different routes in the court system, funnily enough the divorce itself, is often of little cost to you, what tends to cost so much money in legal fees, is ancillary relief matters, that is division of income, property, and assets.

If you are a house owner, and have financial assets, such as shares, a pension, other properties, savings etc, be prepared for a long and drawn out process, if you happen to live in a council house, have no savings, have a small income, etc etc, then don’t worry, there is in truth little money to talk about, and therefore, very little for your wife to petition for a share of, it is likely that you will fall into the realms of CAFCASS if you have children.

CAFCASS

Cafcass is the court’s own mediation service for the children, often it is antiquated and slow, my advice is, try and get your wife to agree not to bother with cafcass, it the Judge asks for a report from them, this could take weeks, and the outcome will almost certainly give residence to your former wife to be, just a short word of note here, custody is not a phrase used anymore, the phrases you will hear now are Resident parent and non-resident parent.

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If you wish your child to live with his Mother, or children, etc, then don’t fight the petition for residency, in this way, it also keeps your costs down, if you intend to fight for residency, due to the prejudicial nature of the courts, and judges generally, it is unlikely that a man will be given residency although there are lots of cases where the reverse is true, its just that you might need deep pockets to fight it, but if you have then go ahead, its your money.

Once residency is established, and you consent to it, you are effectively signing away your right to live in the matrimonial home, you will probably be given about 30 days to find somewhere else to live, the country is full of men living in 1 room houses across the length and breadth of UK, its not nice for Fathers, however, the resident parent will almost certainly be given right to live in the matrimonial home, and child support will be no doubt granted temporarily, this is under government rules 15 per cent of your net income, that is if you are self employed, 15 per cent of your net profit.

So if you are earning say £20,000 per year, your net income is around £463.00 per week, giving a contribution to your first child of around £66.00 per week, if you have 2 children its 20 per cent of your net income, if its 3, 25 per cent etc, there is a full list of contributions provided by the Child Support Agency.

So once having received your initial court bundle, you will have taken legal advice, the next thing that will happen, is that you will of course try and apply for legal aid to assist you with expenses in your case to defend or get the best deal for yourself.

Application to restrain disposal of Assets.

This is what will be dealt with first, the petitioner will no doubt be your wife, she will be advised to stop you from spending any money, as in a marriage all financial matters are considered joint, and therefore what you thought was yours is not, and even if you have been working for years and put all of your spare income into your house, while she has been browsing the sales, and in your mind sitting around at home, forget it, it is hers as well, because the law says so, before a divorce can be granted, a document called a heads of agreement must be reached, and for a divorce to be finalized to decree absolute a consent order needs to be signed by both parties.

If you cannot agree financial terms with your ex wife to be, you will not get a divorce, however don’t worry, if there is not much to go round she will be well advised to reach an agreement, as costs can quickly mount up in these procedures, so much so, that nothing can be left for the parties, if they squabble in court too much.

Affidavits in support of Legal Separation and divorce petitions.

Affidavits are as I have already said, statements of truth according ones own perspective.

Ha ha ha, I wouldn’t actually call them statements of truth, even though an affidavit must be sworn before a commissioner of oaths, for the court, which costs £5.00 per swearing, in truth, they are mostly a one sided story, in fact they can be so hurtful and full of lies, that they are really read like a novel of fiction.

If you ever watched the BBC Drama Pride and Prejudice by novelist Jane Austen may I draw your attention to the words of Mr Bennett when he said “When one listens to stories of woes and misfortune, who would read novels, but what are we here for but to make sport for our neighbours and laugh at them in our turn”

Effectively meaning, that most affidavits that appear on your doorstep are but fiction and read like scandalous novels, they are great to read, but are of little value, more importantly they seem to be full of the most unbelievable lies, there will no doubt be smoke coming out of your ears, as Mr Bennett says, “who would read novels, and yet they are there to be laughed at in our own time”, what I am saying is, the affidavits themselves are nothing but contrived lies, trivia and fabricated stories.

Whilst they may seem hurtful to you at first glance, my advice is to bin them or file them, the end result is your requirement for a divorce, does it matter what it says about you, in a few months, no one will remember what it said, and if they did what can they do with it.

A Good point to note here, is that, if a client tells a solicitor, he did this and he did that, who are they to question it, they will only write into an affidavit, what their client tells them, so if she says, “He beat me up and threw me across the floor into the patio door, and bust open my head” well that’s what they will right into the affidavit, providing you know its not true, remembering that if you did, Police may have been called, if they haven’t and there is no evidence of it, there is little point in worrying about it.

By this time it is likely that you have appeared in court at least once, during the court process it normally lasts about 15 minutes, you will not be allowed to say anything, hence that is why you have solicitors acting for you, this Is frustrating as you will hear things which you feel are not true, you will be tempted to tot tut during the process or express your feelings such as “You lying cow” that is common, but you will be restrained by your solicitor not to say anything, in the end, it is not much point in saying anything, you only make yourself look worse.

The Judge will probably not say anything, they tend to be used to it, and most of the talking is done by lawyers, you will be tempted to say. Lies lies lies.


The next stage takes some 2 months, this is gathering of financial information for the ancillary relief process, you may be tempted to ask whets happening with the divorce, the divorce decree nisi will not be granted until there is a head of agreement in place, this cannot be agreed until there has been an FDR and FDR 2

FDR And FDR2.

The Financial Directions Resolution hearing will only take place, once both parties to a divorce has filled in a statement of full financial disclosure, that is all assets, property, shares, in truth anything you have that the court must consider, when you attend court for the initial FDR no doubt your solicitor will ask for counsel to be appointed, these are often solicitors who work in London and are qualified to speak at court in these matters, they tend to have more experience in these type of hearings, however they are expensive and greatly add to your costs, the initial FDR will be listed for a hearing and in the time prior to this, you must submit to your solicitor a full and frank disclosure of all your financial information including all bank accounts, etc etc, your wife must do the same.

Although when she submits hers, it is unlikely to be very much, however she still has to do this for the court.

Then at the First FDR the purpose of this hearing is for the two counsels to get together and agree a list of questions that they would like answered, this does actually require your attendance and quite frankly is a waste of your time, since you are treated like a mute animal.

Once the questions each side wishes to be clarified are determined, then you will be directed to go in before the Judge, at the small private room, the questions the Judge will allow will then be listed for answering.

A 2ND FDR will then be listen for about 8 weeks later, in this time both parties will then have to respond to the questions, generally this process is a paperwork trail, that often involves you in considerable expense, for example, self employed accounts will have to be re applied for, bank statements, going back 12 months, which you may have nor may not have, and in then end, generally it is all for nothing.

The 2ND FDR

At the 2nd FDR this is an attempt by counsel to reach a full and final financial settlement, although I cannot give specific legal advice at this stage, that is for your solicitor, a female applicant will try and get the best deal for herself, that is probably a 60-40 split on the property, and maintenance for herself and any children, as a general rule of thumb, if you wish to avoid paying her forever, you can ask whets known as a clean break principle, this is where your liabilities to her end on divorce decree absolute, however you will still have to make payments for the upkeep of your children, not only is that right and proper, you will not want your children to suffer.

This can be only 15 per cent of your income as I have previously stated, you may avoid maintenance to your ex wife forever by agreeing to a full and final property settlement, that is to relinquish your right to any equity share in your property, remembering what Danny Devito says in “War of the Roses”, “There are other houses”.

If you can obtain a clean break settlement, it’s the best thing for you, it means that you can avoid paying maintenance to your ex wife for the rest of her life, don’t think that you wont have to pay this, if you cannot get a clean break principles applied in your financial heads of agreement document, you will be stuck with paying her forever, this is something you will want to avoid, your solicitor will advise you of this.

If you can get a reasonable settlement for yourself, then once having agreed to it, and the other side having agreed to it, you will then be asked to go back in front of the Judge, once the Judge is satisfied that the agreement is reasonable and that both parties understand the agreement, she or he will thank you for having reached that agreement, as if you could not, the Judge would have to make a decision for you.

This is something that could have gone either way, but if this has been achieved, there will then be a heads of agreement drawn up.

This does not mean that this is the final matter in the ancillary relief procedures, for one thing, you will have to wait now until the decree Nisi is pronounced, this can only be achieved by the file going before the district judge yet again.

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The Divorce itself.

By now you will have established who is seeking the divorce, if you have committed adultery for example with your future wife to be, it is likely that for purposes of a decree nisi to be pronounced that you will be better off agreeing to sign what is known as a “Statement of Confession”, this will be basically a 2 line statement stating that you confess to committing adultery with an un named woman”, once you have signed this, it will go to the other side, who will then submit this to the court, once the district judge has it, and a legal copy of your marriage certificate a decree nisi will be listed for pronouncing at the next available date.

Decree Nisi

A decree Nisi will be pronounced by the district judge, you will not have to attend for this, it’s a rubber stamping exercise, once having done this, a copy will be sent to each party, via their solicitors.

At this stage, there will be a six week cooling off period, during this time, you will have to wait, and even then it is not the end of the matter, before a divorce decree absolute can be applied for, although being down a separate route, a consent order must be signed by both parties.

The consent order states the general agreements that have been reached and the directions for disposal of any property, this was reached at within the heads of agreement.

Once the consent order has been signed it will be submitted with the application to divorce decree absolute. Once the Judge has received it, and sees the file, a divorce decree absolute should be issued, once you have received your copy, you are effectively not married, and are free to re-marry.

Now that you have your divorce decree absolute, you may then go to the local registry office in your town, and apply for a certificate of no impediment to marriage, this costs £30.00 and needs a validity of at least 3 months, this can then be exchanged at any British overseas mission for a local “Legal Capacity for Marriage”

This is the Divorce procedure for UK Residents, the information I have posted is based on personal experience, and it should not be taken as correct, it is merely a description of one particular case, if in doubt as to your legal position you should consult your solicitor, citizens advice bureau, if you are short of funds, Citizens advice bureaus in most towns can arrange free half hour legal advice with local solicitors who will be able to give you some immediate advice.

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Just to let everyone know, I did receive an e mail from John who is in Mindoro Island, living with his Filipina babe, apparently, he is married to a english woman, and has popped the question to his babe, he asked me the following

"Pete how do I go about divorcing my English wife, I left her 3 years ago, to work abroad, I work for Shell, and I am living with my girl in Mindoro, I work 6 weeks on 2 weeks off, but can I marry her in the Philippines"


The answer is no you cant buddy, you have to be divorced first, and you have to go to the British Embassy in Manila and apply for a Legal Capacity for Marriage, you will be required to be resident in the Philippines for 56 days in total to achieve this, you will need to swear before a consular official, currently Mr Carlos Tampinco, the British Consul General that you know of no impediment to your marriage, however hehehehehe you do have an impediment, first you must arrange your divorce from your English wife, to do this you must return to UK to commence proceedings, how that will fit in with your job I have no idea but in any event best wishes with it.

Regards