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Civil Courts' Review

Published: 01/09/2008
Source: Liz Welsh

The Scottish Civil Courts Review provided the Association with an opportunity and a challenge. The opportunity was to make a case for the introduction of family courts, which had been our policy for a number of years. The challenge was to define exactly what a family court should be.

The basics
In brief, we stated that the Family Law Association is strongly in favour of the formation of a distinct family court. Ideally there would be separate premises, purpose-built to suit the range of cases and the several forms of dispute resolution which are appropriate for the various types and stages of cases that we deal with. We would seek a specially recruited and trained bench, with a range of support and ancillary services available either onsite or close at hand. Such a court would be a centre for the dissemination of information and would be recognised as an appropriate, user friendly place to access both information and services for families in conflict or difficulty. Its creation would facilitate a sympathetic and flexible gatekeeping system to ensure that only cases which required a judicial remedy accessed the courts, while ensuring that other methods of resolving disputes were readily accessible.

We are however aware that such a state of the art provision is unlikely to be achievable in the short term, given present funding restrictions, and especially given the need to ensure Scotland-wide consistency in access to such a court. We have therefore given careful consideration to alternatives which, while less ambitious, still see us head in the right direction in the hope of keeping Scots law in the vanguard of best practice in the field of family law. Each aspect of the court system addressed in the Review has been approached in this way, seeking to identify what is good, or acceptable, in present practice and highlighting what needs to be changed. We have attempted to offer practical solutions which could be achieved without great cost while achieving the object of creating a family court which serves the needs of the Scottish people.

There are some changes which we consider are essential. These are:

Dedicated family sheriffs
Extensive training for sheriffs in child development
Comprehensive revision of the rules of pleading in family cases
Nationwide provision of mediation services
Creation of an accreditation process for court bar reporters and provision of relevant training
Provision of properly funded and remunerated legal aid system to ensure all Scots have access to justice

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