UK role in divorce litigation will be affected by dispute with EU, lawyers say

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A plan by the European Commission to prevent the UK from joining an international legal cooperation agreement after Brexit will lead to serious complications over divorce settlements and child support, lawyers have warned.

Brussels said last month that the UK should not be allowed to accede to the 2007 Lugano Convention, an agreement which determines which countries’ courts have jurisdiction over cross-border civil and commercial disputes and ensures that resulting judgments can be performed abroad.

The commission’s recommendation to prevent UK membership after Brexit was seen as an attempt to erode London’s position as a global center for resolving trade disputes, but lawyers said it would bring henceforth a painful and costly legal insecurity to family breakdowns.

Rachael Kelsey, president of the European section of the International Academy of Family Lawyers, urged the committee to reconsider its position in the interests of millions of European and British citizens with family connections straddling the English Channel.

“A year ago we could say with complete confidence and clarity ‘This court has jurisdiction, this is how long a case will take, and this is the approximate cost’ – but now it is no longer the case. case, ”she said.

“We have to put politics aside and recognize that there are millions of citizens in the EU and UK who will be harmed if we do not end up with a better set of harmonized rules,” said Kelsey.

We need to put politics aside and recognize that there are millions of citizens in the EU and UK who will be harmed if we do not end up with a better set of harmonized rules.

The UK government’s demand to join the Lugano Convention – Britain was a party to the deal as an EU member state – was supported by the three signatories to the convention outside the bloc.

But the commission said the request should be rejected since the UK had requested a distant relationship with the EU on the basis of a basic free trade agreement.

A final decision on the UK’s membership will be taken by EU member states in the European Council, but officials on both sides said expectations of any movement on the issue were very low, given the tensions between London and Brussels on post-Brexit relations.

Josep Gálvez, former Spanish judge and commercial arbitration expert now at London-based Del Canto Chambers, said the committee’s opinion to block UK membership appeared to be designed to weaken the capital’s appeal UK as a center for dispute resolution.

“It is a way to punish the UK for leaving the EU, but also a very good opportunity for some EU jurisdictions to bring international disputes to their courts,” he added.

Without adherence to the Lugano Convention, lawyers handling EU family matters on both sides of the Channel will have to rely on the Hague Conventions.

Legal experts said these were less comprehensive and did not preclude parallel court cases in competing jurisdictions.

The Hague Conventions also do not allow orders, such as the payment of child support, made in one jurisdiction to be so easily enforced in another.

Kelsey said a research paper from the International Academy of Family Lawyers, which sought the advice of expert lawyers, unanimously concluded that it was best for citizens of the EU and the United Kingdom that Great Britain be allowed to accede to the Lugano Convention.

William Healing, a partner at London-based family law firm Alexiou Fisher Philipps who has worked with the French community in England for more than two decades, said there would be “no winner on either side” if the UK was kept away from the convention.

The EU should allow the UK to join the convention immediately, he added. “This will help separated families to recover their child support and, in commercial law, judgments will be easily enforceable,” he said.

Downing Street said allowing the UK’s accession to the Lugano Convention was a “sensitive and pragmatic” solution for EU and UK citizens and would ensure that cross-border disputes for consumers and consumers alike. families can be resolved smoothly.

“We maintain that we meet the membership criteria both because it is open to countries outside the EU and because all non-EU members have already supported UK membership,” he added.