Uncategorized

Clients will tell me that the police have advised them to bring an emergency motion for certain types of relief- including exclusive possession of the matrimonial home, or for custody. The fact is that family court is not set up to hear urgent, or emergency, motions except in very limited circumstances. Where someone is threatening…

At one point, a payor father, who originally had a child support order issued against him based on imputed income, owed the mother over 600K in child support arrears. In a subsequent court action in 2006, he was successful in having these arrears lowered to 60K on the basis that the previous income imputed to…

The list of cases being heard everyday in family court is now posted online, and can be searched by municipality. The list doesn’t get posted until the end of the day before the hearing date. If you’re involved in a court case, you can also find a list posted at the courthouse every morning which…

An important term to include in any separation agreement where children are involved is an acknowledgement that neither parent will unreasonably refuse to provide a travel consent letter to the other party for trips with the child outside the country. Whenever a child is travelling outside of Canada with only one parent, you need to…

The Family Responsibility Office has the ability to suspend a payor’s driver’s license, as well as their passport, effectively preventing them from driving or travelling outside of the country. These are a few of the tools the FRO can employ in order to compel an individual who is in arrears to start paying their court-ordered…

Many individuals expect to inherit money from their parents at some point. If you’re married, it’s worth thinking about how you plan to use this inheritance, since how you use the money, or where you invest it, will have implications for the division of property if your marriage ever breaks down. When people separate, the…

The Family Law Act allows couples to enter into domestic contracts governing what will happen in the event of a future breakdown in the relationship. In section 55 of the Act, it stipulates that any domestic contract must be in writing, signed by the parties, and witnessed. In Gallacher v. Friesen, the Ontario Court of…

When is it reasonable to impute income to a payor of child support? In Tillmanns v. Tillmanns, the mother sought an order against her ex when he was laid off from his job and unable to continue paying the agreed-upon amount of child support. Under the Child Support Guidelines, a court has the discretion to…

In order to avoid the delays inherent in the court process, and the possibility that the judge hearing the issues might not possess any specialised knowledge of family law, parties can choose to hire an arbitrator instead. An arbitration hearing may be conducted much like a traditional judicial hearing, except that the arbitrator’s time is…

A recent Ottawa family law case examines when foreign divorces will be recognized by the Ontario courts. In Kadri v. Kadri, the parties were married in Lebanon in 1988 and went on to have 3 children (who are now adults). Although they resided in several different countries during their marriage, they lived in Lebanon from…