The latest statistics have been published by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), which reveal the number of cases that have gone through the Family Court in the quarter April to June 2015.
According to the figures, the number of family law cases heard in the second quarter of 2015 were four per cent higher than in the three months preceding it, with a total number of 59,908 cases coming before the Family Court in England and Wales. Nearly half of these were divorce cases.
The MoJ’s statistic bulletin stated that there were 10,410 applications for financial remedies in the quarter, which was four per cent higher than the first three months of the year. These financial remedies cases mainly included lump sum orders (32 per cent), property adjustment orders (29 per cent), and periodical payments orders (13 per cent).
One area that will remain of concern is care or supervision cases - the average length of time to deal with these cases was 29 per cent. While this has remained stable over the past year, it is still longer than the 26-week limit introduced in the Children and Families Act 2014. Only 56 per cent of cases were handled within this 26-week window.
Among the other notable findings of the statistics bulletin was a rise in private family law cases. The MoJ revealed that 10,494 private law cases were commenced between April and June 2015, which is a 13 per cent increase on the 2014 equivalent period.