Legal Aid, Courts, Mediation and Parenting After Seperation

Navigating your way through the Legal System is a large and intimidating task. When you walk into to a world where you are dealing with terms such as parenting time, access, primary residence, child support and childs best interest ,you can leave with your head spinning.

There are several different requirements and options,with the issue of children and parents separation. If there is abuse involved women can access legal aid for approval, to have a lawyer assist them ,with working out parenting time and primary residence, of the children. There are financial factors to take into account. Legal Aid will look at you income level to determine, if you are eligible for their services, depending on your income you may have to pay a partial amount for your lawyer or may not be eligible for legal aid at all.

The provincial court houses make their forms very user friendly,so if you are not eligible or can not afford a lawyer, you can access the court house on your own and fill out the forms yourself. There is no cost to fill out and file papers in provincial court. When filing court papers for parenting time or child support, the parents are required to attend a Parenting After Separation Course, before  a court date can be set. While both parents are required to attend the course, only one parent has to attend the course before the court date can be set. This prevents one parent from stalling, the other one, if one parent is resistant to going to court.

Supreme court is more complex than provincial court. It is used if the children live or have moved to another province or country with a parent. Supreme court has become more user friendly in the last couple of years, it is still a very complex system,  it is highly recommended to have a lawyer, when going to supreme court. The paper work that needs to be filed for supreme court have financial costs attached to them.

The court process can take several months to complete,  there are several court dates that are usually set, before a order is reached. This is especially true if the parents are in conflict about the conditions they want the judge to set regarding, parenting time, child support and the primary residence of the child. The judge may offer a family case conference, to see if the parents can reach a agreement. A family case conference is when the parents, their lawyers (if they have lawyers) and the judge sit down privately together to see if the parents can reach a agreement.If  the parents are unsuccessful with the family case conference, the case proceeds through the courts, the judge will hear evidence and make the final decision.

Some parents want to avoid the court process all together and try to work out a agreement, with the help of a  family mediator. This service is provided by the courts to help cut down on the amount of time the courts are spending on  family separation cases. The parents can sit down together or at separate times with the family mediator to work out a agreement. Once a agreement is reached, it is filed with the courts and becomes legal and binding.This process is not recommended when there is a history of abuse and violence in a relationship, as it is not a equal process, when someone is trying to negotiate with their abuser.

Parenting After Seperation is a 3 hour course that is set up through the court system to give parents information and tools to look at the best interest of the children, as they all go through the 
www.lss.bc



services society, legal. InstancebeginEditable. 2012. legal services society of b.cWeb. 5 Jan 2013. <www.lss.bc.ca/publications>.

Domestic Violence

        Violence against women                                     

          Violence

The person who promised to love, protect and cherish you hurts you the most. What would you do if it happened to you? It is a question that is not easy to answer and a question that some do not have to think about. Everyday, women and children face the dilemma of what to do with violence. Women and children want to stay, want the violence stop, but what happens when it doesn't and they have no choice but to leave.

Violence in the home or with a partner is not an isolated incident. Violence is present in every race, culture, economic status and society. Violence, used as a method to control another or others, to break down the confidence, self-esteem and equal partnership. Abusive partners will keep the others "walking on eggshells." not allowing the abused know when or what will set them off, so the abused will always feel  oppression , never knowing "when they are right or wrong."

 I would like to write about resources that are available to women and children, in the community I live and work in. The community has resources and options available, if one does not know about the options, it can create a barrier for many women when deciding to leave a violent relationship. I would like to share the knowledge I have, based on 20 years of working in the field of violence, women’s support and violence prevention.

"Domestic Violence" is a term used by the courts, police, community resources, the media and many other community services to define the illegal imbalance of power, in the family unit. I prefer to call it" violence,” I do not like the term "Domestic, “ this expression waters down the serious impact that violence has on  every person exposed to it." Domestic",  implies that the violence is now tamed in some way just as we refer to house pets, as" domesticated", meaning the animals, are tame enough to live with humans. Implications of the term"domestic" also suggests, violence committed against a family member, is not as serious as violence committed against a stranger.

Violence in the family comes in several forms physical, sexual, emotional, financial and verbal.

Physical violence can include, hitting, slapping, punching, choking, kicking, pushing or any other unwanted physical touching. It also includes threats of doing "these things" to another person.

Sexual violence can include unwanted touching, sexual gestures, force of sexual acts to or by another person, withholding money or necessities, aggression and rape.

Financial abuse can include, one person controlling all the money, refusal of money for necessities such as food, shelter and heat, taking a partners income, not including a partner on the financial decisions of the family and making a partner account for every penny spent.

Emotional Abuse can include, not giving affection, the "walking on eggshell effect" having the household always unsure of your mood and how you will respond to a given situation, constant disapproval,

Verbal violence can include name calling, degrading, screaming, threats, and embarrassing a person in public

www.bcsth.ca

www.wrsfv.ca


Cite Photograph

Leclair, Ryan. Violence against women. 2012. studymagazine.comWeb. 5 Jan 2013. <studymagazine.com>.