The Child Maintenance Options Service – This is a free service that provides impartial information and support to help separated parents make decisions about their child maintenance arrangements. It covers the methods of paying child maintenance, how much should be paid and child maintenance in relation to the law and benefits. It runs a telephone help line along with its website.
The Law Society – Its website provides advice to solicitors on many aspects of family law including family mediation, acting in the absence of a children’s guardian, attendance of solicitors at local authority Children Act meetings, litigants in person, the application process for interim family contracts, and instructing experts in family and children court proceedings. It also publishes its responses to proposed changes in legislation and developments in case law and it gives details of the Family Law Accreditation Scheme.
Citizens Advice Bureau – The Bureau provides detailed information on many topics of family law through its extensive network of offices throughout the country.
Resolution – This organisation has over 6000 members who are family lawyers and other professionals committed to the constructive resolution of family disputes. Its members follow a Code of Practice which promotes a non-confrontational approach to family problems. Its website provide information on a wide range of family legal issues. It addresses the subject of splitting up including the financial implications, parenting apart, child maintenance and domestic violence etc.
Families need Fathers – This charity provides information, advice and support for parents and is mainly concerned with maintaining a child’s relationship with both its parents during and after family breakdown.
Rights of Women – This is a voluntary organisation working to attain justice and equality by informing, educating and empowering women on their legal rights. It offers an advice line on family law, divorce and relationship breakdown, children and contact issues, domestic violence, sexual violence, discrimination and lesbian parenting. It also provides training for organisations on issues concerning women’s rights as well as publishing handbooks, information sheets on the issues of family law and those relating to women and the law.
Separated Dads – This organisation provides information and advice for separated fathers.
Family Law Week – This website provides free access to all the latest family law news and judgments. It also offers online training courses and podcasts for a fee.
Carvers – Carvers is a specialist high street practice with extensive experience in divorce and family law.
CHILDCARE
National Association of Child Contact Centres (NACCC) – This is the supporting membership body for over 300 child contact centres located throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The centres provide neutral places where children of separated families can enjoy contact with their non-resident parents and sometimes other family members in a comfortable and safe environment.
Association of Child Abuse Lawyers (ACAL) – Its members include solicitors, barristers, legal executives, trainees, pupils and paralegals. It was set up for the benefit of victims, lawyers, experts and other professionals involved in the field of obtaining compensation for the physical, sexual or emotional abuse of children and adults abused in childhood and others affected by that abuse. It details recent cases and news and provides training.
Child Support Agency (CSA) – The agency arranges child maintenance or financial support to help towards a child’s everyday living costs when parents have separated. The site includes information regarding which children attract child maintenance, arranging child maintenance yourself, who can and cannot apply for child maintenance through the Child Maintenance Service, how to apply, how long it takes, how to pay Child Maintenance, action taken by the authorities if non-payment occurs,calculating the level of financial support and child maintenance if one parent lives abroad, disagreements about parentage, changes that require reporting and complaints and appeals etc.
Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Services (CAFCASS) – The service is a non-departmental public body accountable to the Secretary of State for Education. It is independent of the courts, social services, education and health authorities and all similar agencies. It looks after the interests of children involved in family proceedings. It works with children and their families, and then advises the courts on what it considers to be in the best interests of individual children.
Coram Children’s Legal Centre – This charity provides free legal information, advice and representation to children, their families and carers, as well as international consultancy on child law and children’s rights. It provides support through telephone advice lines, online information, individual case work and live web chat. It offers expertise in all areas of family, child and education law including domestic violence, child protection, immigration/asylum and schools admissions.
International Child Abduction Database – This database aims to make accessible leading decisions concerning the 1980 Hague Child Abduction Convention, as well as other decisions relevant to international child abduction. It comprises searchable summaries of decisions, links to the full texts of judgments and compendia of legal analysis in English, French and Spanish.
Reunite – This is the leading UK charity specialising in the movement of children across international borders. It operates a telephone advice line offering practical, impartial advice, information and support to parents, family members, and guardians who have had their child abducted, as well as to parents and guardians who may have abducted their child. The charity is part funded by the Ministry of Justice and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office.
International Parental Child Abduction – Government information in the event of your child being taken or kept overseas by their other parent or a relative without your permission or if you are worried that this might happen.
National Association of Child Contact Centres (NACCC) – This is the supporting membership body for over 300 child contact centres located throughout England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The centres provide neutral places where children of separated families can enjoy contact with their non-resident parents and sometimes other family members in a comfortable and safe environment.
Carvers – Carvers is a specialist high street practice with extensive experience in childcare law.