Emergency Legal Defence Fund - His Day in Court

The first family hearing is where everything is decided and where a man with an empty account is most alone. Daniel, 46, a delivery driver from Bristol, sat in that hearing twenty minutes after learning his ex-wife's solicitor had filed; he had no position statement, no bundle, no one beside him - and a career of payslips that became her evidence, not his. Cases like his begin and end in the first ninety minutes, because justice does not wait for a man to find his paperwork. This fund pays for the first line of defence: two hours of pre-hearing preparation with a trained McKenzie Friend, printing and binding of the position statement, the evidence bundle, and travel to the court door. Each £10 entry buys thirty minutes of that preparation. Our target for the night: four fully-funded first hearings - four men who walk into court prepared instead of ambushed. At the session we walk through what the first hearing actually is and is not (from our published briefings, not legal advice), read anonymised outcomes of past funded cases, and open the case board where funded fathers appear as case numbers until they choose otherwise. He cannot afford his day in court. That is exactly why we can.

Price: £10.00

Location: London

Published by Gilbert Johnson on OmniList.