It is important that you know your rights in divorce, so that you can make the best and healthiest decisions for you and your family.
Children- what are my rights in Divorce?
When it comes to children, parents regardless of their relationship status continue to be parents. A separation or divorce does not take away your legal right as a parent nor does it take away your legal responsibilities.
In fact, under the Family Law Act, your responsibilities regarding long term issues that concern children continue to be equal and shared between parents – unless the Court decides otherwise. Long term issues for children are things like:
- Where children live, including moving interstate or overseas
- What school children attend- education
- Children’s religion
- Children’s major medical needs
- Children’ names
The day to day decisions that involve children, such as what time they eat breakfast or when they go to bed, is made by the parent who has the care of the children at that time.
“Children have rights too”
Difficulties arise for parents, where attitudes and expectations remain fixed and where parenting styles are different. At this point a healthy attitude to separation is vital and a focus on children’s interests is paramount.
All children have the right to a loving and meaningful relationship with their parents and extended family. Children have the right to feel safe, protected, cared for and nurtured. Interfering or compromising a child’s right to a relationship with their parent has been shown to have significant and long term damage to children’s sense of identity, self-esteem and mental health.
There are exceptional occasions where some parents have difficulty parenting properly because of their own addictions or significant and untreated mental health issues. In these cases, children must be protected from harm and neglect.
Money and Property- What are my rights in Divorce?
- If I move out of the home, will I lose my rights?
Legally speaking if you own property jointly with your ex- spouse or as tenants in common then you have a right to live in, enter and deal with the property, even if you have moved out. You do not lose your rights because you have moved out.
- Should I continue to pay the Mortgage?
If you are responsible for paying the Mortgage, then your responsibility continues even though you have separated. If you are finding it hard to meet the mortgage payments, then contact your lender and explain your situation. There may be ways of changing the repayments to interest only or reducing the monthly repayments in the short term.
- My ex and I have a joint account where we deposit our salary, should I keep depositing my salary?
It really depends on the purpose of the joint account, if the reason for its existence is to pay house bills, school fees, mortgage and other joint commitments, then you can continue to deposit your salary in the account. The alternative is to set up a sole account and continue to meet your share of the bills.
- My ex continues to use my credit card, what should I do?
If your ex-spouse is unable to work because of ill-health, age, has the primary care of children or needs time to find a job and If you have had an arrangement whilst you were married that the credit card was used for daily living expenses, then this should probably continue. Although as an extra level of protection, you may want to cap the amount and type of expenditure permitted, this can be done by agreement with you and your ex or imposed by the credit card provider.
- Do I have to include my post separation earnings in the asset division?
The simple answer is yes. However, if the earnings are generated solely without any direct or indirect contributions from your ex-spouse then you may have a strong argument to seek to quarantine the earnings or seek an adjustment in your favour.
Disclaimer: The information provided is of a general nature, and is not intended as legal advice. Please contact one of our Family Lawyers for confidential and tailored legal advice on 8999 1800.