ABSTRACT

On 17 June 1999, the Lord Chancellor announced in a response to a question from Lord Wedderburn that the divorce reforms contained in Pt II of the Family Law Act 1996 would not be implemented in 2000. This was because the preliminary research results of the pilot projects, designed to test the operation of the information meetings, were ‘disappointing’.1 How has it happened that a reform the kernel of which has been in the public domain since 19882 seems to have fallen at the last hurdle? It is not as if the reform was enacted without debate: the fate of the Family Law Bill hung in the balance on several occasions during its passage through Parliament. Introduced in the dying days of Conservative rule, the Bill was only saved by the support of the Labour Opposition, given in return for various amendments.3