The Austin Lafferty Solicitors & Estate Agents Blog

In the run up to Father's Day in June, the US Census Bureau has published a series of facts about the estimated 70.1 million fathers in America.

The data reveals that there were 24.7 million fathers who were part of married-couple families with children younger than 18 in 2011.

It also reveals that there were 1.7 million single fathers, and around 15% or all single parents in America were men. Around 45% of these single fathers were divorced, 31% were never married, 19% were separated, and 5% were widowed.

Custodial fathers in 2009 were due $3.5 billion in child support, but received only $1.9 billion. In contrast, custodial mothers received $19.5 billion of the $31.7 billion in support that was due. Around 34% of custodial fathers received all child support that was due in 2009, not significantly different from the corresponding percentage for custodial mothers, 42%.

A recent study in Canada has found that people may be subconsciously influenced by how long they think they will live when making major life decisions such as marriage, divorce, abortion, having a child and attending university.

It is impossible to know how long someone is going to live, but there are many life expectancy cues not consciously processed, affecting how many more years people expect to live. These can include a person's state of health, a family's medical history or whether they have a high risk job.

The study, by researchers at Queens's University, found that the longer someone expects to live, the more time they will invest in education. If life expectancy is short, someone may decide to get married and have children sooner, or stick with the partner they are currently with rather than seek a divorce.

For many years, January was widely considered "Divorce Month" by divorce attorneys who experienced a dramatic upturn in business immediately following the holiday season.

However, according to a new analysis of divorce filings and searches for divorce-related information on the Internet, March is the true "Divorce Month" in America.

According to American company FindLaw, searches for "divorce" and related phrases such as "family law" and "child custody" jumped 50% from just over 10,000 in December 2010, to nearly 16,000 in January 2011, and continued to surge through March.

Along these same lines, analysis of divorce filings across the U.S. between 2008 and 2011 revealed that divorces spike in January, continue to rise and peak in late March.

A recent survey has found that more and more single women would rather date an older divorced man than a man younger than then.

The study, by ThePicnicProject.com, has found that these women, nicknamed 'Pumas' because of their interest in Previously Married and Attractive men, see a number of advantages in divorced men.

Around 12% of women in the survey say that men who have been married before have better experience at relationships, and 8% feel they are more sensitive to a woman's needs. Around 7% of women questioned liked the fact that divorced men have demonstrated an ability to make a serious commitment.

More than a third (36%) don't care if a man is divorced as long as he is interesting, and a fifth (18%) aren't interested in his relationship history as long as he's attractive.

A quarter of women also admit they're not put-off by children from another relationship (24%).

A recent study has found that men get over a divorce much quicker than women, and are twice as likely to consider getting remarried, reports the Huffington Post.

According to the study, which was carried out to promote a film's DVD release, 47% of men would be keen to marry again after going through a divorce, compared to only 20% of divorced women.

The study also found that around 31% of divorced men, but only 19% of women, had tried internet dating, and 42% of divorced men were so keen to meet a new partner that they would be prepared to pay for professional dating advice.

A senior Conservative Peer has announced his intention to challenge the Government's plans to charge single parents to use the future Child Support Agency.

Lord Mackay of Clashfern, who as Margaret Thatcher’s Lord Chancellor introduced the Child Support Act 1991, has tabled an amendment that would exempt from the charges those parents who have no alternative but to use the statutory maintenance service, because private arrangements are not possible or appropriate. The amendment is due to go to a vote on Wednesday 25th January.

The amendment would prevent the Government imposing the following charges on parents who turn to the statutory maintenance service because, without its help, their children would not receive fair and regular child maintenance:

• An up-front application charge levied on the applicant (overwhelmingly ‘parents with care’, around 97% of whom are mothers) in order to use the future new Agency. The Government is discussing a charge of 100 or £50 for an applicant on benefits.

• A ‘collection charge’ taken by the Agency from each maintenance payment it collects, in the range of 7-12% of the payment, before the money is passed on for the child/children.

There is a further ‘collection surcharge’ which the Government proposes to levy on the ‘non-resident parent’, additional to actual maintenance due, in the range 15-20% of the maintenance liability, where the Agency has to step in to collect the maintenance to ensure it gets paid. This would not be affected by the amendment.

Gingerbread Chief Executive Fiona Weir said:

“We are very grateful to Lord Mackay for taking up this vital issue in the Lords, and the indications of support he has received so far show the high level of cross-party concern at the government’s proposals.

“We fully support efforts to help separated parents work together to deal with the financial, emotional and practical consequences of separation. But the government needs to realise that in very many cases that isn’t possible, and if charges are introduced then it will be children who lose out.”

A couple from Italy who are to divorce at the ages of 99 and 96 look set to become the world's oldest divorcees, a record previously held by a British couple who were both aged 98 when they divorced, reports the Telegraph.

The marriage of the Italian couple had not been without its problems, but the final blow came when the 99-year-old man found old letters indicating that his wife had had an affair during the 1940s. Despite the amount of time that had passed, he immediately requested a divorce, bringing an end to 77 years of marriage.

A divorcing couple from Connecticut were ordered by a judge to give each other their passwords for their Facebook and online dating accounts, reports the New York Daily News.

The couple were going through an acrimonious divorce and custody battle. The husband had discovered that there may be information online which would discredit his wife and help his custody claims, and asked for access to her online accounts to verify. The wife complied with the request, but at the same time asked a friend to delete any incriminating evidence from her accounts.

At this point the judge intervened, and ordered both parties to exchange log-on details for their social media accounts. He also issued an injunction forbidding either side from deleting any information while the divorce was ongoing.