A sweeping overhaul of the family justice system in England and Wales, described by ministers as a fundamental rebalancing away from adversarial “brutal legal showdowns,” is now being rolled out nationwide, aiming to put child welfare and the safety of domestic abuse victims at its core.
The reforms, underpinned by a £17 million investment for 2026-27, are a direct response to what the government acknowledges are decades of unfair treatment of women and children within a system that has “not been good enough.” At its heart is the nationwide expansion of Child Focused Courts, a model piloted since 2022.
A System Under Strain: Backlogs and Human Cost
The drive for change comes against a backdrop of a system buckling under pressure. Family courts have been plagued by severe backlogs, with over 100,000 children caught in delays during 2023. As recently as December 2024, more than 4,000 children were in proceedings that had dragged on for nearly two years or longer.
Such delays can be devastating. “For a child, every additional month waiting to find out where you will live can feel like forever,” said the Justice Secretary, David Lammy. The statutory 26-week time limit for public law care proceedings, introduced a decade ago, has never been consistently met; currently, only 35-39% of these cases conclude within that period, with an average duration of 38 weeks.
Alison Levitt, the minister overseeing the overhaul, was blunt in her assessment. “I think that women have not received fair treatment,” she said, reflecting on her experience since being called to the bar in 1988. She argued the entire justice system, including family courts, must change to ensure victims are “not, for example, being retraumatised.”
Key Reforms: From Parental Presumption to Child Impact
The most symbolic shift is the repeal, via the Courts and Tribunals Bill, of the legal presumption that a child’s welfare is automatically served by the involvement of both parents. This change, made in honour of campaigner Claire Throssell whose two sons were murdered by their father during court-ordered contact, moves the court’s starting point to a neutral inquiry focused solely on the child’s best interests and safety.
Concurrently, the Victims and Courts Bill will introduce automatic restrictions on parental responsibility for anyone convicted of a serious sexual offence against a child, or where a child is conceived through rape. This aims to spare survivors lengthy court battles to prevent abusers from influencing key decisions about their child’s life.
The operational engine of the reform is the Child Focused Court model. Pilots in areas like Dorset, North Wales, and Birmingham have shown striking results. In Birmingham, the average case time for certain disputes reportedly fell from 53 days to 23, while backlogs were halved. Nationally, the Ministry of Justice says the approach has resolved cases up to seven and a half months faster.
A cornerstone of the new model is the early commissioning of a “Child Impact Report” by Cafcass or local authorities. Sir Andrew McFarlane, President of the Family Division, has hailed this as a “gamechanger,” giving courts an immediate understanding of a dispute’s effect on the child and reducing the number of hearings needed.
The process also involves multi-agency collaboration from the outset, with Independent Domestic Violence Advisers and other services working to identify risks early. “Unlike the old system, the new model would see family circumstances – including allegations of domestic abuse – examined ahead of court,” Lammy explained.
Confronting Domestic Abuse and ‘Alienation’
This focus is critical given the prevalence of abuse in family courts. Research indicates up to 87-90% of private law cases involve allegations or evidence of domestic abuse, affecting approximately 3.8 million adults in England and Wales annually. Campaigners have long argued the system has been weaponised by abusers to extend control.
Minister Levitt specifically criticised the distress caused by traditional “fact-finding” hearings where victims were “cross-examined up hill and down dale.” While the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 already bans direct cross-examination by perpetrators, the new model seeks a more fundamental cultural shift.
The reforms also take aim at the contentious issue of “parental alienation.” Levitt stated the concept was “not something that’s capable of definition or of scientific proof in any way, shape or form,” echoing concerns about unregulated experts in the field. While UK courts do consider “alienating behaviours,” as guided by the Family Justice Council, the minister’s comments signal a cautious approach within the new child-focused framework.
A Measured Welcome
While the expansion has been welcomed, experts stress that speed alone is not the only metric for success. Lisa Harker, director of the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, said: “It is important that we measure how children experience proceedings and whether their lives improve, not just how quickly decisions are made.”
The scale of the challenge remains significant. Oversight is fragmented and, as the National Audit Office has highlighted, a lack of comprehensive data on the causes of delays makes targeted improvement difficult. Furthermore, with 80% of private law cases involving at least one party without legal representation, the system’s accessibility remains under strain.
Nevertheless, the government insists this is a turning point. “Whenever we leave office, the situation in terms of violence against women and girls will have improved because it’s an uncivilised way to behave. It’s just unjust,” Levitt said. “You can’t care about justice if you don’t care about this.”
