Recent Changes to Family Law in British Columbia
The Divorce Act has been around since 1985. It hadn't changed much over the last 35 years or so, except when the Child Support Guidelines were introduced in 1997 as a regulation to the Act. On 1 March 2021 it changed a lot.
On 18 June 2019, Parliament passed Bill C-78, "An Act to amend the Divorce Act, the Family Orders and Agreements Enforcement Assistance Act and the Garnishment, Attachment and Pension Diversion Act and to make consequential amendments to another Act." The changes to the Divorce Act, and to the other laws listed in that very long title, came into effect on 1 March 2021. This page provides an overview of some of the more important amendments to the Divorce Act.
Introduction
The federal Divorce Act
The purpose of this requirement is to make sure that the court is aware of any legal proceedings that might be going on outside the family law case, so that it doesn't, for example, give lots of unsupervised parenting time to a spouse who is accused of abusing the other spouse or the children.
Resources and links
Legislation
- the old Divorce Act
- Bill C-78
Links
- An Overview of Bill C-78 by John-Paul Boyd
This information applies to British Columbia, Canada. Last reviewed for legal accuracy by JP Boyd, February 15, 2021. |
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JP Boyd on Family Law © John-Paul Boyd and Courthouse Libraries BC is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 Canada Licence. |