The Key Facts About The No-Fault Divorce Law Changes

Ministers have announced that the Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020, which will allow married couples to divorce without assigning blame, will come into force on 6th April 2022.

The new law will retain the irretrievable breakdown of a marriage as the sole ground for divorce and it will replace the requirement to specify one of the five grounds for divorce with a ‘statement of ‘irretrievable breakdown’ – thereby eliminating the requirement to administer any blame.

The first change is that divorce proceedings no longer have to be initiated by one partner alone and a couple can make a joint application.

All that will be required is for at least one spouse to provide a legal statement to say the marriage has broken down irretrievably. This statement counts as conclusive evidence and cannot be contested.

The relevant laws on the dissolution of a civil partnership will also be updated. The idea is that broadly the same system and principles, complete with the no-fault declaration of irretrievable breakdown, will apply to both divorce and dissolution.

While the new law will remove some delays (particularly in amicable divorces), it’s not a case of “instant divorce” as the measures have a built-in cooling-off period of a minimum of 20 weeks between the initial application and the conditional order, and another six weeks between the conditional and final orders.

That means that even the smoothest divorce will take at least six months to complete.