In depth: Family law 'strategy' requires 'big thinking'

Solicitor Jenny Beck is a prominent figure in the world of family law. She is chair of the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory, a member of the Law Society’s access to justice and family law committees, private law solicitor representative on the Family Justice Council and co-chair of the Legal Aid Practitioners Group.

She knows the family justice system inside out. Sitting down with me for a chat at her office, a stone’s throw away from the Central Family Court in London, she says: ‘At the moment, we do not have a fair system, a system that works for the children and families we are supposed to serve.’ 

Beck and Susan Fitzgerald set up family law firm Beck Fitzgerald 10 years ago with two aims: to provide an affordable service to clients and look after them; and to galvanise positive change to improve the family justice system for families passing through it.

With the government due to publish its first ever family law ‘strategy’, Beck believes lawyers have a role – in fact, a duty – to be change-makers. Beck Fitzgerald is leading the way.

For example, the firm spearheaded a campaign to achieve a nationally standardised approach to Family Law Act applications. ‘We had a postcode lottery of justice in which separate courts were operating as mini-fiefdoms with no consistency between them,’ Beck says.

'If we are not the custodians of justice, who is? If solicitors – who see day to day at the coalface what is going wrong, when rules do not work for everyone, human suffering – do not call it out and do something about it, all we can do is stick a plaster over a haemorrhage'

Jenny Beck

Director Molly Ashcroft tells me the firm called 96 courts to identify national inconsistencies in the way applications for emergency protection orders were being dealt with. The firm charted the differences, then knocked on the door of the president of the Family Division. Sir Andrew McFarlane convened all the relevant actors, such as HM Courts & Tribunals Service, judges and the domestic abuse commissioner. The result? A new standardised process.

Joint heads of care Flora Hughes and Jasmine Hollis, together with Beck, are founding members of Family Law Advice for the Neurodivergent Community (FLANC), which was set up two years ago. ‘FLANC was born out of a wish to make the law fairer for everyone,’ Beck says.

FLANC is on a mission to secure mandatory training on neurodivergence for all professionals working in the family justice system. The body has already contributed to the Family Justice Council’s guidance on neurodiversity in the family justice system, advised on court layouts and reasonable adjustments, and developed with Family Law in Partnership a non-court dispute resolution toolkit for neurodivergent people who need family law advice.

FLANC was spearheaded by Beck and law firm Duncan Lewis’s Alia Lewis. Beck holds up the organisation as a great example of firms working together to produce better solutions.

Beck is passionate about encouraging young people to learn the skills of being a campaigning lawyer. ‘We’re trying to breed a culture of hunger for change – non-acceptance of things that are broken. If we are not the custodians of justice, who is? If solicitors – who see day to day at the coalface what is going wrong, when rules do not work for everyone, human suffering – do not call it out and do something about it, all we can do is stick a plaster over a haemorrhage. We need to be fixing the bigger problems.’

Beck Fitzgerald staff are encouraged to get involved in campaigning work. Kajol Sembi told the firm when she was a trainee that she wanted to do something with schools. So she has been involved in a project educating young people about controlling and coercive behaviour.

Leah Shannon-Tetsola, who recently qualified, said: ‘When I was studying law, I knew I wanted to do the “helping people” type of law. I found human rights law interesting. I found Beck Fitzgerald and how it was an advocating law firm. I didn’t know a law firm had that side to them. It ticked all my boxes.’ Shannon-Tetsola has been involved in a Family Justice Council reunification workstream, providing administrative support.

Director Rebecca Pantelli, who oversees recruitment, says it has been gratifying to see young people ‘coming up the ranks, eager to make a change’.

Beck Fitzgerald concedes and indeed highlights the fact that there have been positive changes in family law over the last decade, such as the recognition of coercive control, a wider definition of domestic abuse, child-focused courts and family court transparency. 

But, as lawyers await publication of the family law ‘strategy’, Beck Fitzgerald believes ‘big thinking and remodelling’ are required to tackle ‘coalface’ problems such as court delays and legal aid gaps. Whatever the future holds, Beck is determined that the firm will continue to be a change-maker.