Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - February 17, 1968, Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg free february 1968 costlier Battles predicted divorce cases could double by John Doig or Toronto special Al for the past several unhappily married men and women have kept switchboards Busy in supreme court buildings and lawyers offices across can the phones started ring ing As thousands of canadians trapped in miserable saw a for Mula Hope in the coun try new divorce passed by the commons Given Royal assent and due to come into effect May the act provides for div orce on the old ground of adultery and the new grounds of cruelty physical and and an illegal marriage by one of the it also adds a marriage breakdown concept on possible grounds of mental Gross Addic Tion to alcohol or and As Many of the More desperate inquirers Are Dis the new Laws Are not going to bring a sum Mer of springing Ottawa sweeping reforms to make divorce easier and less painful in Canada will Al most certainly slow Down the process of dissolving unhappy marriage for at least a probably Long and the Cost of divorce is Likely to Rise Al Ontario supreme court officer responsible for processing divorce reflects the View of Many government and court officials and when he says i just smile when people say divorce is going to be easier and faster there be Relief for thousands bound in matrimonial deadlock by Laws dating Back 100 years and but first there must be a drastic overhaul of the machinery used in div orce court actions in supreme courts across can Ada a testing period in the while judges attempt to define new grounds and new Judi Cial a major reappraisal by lawyers of their roles and duties the new at the same waiting lists in the courts Are expected to grow immensely As the new formula brings a flood of applications from Long disgruntled so those who have waited years for some kind of Miracle to free them will have to wait a while longer for the end of the wait is at least in sight of there for i a Way out now for Alice one of the lonely wives who called Toronto lawyers when the headlines hailed the new Rogers husband deserted her four years ago and went to where he is living with another in the the stranded wife would have had to hire a private detective to get evidence of her husbands adultery Only prac tical ground for divorce in nearly All of Canada until with the help of Rogers would have had to persuade the courts Here that she could not bring an action in Britain so that the Ontario supreme court could establish its discretion to try the Alice in the Days of this country victorian Outlook on could have expected or years of Legal Bicker ing and pressing before freeing herself of her now she can bring an adultery action in Toronto immediately the new Dom Icile Law practically ignores the fact that her husband is not or she can attempt to prove marriage break Down because she and her husband have been Separ ate and apart for More than three Canadas old divorce Laws Are based on English statutes passed in 1857 and in Ontario and the West Ern provinces the traditional grounds have always been sodomy and Only Nova Scotia has recognized cruelty As a reason for divorce in the Quebec and Newfoundland have never established divorce their residents have had to bring annulment actions in parliament this Job has now been Given to the Federal exchequer reserves of the years were sliced away when Justice minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau took the new Bill through the but it was a double edged while the makes divorce possible and practical on much wider it also Calls on the courts to try to save the act directs judges to consider any possibility of and instructs lawyers to advise their clients on family counselling services before taking cases to How far lawyers and judges Are expected to go is not spelled out in great details in the new some expert in the divorce Field say the recoil filiation clauses will not pose any major but officials in the Federal Justice department counter the marriage saving spirit of the act must be taken they cite the substantial Success in the courts have brought in financial advisers and saved marriages that were collapsing under the weight of credit card living and mounting provincial chief justices Are to be called to Ottawa soon for conferences on the new Law be told about Ottawa feelings on marriage the result could be a tremendous Strain on the country already overburdened so Cial welfare Alice Hall of Metros family services Assoc a says there is a grave shortage of properly qualified family several Are moonlighting of cases handled by the association last centred solely on mar rage Only 77 were referred to the association by welfare agencies fear the demand for counselling brought by the new Laws will encourage unqualified and unscrupulous amateurs to set up business As marriage no qualifications Are set Down in even if this Doest Hap attempts at marriage repair Are Likely to severely slow the Progress of of divorce hear Ings through the but for thousands who have waited years for a few More months or even years will not make that much spheres a Way out Al now for june whose husband was sent to jail As an habitual criminal a few years the last time they were he beat her with a faced with waiting several More years before could even Hope to break her miserable has taken her three Young children and moved in with another Man one of the estimated common Law unions in Canada now she Doest have to await her husbands and plans to bring evidence of then divorce and remarry to make her expected child legitimate in the eyes of the she need merely petition for divorce on the grounds of marriage be cause her husband been imprisoned for a period or an aggregate period of three years during the five years before the in 1966 a record of divorces were granted in Canada on a preliminary count by the Dominion Bureau of to illustrate the number of divorces granted in relation to the number of there were applications in Ontario last year and All were if experts and matrimonial lawyers Are the rate of applications will soar even double once the new Laws Are in opera that Keans about applications this to ease the the provinces May attempt to appoint county judges As local judges of their supreme courts British Columbia did this before the new but the divorce explosion is still Likely to Strain court Well have one hell of a says Chapman in where the cur rent waiting list is around ill be working we dont have enough filing space or anything Here at Osgoode Gordon registrar of the Ontario supreme says Well be pushed to the limit at we might be snowed the con fusion aspect is More worry ing than the our rules of court must be for a All the documents will have to be the new Laws Call for instead of Beddis is spending most of every Day now in meetings with a special committee to organize the big Federal Justice depart ment officials say Ottawa will proclaim the new act once All the provinces Are ready hopefully by May a leading authority on divorce in professor Julien Payne of the University of Western on says the rate of divorce applications is going to Rise tremendously i dont think Many people realize just How it will at least double in the first few apart from the Strain of sheer the new Laws will make heavy professional demands on judges and lawyers dealing with the new grounds for there is if Case history they can use As a guideline for divorce actions dealing with narcotics or alcohol Addic Tion As the main its a terribly Complex piece of says its rather like introducing an entirely new criminal if you want a Bible of judicial decisions you wont get it for five years or most experts believe adultery will still prove the most popu Lar ground for divorce actions although has a reconciliation aspect for those who find adultery actions difficult to bring or distaste Ful Trudeau said the ground often leads to a very hypocritical procedure of fabricating evidence and arranging proof for a divorce which is a hypocrisy and a Sham there Are Many new avenues of or heres Hope for a a painless and relatively simple Way out for Stavro whose wife left him because she didst like returned to her native Yugoslavia and married again with the help of a marriage Pilic is a religious Man who Doest savor the thought of using adultery to sever the yet this has been his Only Chance until moral considerations it would have been a difficult and costly action for an immigrant adjusting to a strange but the new Law will give Pilic a divorce because his wife has gone through a form of marriage with another his who had a Call from the client last guesses that evidence assembled by mail will be v cases under the old Law still waiting on the lists will be handled under the old rules unless the parties choose to withdraw their actions and Start the going rate for a straightforward adultery action unde fend with no children under 16 involved is about although the Case will take a minimum of six months from the time the writs Are issued to reach a the lawyer probably spends no More than a Day on paper work in his Toronto lawyer John answering a question during a panel discussion at a recent can Adian bar association meet said it is my View that a solicitors time in the preparation and presenta Tion of a divorce action will be this will probably necessitate an increase in fees and also a revision of the fees allowed under the Legal Aid act for an undefended divorce Standard fee is now the lawyer will have additional duties and re he must raise the question of conciliation and draw the clients Atten Tion to conciliation Machin the spirit of the Law seems to Call for divorce at the stage where All Hope is on grounds other than the lawyer will need to prepare his Case much More the phones Are ringing at Legal Aid offices the plans Deputy area director for York William says weve been getting about 10 More in quiries than usual each week since Early but were refusing All applications until the new Law is in Legal still in its Hast yet any accurate of the amount of assistance it provides in divorce but Donkin estimates that of requests received by his office each about 100 concern unhappy spouses May account for Only about five per cent of the Legal Aid operation like so Many other statistics in predictions about the new the pressure on Legal Aid is expected to and it May double again if lawyers fees go up As Donkin says the York county office would probably need at least one extra staff lawyer and an additional clerk to Cope with an 100 per cent Rise in divorce it heres a probable a Way out under the new Laws for Victor whose wife refuses to con Sider a divorce for religious there Are no Chil and there has been nothing else in the marriage for More than two but Kennedy wont bring an action for her husbands there is no Chance of her commit Ting so victors but soon he will be Able to petition on the grounds of marriage b e cause of his desertion of his wife for a period of not less than five for the first the guilty has a Hope of freeing himself even though his wife Doest break any of the in similar provision has been castigated As the Casanova senator Arthur Roe 89 year old co chairman of the joint Senate commons committee whose report brought Canadas divorce Laws into the 20th describes the new act As one of the country greatest social Reform nothing will contribute More to human happiness than the provisions of this he when he introduced it in the Senate on 20 but even the chief architect of the new act admits i that there Are some flaws in parts of the marriage breakdown very badly for the clause which allows divorce when the spouses have been living separate and apart for any reason other than particularly stated for a period of not less than three years this says is much top it could conceivably be cited by a wife whose husband has been incurably ill for three years or away in a but Roebuck believes that the Good sense of judges will Avert any abuse of the there Are several Builtin defences a judge can turn to in the the separate and apart clause May bring distress but it is Likely also to be the strongest weapon in the new act for thousands genuinely seeking it is a Way out for hundreds of women deserted by uncaring Hus its a Way out for whose husband has spent most of his recent life in mental at he has come apparently cured but wild eyed and violent a Gam after a Johnson says there Are times when she and her six Earold daughter live in fear of our even in the peaceful her husbands its a constant Battle to under the new Johnson will Likely be Able to make a permanent break with her her lawyer believes there will be Little difficulty in proving Marri age breakdown because of her husbands mental ill there Are other new grounds which can bring Relief from or Gross addiction to alcohol or but there is also an element in the new act which would allow a Hus band and wife who want to try again an Opportunity to regain understanding and love without the arms barriers of the old Days of judges May Rule that a couple seeking divorce can resume cohabitation after a forgiven for a trial reconciliation period of three it be called a 90day trial for togetherness editors note fictitious names have been substituted in Case histories to protect the ident Ity of those copyright 1968 Toronto Star Syndicate so much More to offer you before you buy see this elegant Home each Home individually styled for distinctive appearance Builtin custom features 2 left 7 occupancy the 1968 Viceroy 4 3 finished recreation extra Large open House 14 Edge water South Dale phone 2561272 location East on Tran Canada daily turn right building in fort Richmond South Dale Wert Dale development company limited meet the men who help drum up business for you j v meet the men of the department of Industry Commerce who Are helping you make our province grow and Prosper they carry out business expansion programs to help build your 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