Civil partnerships are open to both same-sex and heterosexual couples in England and Wales as an alternative to marriage. A civil partnership is a legal status acquired by couples who register as civil partners of each other in line with the requirements of the Civil Partnership Act 2004.
While civil partnerships do not come with the religious and traditional connotations of marriage, they are considered almost identical to marriage in respect of the rights and obligations acquired. Similarly, the legal requirements for the dissolution of a civil partnership are broadly the same as for divorce.
Eligibility to dissolve civil partnership
In order to apply to have your civil partnership dissolved, you must fulfil the below criteria:
- As with divorce, you must have been in your civil partnership for at least one year before dissolution proceedings can be started.
- The jurisdictional criteria for bringing a dissolution application are more limited than those for divorce. The courts in England and Wales can only deal with the dissolution of a civil partnership where one (or more) of the following criteria applies:
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- The applicant and/or respondent civil partner is habitually resident in England and Wales. This means that the party lives in England and Wales “most of the time” and is where they have their centre of interests
- Both civil partners were habitually resident in England and Wales and one civil partner continues to reside there
- The applicant is habitually resident in England and Wales and has resided there for a least one year immediately before the application was made
- The applicant is domiciled and habitually resident in England and Wales and has resided there for at least six months immediately before the application was made
- Both civil partners are domiciled in England and Wales. This means that both partners must consider England and Wales their permanent home, even if they live in another country
As with divorce, there is only one ground for the dissolution of a civil partnership. This is because the civil partnership has irretrievably broken down.
The process
One civil partner can make the application as a sole applicant. In this instance, the other civil partner will be known as the respondent. As an alternative, the application can be made jointly by the couple together as a joint application. In this instance, both parties will be the applicants and there is no respondent.
A joint application can be changed to a sole application if one of the civil partners subsequently decides that they no longer wish to pursue the dissolution proceedings or refuses to engage in the progress of the proceedings. A sole application cannot be changed to a joint application later down the line.
In the context of a sole application, this is submitted to the court online and the court will issue the application which commences the dissolution proceedings. The issued application is then served on the respondent civil partner or their instructed solicitors. The application must be served on the respondent within 28 days after the application is issued. The respondent civil partner must then complete and submit their acknowledgement of receipt of the dissolution application (known as their acknowledgment of service) within 14 days. This can be done online.
Provided that the respondent civil partner does not dispute the dissolution proceedings, 20 weeks after the dissolution application has been issued, the sole applicant can apply for the first stage of the dissolution order. This is known as the “Conditional Order”. At this stage, the sole applicant must confirm that they wish to proceed with the dissolution of the civil partnership and confirm if anything in the application has changed, such as their current address.
After six weeks and one day from the date the conditional order was made, the sole applicant can then apply for the final dissolution order which will bring the civil partnership to an end. However, you should not apply for the final dissolution order until you have resolved the financial arrangements with your civil partner and an agreement has been made into an order which has been approved by the court. It is only at the stage of the conditional order that the court has the power to make and/or approve orders in respect of the finances.
Resolving your finances
Dissolving your civil partnership does not automatically provide you with a clean financial break from your partner. The court will need to approve any financial settlement agreed between you or via your solicitors if it is to be made into a binding and enforceable court order. It is therefore important to focus on resolving financial matters as soon as possible.
If you require any advice regarding dissolving a civil partnership, please contact our Family team who will be happy to help.