The sixth symposium on the recent developments in family law of the Utrecht Centre for European Research into Family Law (UCERF) will take place on Thursday 12th April 2012. All those interested are invited to attend (although the event will be held in Dutch). At this symposium (consisting of an afternoon programme in two halves) six renowned researchers and practitioners will speak about new developments in family law. During the first session, Professor Lieke Coenraad (Free University Amsterdam) will present her contribution on procedural law issues in family law cases. Thereafter Dr. Susan Rutten (Maastricht University) will discuss a number of issues concerning Islamic family law. The first half will be rounded off by Pia Lokin (UCERF, Radboud University Nijmegen) with an insightful presentation on international inheritance law.

During the second part of the programme Dr. Anne-Rigt Poortman (Social Sciences Faculty, Utrecht University) will discuss family solidarity from a sociological perspective, sollowed by Dr. Ton Liefaard (Criminal Law Department, Utrecht University) who will explain the recent developments in Juvenile criminal law in The Netherlands. The final speaker is Nora de Vries (UCERF, Utecht University), who will present her ideas on the liability between family members.

During the symposium there will be plenty of time for discussion and the ability to pose questions to the speakers. Afterwards there is opportunity to reflect on the symposium with a drink.

Date: Thursday 12th April 2012 

Time: 13:00 (1pm)

Location: Utrecht (specifics to be announced)

Costs: € 70 (€ 30 for PhD candidates and students) including a booklet containing papers presented and the drinks

Additional information click here. The application form can be downloaded here.

If you have any questions, please contact Evelien Verhagen.

b.) Recent developments in child maintenance law

In September 2011, two MPs of the VVD (Party for Democracy and Freedom) and the PvdD (Labour Party) proposed a new, simplified system for the calculation of child maintenance in the Netherlands. Two UCERF researchers, Dr. Ian Curry-Sumner and Dr Merel Jonker, were part of the advisory group on this topic. They were required to give insight in different foreign child maintenance systems. Ian Curry-Sumner explained the system currently used in England & Wales, whilst Merel Jonker drawing upon her PhD thesis ‘Child maintenance: a shared responsibility’, focused on the Norwegian and Swedish systems.

c.) Specialist Education Programme Juvenile Law

Overview

On the 3rd April 2012 the second edition of the Specialist Education Programme on Juvenile Law will commence. This education programme is designed for lawyers who want to specialise in juvenile law (in both civil and criminal law). This intensive, practically oriented course has an academic background and is in-line with the conditions that will be set for juvenile lawyers in the future. 

Contents of the programme

The Specialist Education Programme on Juvenile Law will run from April to November 2012. Over the course of ten evenings (6 pm – 9.30 pm) the participants will deepen their knowledge of  the position of minors within the national and international law, child protection law, Youth Care Centres, the Youth Care Act, Compulsory Youth Care Programmes, juvenile criminal law and juvenile detention centres amongst other areas of the law. Additionally, parts of the programme focus on communicating with adolescents and the role of parents within juvenile justice system. 

Lecturers

The course lecturers are all specialists in either civil or criminal juvenile law and are employed as professors, university lecturers, lawyers, juvenile law judges or prosecutors in juvenile law cases.

Conditions, costs and registration

Lawyers who want to take part in this programme need to at least have an internship declaration. The course is, however, only offered in Dutch. The costs are € 3,150 (including course literature and catering, VAT exempt). Application is possible until 1st March 2012 with the ‘Stichting Strafrechtpraktijk’:  secretariaat@stichtingstrafrechtpraktijk.nl.

Institutional organization 

The programme is set up and conducted by the Utrecht University’s Willem Pompe Institute for Criminal Law and Criminology and Molengraaff Institute for Private Law, commissioned by the ‘Stichting Strafrechtpraktijk’.

Additional information

More information about this programme can be found at: www.uu.nl/strafrecht.

You can also contact this programme’s coordinator, Dr. T. Liefaard directly: t.liefaard@uu.nl.

d.)

e.) WODC (Research and Documentation Centre) report: marriage or registered partnership?

This research was conducted to evaluate two important Dutch laws: the Same-Sex Marriage Act (Wet openstelling huwelijk) and the Registered Partnership Act (Wet geregistreerd partnerschap). After the introduction of the Same-Sex Marriage Act, the Minister of Justice has promised in 2001 to commission an evaluation of this law, focusing specifically on the correlation between marriage and registered partnership. This research fulfilled this promise. How does the legislation function? Have the goals set by the legislation been reached? Have there been any problems? What role does the registered partnership play alongside the marriage? These and other questions lie at the core of the evaluation of both laws. For a Dutch summary of the report, click here. For the pdf version of the report, click here.