Divorce

The Court will need basic information from you such as names, addresses and whether there are any children in your family. They will need your original Marriage Certificate (or a certified copy from the church or district council where you were married). They will also need to know the reason for your divorce.

If your divorce is to be based on your spouse's adultery or their unreasonable behaviour (see Factsheet: Divorce) you will need to give details about this. For example you will need to say when the adultery began although you will not have to name the other person (in fact, people are encouraged not to name the other person to promote an amicable way forward).

If the divorce is based on your spouse's unreasonable behaviour you will need to give details about that behaviour in brief, providing a list of events which end with the breakdown of the marriage.

If there are children in your family you will need to complete a separate form giving the Court information about them. This information will include where they live, who with, where they go to school and whether there are any agreements in place between you and your spouse.

If you would like some advice about agreeing arrangements for children to see the spouse who no longer lives with them, please follow this link to see our further information: Children: Residence/Contact.

An average divorce will usually take between 4 and 6 months.

This assumes that there are no complications such as locating your spouse, your spouse not replying to the Court or your spouse defending your petition or lodging their own in response.

No, not if you and your spouse agree to the divorce progressing in the terms stated.

If, however, you or your spouse want to defend the divorce or issue a separate petition for divorce on different grounds this may have the result of the Court wanting to see you both before it makes any decisions about how the divorce will move forward.