New Zealand Law Society - Guardianship applications dominate in Family Court

Guardianship applications dominate in Family Court

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Guardianship applications made up 30% of all substantive Family Court applications filed in the year to 30 June 2019, the Ministry of Justice reports.

Information released by the ministry shows that there were 17,953 guardianship applications out of a total of 60,587 applications. The guardianship applications related to the Care of Children Act 2004 (excluding Hague Convention) and were mostly applications for parenting orders.

The next most frequent Famiy Court case types in the 2018/19 year were related to care or protection under the Oranga Tamariki Act 1989, making up 18% of applications. These were followed by applications for dissolutions/divorce of marriage or civil unions (14% of all applications) and applications related to family violence (13%).

Substantive Family Court applications filed, year to 30 June

Case type 2019 2019 % 2018 2018 %
Guardianship 17,953 29.6% 18,640 30.8%
Oranga Tamariki 10,775 17.8% 9,994 16.5%
Dissolution 8,440 13.9% 8,522 14.1%
Family violence 8,044 13.3% 8,231 13.6%
Mental health 7,132 11.8% 7,077 11.7%
PPPR 4,902 8.1% 4,742 7.8%
Property 1,692 2.8% 1,718 2.8%
Family proceedings 532 0.9% 559 0.9%
Adoption 362 0.6% 343 0.6%
Child support 207 0.3% 249 0.4%
Miscellaneous 196 0.3% 173 0.3%
Estates 185 0.3% 172 0.3%
Hague 117 0.2% 100 0.2%
Substance addiction 50 0.1% 32 0.1%
TOTAL 60,587 100.0% 60,552 100.0%
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