Horrors of divorce
Sir: Like Jeffrey Bernard (15 October) I too have been forcibly put through the divorce wringer and could easily top his horror stories by some of my own. When I contested the grounds for divorce and the unseemly haste for it, my ex-wife's solicitor introduced some obnoxious nonsense of his own between the parties: he had an injunction slapped on me and then opposed my access to the child of the family, contrary to their instructions and wishes, as our mutual friends testified.
And yet the courts rubber-stamped whatever her lawyers proposed —she was on legal aid which was refused to me even though she earns more than I. Still it took her lawyers eighteen months to tear us asunder legally. When the judge had granted the divorce and counsel rose to ask for costs on her behalf, my ex-wife told him not to and, to his credit for once, he did as he was instructed.
I have now got legal aid for access and the hearing for it is set for the end of the next month; if I am then granted access it will have been well over a year since I was allowed to see my child. No, I am not recounting my experiences in South Africa, Russia or Sanjay's India. A few days ago I wrote to complain to the Law Society about the solicitor's conduct in this matter. I should perhaps add that over the last six months the solicitor in question has been pursuing off and on an obscure legal process against me for calling him a bloody liar in public, even though his immediate verbal retort to that was, 'So are you, Mr Bard'.
J. Bardwaj 35 Ascot Road, Luton
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