Family Law Blog Archive

The Family Statutes Amendment Act, 2018 (Bill 28) received Royal Assent on December 11, 2018. Effective January 1, 2020, the Matrimonial Property Act will be renamed the Family Property Act; property distribution rules will be extended to adult interdependent partners; and the beginning of the relationship of interdependence will be established as the start date for property sharing for adult interdependent partners … Read More

The 2019 Federal Election: How will it affect childcare and parental leave? With the 2019 Federal Election fast approaching, one of the major issues for many parents is how the elections will affect their childcare solutions and parental leave. This year, significant promises have been made by the various parties and despite there being no guarantee that the parties will make good … Read More

Considering the upcoming Federal Elections, this week we are looking back at changes made to the Canada Child Benefit. See the original Financial Post article discussed below here: https://business.financialpost.com/personal-finance/taxes/understanding-the-new-canada-child-benefit-and-other-tax-tips-for-parents. What is the Canada Child Benefit?  The Canada Child Benefit (CCB) was developed in July 2016 after combining the Canada Child Tax Benefit (CCTB) and the Universal Child Care Benefit (UBBC) … Read More

Accessing Child Welfare Files 101: Section 126 of the CYFEA In Alberta, TheChild, Youth, and Family Enhancement Act (“CYFEA”)afford Child and Family Services (“CFS”) the ability to intervene in the private family lives of Albertans. The powers granted under the Act can be quite extensive. For example, the government can investigate families, impose Supervision Orders, apprehend children and grant Temporary and … Read More

In July 2019, Jeff Bezos and MacKenzie Bezos finalized their divorce. As the worlds richest couple, it is certain that Jeff and MacKenzie will both survive financially despite their separation (Jeff’s net worth is now US $123.1 billion, and MacKenzie’s is US $39.7 billion post-split). Unfortunately, we can’t all be in the enviable (or perhaps unenviable) position of splitting up billion-dollar … Read More

EBL Family Law is proud to announce that on July 15, 2019, Madison T. Dupuis joined the EBL team as a Student-at-Law. Read Madison’s bio below. Madison Dupuis is a Student-at-Law with EBL Family Law in Calgary. She graduated from the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Law in 2019, specializing in Family Law and accessible justice. Before completing Law School, … Read More

Section 7 Expenses Part 1: Enforcement of Section 7 Expenses by the Maintenance Enforcement Program 101 In Alberta, ‘the Maintenance Enforcement Program’ (MEP) collects court-ordered child, spousal, and partner support owed by one party to another. In this article, we discuss a form of child support available under the Divorce Act, section 7 expenses. In this post we briefly discuss: … Read More

The Family Law Act (Alberta) will change in 2020 and the children of separated unmarried parents will have new child support entitlements. In 2020 the Family Law Act will be changed to allow children 18 and older to qualify for child support if they are unable to live independently of their parents by reason of illness or disability. How are … Read More

What do the changes mean? Individuals living with common law partners will have the same property rights as married people at the end of 2019. The new rules come into effect January 1, 2020 and will apply to relationships that separate after December 31, 2019. This means that even if property is in “your name” it is shareable. Even if … Read More

The Value of Education upon Divorce Evaluating a degree or professional development obtained during a marriage is an area of law that is confusing and frustrating for lawyers but seems to generally work out for the people involved. It’s a frustrating legal issue for a couple of reasons, 1) There is not a lot of cases or commentary from Canada … Read More