When you become involved Family Law proceedings and start to attend Court and engage in discussions with your Solicitor, there are many words that will be “thrown around” that you haven’t heard before.

Here at Tiyce & Lawyers we do our best to communicate with our clients in plain English and, where a matter is in Court, we do our best to explain terms that are used by Judges and other solicitors.

Here are some of the terms that you will likely hear if your matter is dealt with in Court:

Term Definition
Adjourn Defer or postpone a Court to another day.
Applicant A person who makes an application to the Court.
Barrister A Lawyer who specialises in representing clients in a Court. They are different to a Solicitor.
Bench The Judge who hears a case.
Consent To agree or approve something.
Directions Hearing or Mention A short hearing before a Judge or Judicial Registrar to decide matters relating to the timing of when things happen during proceedings including what has to happen, who does it, and when it needs to be done by.
FCFCOA Refers to the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia.
Hearing The time and place at which a Court hears the parties argue their case and make a decision.
Interlocutory Application or Interim Application An Application by a party which is made after the case has started and before the case is decided on a final basis.
Judicial Registrar or Senior Judicial Registrar A type of Judicial Officer with powers to make directions and resolve interlocutory disputes.
Learned Friend A traditional way in which Barristers refer to each other in Court (mostly civilly!).
Leave of the Court Permission to do something.
Legislation Laws made by parliament or other body under the parliament’s authority. The Family Law Act 1975 and the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia Rules 2021 are examples of types of legislation that are applicable in the Family Law jurisdiction.
Respondent An individual that an Application is made against.
Service Delivery of Court documents to a person or a company. There are different rules for the delivery of Court documents depending on the type of Court document as some documents must be served in person while other documents can be served by email, post, or fax.
Solicitor A commonly used term for a Lawyer.
Subpoena Legal documents that force an individual or a company to produce documents for evidence, attend a trial to give evidence.
Stand down or stood down To put a matter on hold for a short time to deal with the case at a later time in that day.
This may occur at a Directions Hearing or Mention to allow parties to have negotiations outside of the court room, in the hopes of all or some of the issues being resolved before the matter is before the court again.