It is not unknown that occasionally there can be a mistakes within court orders that have been approved by the court. One party might then be left thinking they are bound by the terms of the court order which are incorrect.

This came to light recently in a case called IC v RC [2020].  The lawyer who had drafted the order had incorrectly referred to the wife as the ‘applicant’ when she was, in fact, the ‘respondent’.

This terminology was crucial because the order stated the level of spousal maintenance could be varied upon the applicant’s remarriage (i.e the husbands remarriage). However, the order should have instead referred to the respondent’s remarriage (i.e the wife’s remarriage), meaning that the wrong party was referred too.

When mistakes like this come to light, the court implement a process called the ‘slip rule’.  The slip rule allows for mistakes to be rectified. 

Usually you would expect amendments under the slip rule to be rectified quite promptly after the hearing (sometimes before the order has been sealed by the court),  but in this particular case the slip rule was implemented 2 years after the order was granted.

The reason for this is because the way the order was worded was not what was intended. It would have been unfair for the husband to benefit from the mistake when it did not accurately reflect the agreement reached.  Therefore the court agreed that the mistake within the order should be corrected using the slip rule to reflect what the real intention was.

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If you have any questions, our expert family lawyers will be happy to help. George Green have offices based in Wolverhampton and Cradley Heath and serve clients across the West Midlands and Black Country including Stourbridge, Wolverhampton, Halesowen, Birmingham and beyond.  If you complete our online enquiry form, a member of our team will contact you for an initial discussion. Alternatively please contact the author of this blog, Aimee Stokes, on 01902 328 355.