Get all your legal questions answered

We have teamed up with Taylor Bracewell Solicitors to bring you the best legal tips and advice. Below is our first set of questions asked by you.

How expensive is a solicitor? Do they work hourly, or for a fixed fee? Do they charge when I first go in? I don’t think I can afford to have any advice.
We would always recommend that you call our solicitors for an initial chat about your problem, we may be able to assist on the telephone at no cost. The costs of instructing a solicitor can depend on many things such as the area of law, and the experience of the solicitor. Solicitors work for fixed fees and on an hourly rate basis. Again, this will depend on the nature of the legal work. Conveyancing transactions, wills and some family work can be on a fixed-fee basis.

I am a single father-of-one. He is 10. I am on the birth certificate, does this give me parental responsibility automatically? My son doesn’t live with me full time, I pay my maintenance and he stays over often.
As long as you are named on your son’s birth certificate, you will automatically have parental responsibility for your son. You will have shared rights and responsibilities with the mother of your son.

I am wanting to divorce my ex-partner, we haven’t been together for nearly a year now. It was an amicable split, and no real reason other than we fell out of love. I was told by a family friend I had to wait two years minimum before I can divorce him. Is this correct?
You would be able to initiate a divorce on the basis of two years separation assuming your ex-partner consents to the divorce and fully co-operates. In order to issue before this time you would have to assert that your partner had behaved in such a way that you couldn’t reasonably be expected to live with him (unreasonable behaviour) or that he had committed adultery.

My previous employer dismissed me whilst I was on leave for a broken wrist. I was due to sign my contract the week after the wrist injury but they told me I couldn’t sign whilst off and then dismissed me. They said I had too long off work. Is this wrongful dismissal?
An employee can be fairly dismissed even when they are absent from work due to illness or injury. However, much will depend upon how long you were employed for. Employees with less than two years’ continuous service do not have the right to bring an unfair dismissal claim. There are exceptions to that rule where an employee is dismissed for whistleblowing, health and safety reasons or similar but that doesn’t seem to apply in your case.

However, unless an employee is dismissed for gross misconduct, an employer must dismiss with notice.

Keep your questions coming – Doncaster Echo and Taylor Bracewell want to help you get the answers you need! All you need to do is send us your questions and the experts will do their best to put your mind at ease. Email your questions to info@createtvt.co.uk and we will then send them over to Taylor Bracewell and your answers will be published in the next edition of Doncaster Echo and on our website at www.doncasterecho.co.uk