On the Couch with Stephanie Bellchambers

Welcome to On the Couch with Biscoes, your home for honest, unscripted business and community conversations brought to you by Biscoes Solicitors. We work with a huge range of local organisations, and we’ve learned so much from the people behind them, now we want you to hear their stories too.

In this episode, Alison is joined by Stephanie Bellchambers, Head of Biscoes’ Family Department, for a thoughtful and eye‑opening conversation about some of the most sensitive areas of family law. Stephanie explains the wide range of support her team provides, from divorce, separation and domestic abuse matters to the specialist areas of fertility law, surrogacy and collaborative divorce.

Together, they explore the realities behind modern family‑building: donor conception, the legal pitfalls of informal arrangements, the protections offered by licensed clinics, and the complex journey intended parents face when navigating surrogacy in the UK or abroad. Stephanie also lifts the lid on collaborative law, a more dignified, constructive alternative to traditional divorce that keeps couples in control and reduces conflict, cost and emotional fallout, especially for children.

They also discuss Biscoes commitment to providing legal aid for vulnerable clients, particularly survivors of domestic abuse, ensuring that vital support remains accessible within the Portsmouth community.

This isn’t a legal lecture, it’s a warm, reassuring conversation that highlights the human stories, modern challenges and compassionate solutions at the heart of family law.

So grab a cuppa, get comfy, and join us on the couch.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Bisco's great service to every client every time.

SPEAKER_01 0:10

Welcome to On the Couch with Bisco's, your home for honest, unscripted business and community chats brought to you by Bisco's solicitors. We work with all kinds of businesses and organisations through our local community, and we've learned so much from the people behind them. So now we want you to hear from them too, to understand the values, lessons, and experiences that kept them moving. If you're looking for hard-hitting legal content, this isn't the podcast for you. This is a cozy, comfortable space for local people and our best collaborators to have a voice. So grab a cupper and come and join us on the couch. Lovely. Right, Stephanie, so tell us. You head up our family department at Bisco's. So tell us what we what do we do in the family department?

SPEAKER_00 1:08

So the family department covers all things in relation to your family. So divorce, separation, children, issues, um, injunctions. So we cover a lot of vulnerable clients in terms of domestic abuse. Um and then there's also some other niche areas of law that I particularly cover. So one of those is fertility law, which is one I'm really, really passionate about. And the other one as well that I do, and one of my colleagues, Katie, does is collaborative law.

SPEAKER_01 1:35

Okay, so let's start with fertility law. People probably listening um may not have any idea uh what that what that entails. What sort of things would that um cover?

SPEAKER_00 1:47

So it's trying to help a couple or an individual to have a child. Okay. Um, and whether that is because they are an individual not in a relationship or don't want to be in a relationship. Okay. You can have a child. You don't have to be in any form of relationship to do that. So, how would they go about that? Um, if it's a female, do they need a sperm donation? If it's a male, do they need a surrogate to carry a child for them and to help create the child through embryo donation or using their own sperm with an egg donation? Um, or a couple who may be having fertility problems, how they may go um navigate that with the IVF process potentially, um, or perhaps a same-sex male couple who would need a surrogate to carry a child, or a same-sex female couple who out of them may carry the child if one of them wants to carry the child, um, and how they would go about creating the embryo, so with a sperm donation.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

So, what would be a solicitor's role in in any one of those scenarios? What sort of things do you advise on?

SPEAKER_00 2:53

So, there are two potential roads with all of this. One is outside of a licensed clinic, whereby uh, for example, we get a lot of uh same-sex female couples or an individual female who would like to have a child, and she may be friends with someone or knows or has some connections online where someone would be happy to give them her sperm and say, you know, go ahead, have a child. I don't want anything, don't want any involvement, but I'm I want you to have what you want. I want to help you. That is a process outside of a licensed clinic, and the implications and the law on that is very different to doing it through a licensed clinic.

SPEAKER_01 3:35

Okay. And just in a quick, quick summary, um, what are the legal obligations of that of that sperm donor?

SPEAKER_00 3:43

So outside of a clinic, they are the biological parent. So there's one issue where um everyone's expectations may be this is just to help you have a child, I what don't want any involvement, this is this is your child. Um, but in the eyes of the law, if it's un outside of a clinic, that person is the biological father. They can pursue contact, they can pursue parental responsibility, and equally the birth mother could pursue child maintenance against that person. And none of those things may have been anticipated or expected at the time.

SPEAKER_01 4:16

Yeah, those are the sorts of things that that you need to be aware of before entering into that sort of unlicensed uh arrangement. Um, and if you're talking about a licensed arrangement, what what's other other is it different?

SPEAKER_00 4:27

Absolutely different. It is absolutely clear that person, the donor, has no legal right whatsoever. So no right to contact, um, they are not going to be the biological parent. Um, and uh there's strict rules in terms of what information the child can access later on in life.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

Okay, and rights to maintenance, those sorts of things, they don't exist either?

SPEAKER_00 4:52

Absolutely not, no. So it protects everyone involved. The the biggest disadvantage is the cost, and that's why people look at the other road doing it outside of a clinic because it can be prohibitively expensive. However, you have to weigh everything into the round to give everyone certainty. What we can do if people are not using a clinic is to put a donor agreement in place so that we have discussed with everybody what their expectations are and their wishes and their intentions, so that hopefully there's no dispute later because we've covered everything off. It's all very well people having discussions in their living rooms or by WhatsApp, but they may not have thought about um when the child or if the child should be told that they were created from a donor. Um, what should whether the donor should have any form of contact, whether they should be kept updated on the child's upbringing. All of those things are just to cover those off so that everyone's expectations are managed. Um, and whether there's an expectation of a sibling in the future.

SPEAKER_01 5:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:52

Would you want the same donor, for example?

SPEAKER_01 5:54

Yeah, okay. Um, and then surrogacy, that's uh that's quite an uh an interesting area where we're actually um a child is carried by somebody who's not intending to bring that child up.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

Yes. Um so our laws, unfortunately, are so historic, they're so old, they're so backward. Um, so there's no legal framework here that says if a surrogate gives birth to a child, then they are not the legal mother, they must hand over the child. We don't have that as yet.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

And that's even the case where they've had um that that embryo that they've carried through to a full-term baby is not biologically connected to them. So if they have um effectively there's been sperm and an egg that create an embryo that's not theirs.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

Yeah, and that would be the typical arrangement as well. There would be no biological link to the surrogate. Um, but in the eyes of our law in England and Wales, the person who gives birth is the legal mother, and the intended parents then have to apply to the court for a parental order to get rid of extinguish the surrogate's rights and to put the intended parents with their legal standing on the birth certificate.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

So that's akin to an adoption effectively of your own of your own child, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 7:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:10

Yeah. Okay. Um, so who might use surrogate?

SPEAKER_00 7:14

So you I think you mentioned it's same-sex couple, so uh Yep, so potentially same-sex male couple in particular or a a male individual because they they cannot carry a child, so they will need someone to do that for them. Um, and something, some other fact that's bonkers is that we can't help, we are prevented from putting in place a surrogacy arrangement because that looks like a commercial contract in relation to a child. What we can do is advise on you should try and put a surrogacy agreement in place that records everyone's intentions and wishes. This is what you should cover off in that agreement, so that again everyone knows where they stand. The most important thing is choosing your surrogate wisely because this is going to be a trusted person that you're going to entrust with the biggest thing in your life. Um, and ideally, we look at someone who has been pregnant before, carried a child to term, given birth, um, and that they are doing this for purely altruistic reasons. There's no other thing at play here because the court, when looking at whether a parental order should be made, is how much has been paid to the surrogate. We call that reasonable expenses. So they will want to know what have you paid in terms of clothing, extra food, time off work, attending medical appointments, all of those things are reasonable, but we shouldn't be paying anything sort of over and above.

SPEAKER_01 8:34

So it's not it, it can't be a commercial transaction in the UK. So um, and uh obviously there there'll be instances where heterosexual couples um would also use a surrogate, for example, if if a woman couldn't carry a baby, she'd she'd maybe suffered um a medical condition that made that that it that impossible. Yeah. Um, so that's that's also a relatively common way that surrogacy comes up.

SPEAKER_00 8:58

Yep, extremely common, whether it's done here or we get a lot of uh international surrogacy. So some people consider America as being a great option because it's very clear in a lot of their states that the person giving birth is not the legal mother, and it's easier for the intended parents to then bring the child home through immigration status. But again, there's a cost factor to that. So some people look at other countries such as Ghana, Sri Lanka, where it can be cheaper in terms of the IVF process itself, because that's one cost, then you've got the surrogate as another cost, so it's weighing everything up into the balance. And we've got an immigration team at Bisco's with where who I lie is with, in order to try and get the the baby back into this country as soon as possible.

SPEAKER_01 9:41

Okay, that's great. So if um anybody wanted to inquire about surrogacy, they can contact yourself or Katie. Yes, um at Bisco's. Um the other um bit of uh family work that we do that probably a lot of other firms um don't do is to deal with divorce differently. So tell me a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

Well, I think if you just said what what springs to mind when you say the word divorce to Joe Blogs on the street, what do you think they would say when you say the word divorce?

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Well, conflict, acrimony, um, arguing, big solicitors' bills, all those things that conjures up.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

Yeah, yeah. And it doesn't have to be like that. That's the message we're trying to get across. It is possible to have a good divorce. Um, and what we look at in particular are non-court dispute resolution options. So doing um a divorce or a separation outside of the court arena where the couple can have full control over their situation and how they're going to move forward. So, with collaborative law, what would happen is that each of the couple would choose a collaboratively trained lawyer, and then we come together as a four in the same room, and we talk about what the potential options are for their situation.

SPEAKER_01 11:03

So, this is still a situation where um each of the couple would be represented by their own collaborative lawyer.

SPEAKER_00 11:08

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 11:09

Um, but that's all done in the instead of emails and letters going backwards and forwards between two different firms of solicitors who um represent their clients' interests, everybody comes together in the same space. Yes. Um, and and that is an open discussion. Is that how it works?

SPEAKER_00 11:27

It's an open discussion. There's no correspondence in between, no back and forth, so that limits the cost there. We're all in the same room and we advise in front of our own clients. So everyone gets to hear what that advice is, which is essentially the law. It applies in every scenario to say, well, look, this is how the court would approach dealing with the house. These are the options. What ones do you want to rule in, rule out? And we can bring in other people to help, whether it's a financial advisor or a family consultant or a mortgage advisor, who are neutral and they're advising both individuals of the couple so that everyone hears that advice and then we take it, run with it, and and resolve the situation. And it might be that we just need two or three meetings and it's done. And it's far better that everyone walks away from that process, having been in control. You choose the time and day of the meeting, you choose the location of the meeting, it works around everyone's diaries, and hopefully you can walk forward as co-parents moving forward if you're not going to still be man and wife, you're not still going to be together anymore, but you're still going to be adults that can communicate and problem solve. And you know, you've taken control of that aspect of your life.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

Absolutely. Um, and in terms of cost, how does it how does that work? Everybody pays their own collaborative lawyer?

SPEAKER_00 12:44

Yeah, you pay your own, but you can decide that perhaps all of those fees are taken out of the joint account, or you have a pot that's put to one side that is covering all of the legal fees involved, and perhaps if you've had to pay a financial advisor to come in, that comes out of the same pot. So you know exactly how much you've spent. And it might be, for example, you know, maybe three to ten thousand between the two of them, depending on how many meetings have been required, rather than potentially 10 to 20 per party if you're going off to court.

SPEAKER_01 13:17

Yeah, and ultimately it's the family that suffer from from whatever the legal costs are, um, coming off of what there is available to be divided up for the benefit of each other and and any children of relationships.

SPEAKER_00 13:29

So the pot needs to be kept as whole as possible to meet everyone's needs, housing needs, income needs, retirement needs, all of those things, we need to conserve that. And we don't need to be at each other's throats to do it.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

Yeah, and you mentioned about co-parenting. Um, a big bit of of people having acrimonious divorces is actually how the children suffer in those those circumstances. So is collaborative law a way of trying to minimize that sort of fallout?

SPEAKER_00 13:58

It is, yeah. And we appreciate that the the couple may be at different stages emotionally because maybe one of them hasn't chosen this separation, hasn't chosen this divorce. So we work on that as well. We can bring in a family consultant who can help navigate those emotions. And if we need to wait a bit to make sure that we are all on the same page and ready to move forward, we'll do that because it's only when we are all in an emotional space that we can then start to deal with these practical issues that we can then talk about the children and how their situation is going to work moving forward. And again, it's got to be the couple that makes the decision about their children. It shouldn't be a stranger who is a judge sat in a courtroom that knows nothing about this family, what activities the children do, everyone's working relationships. It should be the couple that decides. And the more input they have, the more they take control of their own situation, the better off the children will be. And then they can see their parents can problem solve.

SPEAKER_01 14:58

Yeah. So they might not be together, but actually they're both parents, and it's the less opportunity to play one off against the other and and feel or feel abandoned by one or the other.

SPEAKER_00 15:07

Yeah. Yeah. So important.

SPEAKER_01 15:08

So that's that's brilliant. Um, so in terms of um training for for um collaborative lawyers, that's a specific form of training. This is not all divorced lawyers are collaborative lawyers, that's right, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 15:20

No, you have to go through specific training. Um, and then we always try and see someone else's collaborative law in practice. We work closely um in a pod. So every collaborative lawyer needs to be in a pod with other collaborative lawyers so that you're sharing ideas, sharing experiences, sharing uh potential experts that come in, so a family consultant, financial advisors, um, and so that you can get to know each other as individuals because we need to try and recommend to the other part of the couple, well, perhaps go and see X, Y, and Z in the local area because I've worked with them before, they you know have a similar mindset. I think together we'll be able to work really well to help your family.

SPEAKER_01 16:02

Okay, great. So if anybody's listening to this podcast and they they're they're at that sad point where they think that their relationship's irretrievably broken down, um, and that they were thinking about contacting um a lawyer. They if if they were to contact Biscoes, they could indicate early on um that they were interested in in doing this on in a collaborative process, yes?

SPEAKER_00 16:24

Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:24

Okay. Um, but is it something that that if if um they're already with a solicitor, could they could they say, well, actually, I'm I'm really interested in that process. Um, could they change midway through at any time?

SPEAKER_00 16:38

Yeah. And we can all appoint our own collaborative lawyers. And at the stage where everyone has done that, we then sign up to a collaborative agreement. So everyone understands this is the process we are going to use. And because we've signed that agreement, it empowers everyone to be fully on board. And I I can't name one collaborative process that's fallen down. Okay, we've got to the end point because if it does, we everyone has to step away, and no one really wants that. When you've invested all of that time, you've invested um into the process, you want to be able to see it through. That's that's everyone's goal, and it's not to go to court. You're all signing up to say, this is how we're gonna deal with it, we're not going to go to court.

SPEAKER_01 17:19

Okay. Um, and that can sit alongside the legal formalities of ending a marriage in a divorce.

SPEAKER_00 17:25

Yep. So at the same time, you can have the divorce running through. And again, that's a discussion to be had in that open room. Who's potentially gonna start the divorce? Should we do it together? Should we have a joint application? Is everyone ready that we start? Or do we need to delay it a bit, you know, to have some time to maybe have a a counselling session for one of the parties just so that they are ready?

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Okay, so it sounds a lot like actually just taking control of the process and and feeling that um you're controlling it rather than outside agencies and judges, courts, etc. Controlling you. Controlling you.

SPEAKER_00 17:59

Yeah, because it is such a difficult stage in some people's lives to go through. No one would choose divorce when you get married or a separation. Um, so just taking back that bit of control, I think, is really empowering as well.

SPEAKER_01 18:13

Brilliant. Um, so our team, Abisco's, um, consists of um male and female lawyers. Um so people can can come along, um, chat to one of the team and express a preference as to how they want their their case dealt with um just by contacting us through the website.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

Or we have we have full range, so highly, highly donkey's years experience, you know, myself, my deputy right at the top there, down to um juniors and trainees that are coming through that are so motivated, so hardworking. And we also have a dedicated team who still offer legal aid because a lot of firms have stopped doing legal aid um for whatever reason. But Bisco's have taken the decision to carry on um with the legal aid process because we want to give something back to the community, and it's very important to us that we help the most vulnerable people in the society. So, um, survivors of domestic abuse, we will offer legal aid to them if they're eligible on merits and means to give them protection, whether it's an injunction or because they need to safeguard their children. We still do that, and that's just so, so important.

SPEAKER_01 19:18

Brilliant. Steph, thank you for coming and telling us all about the uh the ins and outs of our family department. And I'm sure um if anyone wants to get in touch, they'll they'll get a good reception from us. Yes, great, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

This goes great service to every client, every time.