Scotland

Scotland

Divorce and dissolution in Scotland

Sections 1 and 2 of the Divorce (Scotland) Act 1976 (D(S)A 1976) (as amended by the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006 (FL(S)A 2006)) provide that there are two grounds of divorce in Scotland:

•
that the marriage has broken down irretrievably, or
•
an interim gender recognition certificate under the Gender Recognition Act 2004 (GRA 2004) has, after the date of the marriage, been issued to either party of the marriage, even if a full gender recognition certificate has been issued to that person by a sheriff under the procedure provided for in GRA 2004, s 4E—in contrast, this provision does not apply if the Gender Recognition Panel (ie as opposed to the sheriff) issues a full gender recognition certificate to the person to whom an interim gender recognition certificate has been issued

The most commonly used ground is that the marriage has broken down irretrievably, and under D(S)A 1976, s 1(2) this can be established in one of four ways, ie that:

•
since the date of the marriage, the defender has committed

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