Family Law:A Case for Children

Hosted by Bertha Belmore

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Episodes

Latest episode

Oct 2026

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About the show

A journey through history, the law and society in England with respect to children and asking the question whether we, as society have acted as reasonably responsible adults to our children. Is there a case to answer?

Listen to episodes

37 recent

October 28, 2026Episode 3720 min

Was the Court of Wards Corrupt?

Send us Fan Mail This week we follow the money. We meet William Cecil again and his son Robert, who ran the Court for decades and did very nicely out of it, and the Court’s own money men, who did even better. Along the way, there’s a boy sold back to his own family so a stranger could turn a profit, and a stepfather who chopped down £2,500 of his stepson’s timber and got fined £3. So was the Court of Wards corrupt? And is it worse that most of it was completely legal?

October 14, 2026Episode 3618 min

Wardship: The Law That Owned The Children

Send us Fan Mail Wardship began as a feudal duty to protect an heir, and it became a business. With the robe on, we walk through the Court of Wards and Liveries rule by rule: the inquest, the sale of a child’s guardianship, the “value of the marriage,” and the cost of getting your own inheritance back. We test it against the life of Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, and look at how society helped the law along. The law never asked what a child needed. It asked what the child was worth. Were the Tudors reasonable, responsible adults?

September 30, 2026Episode 3516 min

Court of Wards and Liveries continued

Send us Fan Mail For roughly a century, the English Crown could sell a child's marriage to the highest bidder. This wasn't a scandal. It was the system, run by the Court of Wards and Liveries. This episode asks two questions. First: how many children were actually married under wardship? Second, a more personal one: after immersing myself in this subject for so long, have I inflated the Court's importance? Most people in Tudor England were never touched by it. Wardship fell on the landed classes, and the surviving records come largely from families who were hit hardest and complained loudest.

September 16, 2026Episode 347 min

Court of Wards and Liveries

Send us Fan Mail It is easy to start a topic without full comprehension of the reasons necessary for the discussion. So today I pause to give the reasons why The Court of Wards and Liveries warrants mentioning and the subsequent discussion.

August 26, 2026Episode 3315 min

The Court of Wards and Liveries and The Monarchs

Send us Fan Mail This is a brief look at the monarchs who reigned during the exercise of the royal prerogative rights, which lead to the eventual development of the Court.

August 11, 2026Episode 322 min

The Tudors Continued

Send us Fan Mail This is an introduction to the next few episodes we will be looking into. As we are called to do, I would like you to think on the children.

July 28, 2026Episode 3113 min

The Elizabethan's and Lord Burghley

Send us Fan Mail The Elizabethan's epitomises the classic phrase "the rich get richer and the poor get poorer". The situation was dire, like Lady Justice they were blind.

July 14, 2026Episode 3019 min

Poverty and the Poor Laws Concluded

Send us Fan Mail The Poor Law of 1601 consolidated the previous statutes in a bid to create uniformity and to prevent riots, overall it was successful for those who needed it to be. But were the Poor Laws necessary given that, the Tudors, especially the Elizabethans were a wealthy bunch? The question of who is my neighbour failed to crossed their minds.

July 1, 2026Episode 2925 min

Poverty and the Poor Laws

Send us Fan Mail A brief look a the reasons for the large scale poverty in the Tudor era and the laws the enacted to try to tackle the crisis.

June 17, 2026Episode 2822 min

Infanticide, Illegitimate Children, Physical and Sexual Abuse

Send us Fan Mail Today we look at illegitimacy, infanticide, physical and sexual abuse in the Tudor era and what steps were taken if any to protect the vulnerable children.