The privacy of the family justice system makes it difficult for the public to get a good idea about what steps the courts are prepared to take in order to ensure that a child has a relationship with both parents. Those sources which are most critical of the ‘secret family justice system’ often suggest that the courts are either impotent or disinclined to support non-resident parents (usually fathers) in their attempts to obtain contact, but in fact this is not always so. Following is a selection of a few recent cases where the courts have been proactive and determined to ensure that an intransigent parent does not frustrate a child’s right to a relationship with both parents.
Re P (A child) [2006] EWCA Civ 1792, [2007] 1 FLR 1820
The child was resident with its mother, who failed to produce the child for contact on 4 consecutive occasions. This was a breach of a court order which had a penal notice attached (a penal notice is a warning to the person who has to comply with the order that they must obey the order or they may be punished including by being sent to prison). There had been a previous history of the Mother failing to attend court or to facilitate contact.
On the Father’s application the court made a committal order against the Mother (a committal order is an order punishing someone who is in contempt of court because they have disobeyed a court order, and this can include a prison sentence) even though the Mother had not been at court on the day the committal order was made. The Mother had failed to attend court, citing childcare difficulties and an application on her behalf for an adjournment had been refused by the Judge who went ahead in her absence and made a suspended committal order (this means that if there was a further breach she would automatically serve a sentence of imprisonment).
When the Mother appealed the Court of Appeal upheld the committal order saying that it was appropriate in some cases to proceed with a committal application even when the Respondent (the Mother) was not present. The key factor here appears to have been the importance of ensuring that the Mother complied with the contact orders and given the Mother’s history of non-attendance the court was entitled to go ahead and deal with the matter. The Court of Appeal held that the Judge was entitled to take the view that the Mother’s reason for not attending court on that day was no more than an excuse. The Court of Appeal noted that it would have been better if the Judge had set out his reasons for the order made, but the order itself was allowed to stand.
Re A (A Child) [2007] EWCA Civ 899
In this case there was a history of attempts by the Mother (with whom the 8 year old child lived) to interfere with and interrupt the Father’s contact with the child. Court proceedings ran over a period of years during which the Judge warned the Mother that if she continued to disrupt contact the court would consider changing the child’s residence to the Father. After findings were made regarding the Mother’s deliberate sabotage of contact the Father chose to proceed not by way of a committal application as in the case above, but by making an application for residence.
The Mother’s behaviour continued. At the final hearing the expert evidence (social worker and psychologist) was that it was in the best interests of the child to live with his Father. The Psychologist’s view was that the Mother had a serious personality disorder and had a total lack of insight into how her behaviour was damaging for the child. The Social Worker’s evidence was that although the child did not want to live with his Father the long term risk of emotional harm were outweighed the short term trauma to him of a change of residence.
The court in this case plainly took the long view. In light of the Mother’s personality disorder (which are usually difficult to treat) there was little prospect of a change in the Mother’s behaviour so the prospects of maintaining a relationship with the Father without causing emotional damage to the child must have been pretty remote. The change of residence was ordered against the recommendation of the child’s headteacher and in spite of the facts that the Mother was acknowledged to provide very good care for the child who was doing well at school, was settled and wished to remain with his Mother. However it is not every case in which there will be a clear diagnosis of a personality disorder – most often the case will be far less clear cut.
One feature of the case is that the social worker involved in his report ruled out termination of contact with the Father as ‘not an option’, leading eventually to the inexorable conclusion that the only way to ensure a relationship with both parents was to change his residence. Unfortunately it is not always the case that social workers / CAFCASS Officers / Judges are prepared to take the same robust view – the professionals do sometimes advocate termination of contact as the least worst option for the child, although I think this is happening far less often, as is evidenced by the increasing frequency of law reports involving cases of a change of residence arising from the resident parent’s implacable hostility.
In the matter of C (A Child) [2007] EWCA Civ 866
Again a case where a Mother repeatedly failed to cooperate with contact orders and sabotaged contact by making negative comments to the child about the Father. The Court held that the Mother was implacably hostile to contact. In this case the court had to weigh up the two options of committing the Mother to prison or changing residence. The child was c6 yrs old. The Father’s practical parenting ability as a primary carer was untested. The Mother had effectively issued the court with an ultimatum, saying that if residence were changed she would refuse to have any further contact with the child. The Judge took the view that since the Mother had made but not followed through on previous threats in the course of the proceedings this threat too may well not become a reality if residence were changed, although it was a risk. The Judge rejected the Mother’s offer of contact made half way through the hearing as he was not persuaded she would honour her offer.
The Mother had recently had a baby with her new partner and so instead the court ordered an immediate change of residence. The Judge had looked at the Welfare Checklist and struck a balance between the short term distress of a change of residence and the risk of long term harm. The Court of Appeal upheld the order. In the Judgment of the Court of Appeal Lord Justice Ward said:
As to the option to make no order, that was the option of abdication and all too frequently judges are driven to that conclusion and that is why week after week fathers come to this court protesting that the court is powerless to enforce its orders, quite unable to control the intractable, implacably hostile mother, even though the long-term damage to the child is perfectly obvious. Time after time this court has to mollify the angry father, endeavouring to explain that the judge has a broad discretion and that his decision cannot be challenged unless plainly wrong. This time the boot is on the other foot, and if a different conclusion has been reached in this case then let it be shouted out from the roof-tops.
A few headline judgments from the appeal courts, and we are expected to believe that fathers (sorry: ‘non-resident parents’) are not so hard done by after all?
These cases are an irrelevance — and, I have long suspected, a cynical PR exercise on the part of the courts (prompted by their government masters) to defuse criticism and deflect attention from the central issue: that the overwhelming majority of parents should not even have to set foot near a court — let alone fall into the clutches of family lawyers — in order to continue raising their children following separation or divorce.
UK family law is perverse: one parent seizes possession of the children, while the other has to go (wallet-in-hand, of course) before a cabal of self-serving apparatchiks in order to attain some quantum of ‘contact’ with their own offspring.
This is an obscenity, wouldn’t you agree? And not only an abuse of parents, but also of the very children whose ‘best interests’ the system, laughably, purports to represent?
Sigh…I’m disappointed. Not surprised. But I am disappointed. I was hoping for a ‘Thanks for posting these cases for our dads to see and use – these cases are really good news but this kind of approach is not adopted often enough. We need to work towards educating the judiciary and the legal profession to follow the lead that these cases take so that fathers are able to play a full and proper role in their children’s lives’. But I really can’t say that was what I was expecting to get in my comments box. Nope, what I was expecting (pretty much word for word) appears above.
Why is it that even ‘pro-father’ cases receive the same kind of vitriolic response?
These few cases tend to suggest that the courts are not as biased against fathers as you and others might have us believe, although of course this is a very small sample of cases. And I accept that what they don’t prove is that the courts get it right ALL the time (even if we knew what ‘getting it right’ was). Indeed I wouldn’t be the one to suggest that they do always get it right.
You might legitimately argue that these cases are not representative of the prevailing approach, but I really don’t see how you can say they are an irrelevance. I would have expected an organisation like f4j, which is (I assume) committed to helping fathers get justice (rather than to wingeing for the sake of it), to welcome any signs of a shift in judicial attitude and to grasp every opportunity to utilise that for the benefit of its members.
You suggest that the overwhelming majority of parents ‘should not even have to set foot near a court’ – I’m sure most sensible people would agree that it would be great if none of us had to go to court. But the reality is that parents very often do not agree about how their children should be raised after separation, so what are you suggesting should replace the court system where other methods of resolving dispute have failed?
Is your point simply that parents should not be going to court because – what? because these disputes do not warrant court involvement because there is one right answer which can be magically arrived at by waving about the proposition that a child has a right to see her father FULL STOP? The logical extension of this of course is that in any dispute of this kind the Mother is going to be in the wrong regardless of the individual facts, and that therefore that judicial consideration of the issue is a perverse exercise from the start?
If so, how and by whom should these disputes between parents be resolved if not the courts?
And how credible are arguments for parity of treatment between mums and dads when you cannot accept that sometimes the answer is unpalatable to dad and that sometimes Mum is talking sense? Do you want equality or do you just want to have it your way?
Or is your point that the court system itself is the problem? If so – these cases MUST be highly relevant as at least some evidence of reform? Not to mention helpful ammunition for Fathers in other cases before the courts (I use cases like these in court on behalf of Fathers I represent, and to warn my Mum clients of the possible consequences of frustrating contact).
I sense that cases like this are difficult for f4j to respond to because to accept that the courts are capable of getting it right in these cases might suggest that they are also capable of getting it right in others (including cases where the ‘right’ answer is less favourable to the father)? And accepting that SOMETIMES the Mother is ‘in the right’ and that SOMETIMES the Father is something which is a little more difficult to formulate into a soundbite?
F4j has done a lot to raise the profile of these issues and I suspect has played a part in focusing many a judge’s mind so that this kind of decision is now more commonplace. But if f4j are unable to respond constructively to positive shifts in the way the courts deal with these cases, and if f4j can’t accept that these cases are not susceptible to a one-size-fits-all approach, their credibility – and influence – will wane. You can keep saying how hard done by fathers are (as you do in your comment above, relegating the obligatory reference to child abuse and ‘best interests’ to almost a post-script) but the more you focus on poor old dad the more self-evident it is that the campaign has never been as much about the needs of the child as the demands of the father. But then I suppose we’re back to the beginning again?
“Why is it that even ‘pro-father’ cases receive the same kind of vitriolic response?”
Vitriolic? We are not a family court now: people don’t speak in polite euphemisms out here in the real world.
We approach these cases from opposing perspectives: you, as a system insider whose social capital is invested in an apparatus whose basic premise is that fathers are second-class parents fit only for some more or less marginal role in their kids’ lives (depending upon the severity of their perceived flaws and Mother’s willingness to comply with the diktats of the court); myself, as somebody who was unfortunate enough to fall down the family court rabbit-hole, and who sees it in all its absurdity.
“We need to work towards educating the judiciary and the legal profession to follow the lead that these cases take so that fathers are able to play a full and proper role in their children’s lives’.”
Sod that. Let’s just introduce a presumption of equal parenting.
“I would have expected an organisation like f4j, which is (I assume) committed to helping fathers get justice (rather than to wingeing [sic] for the sake of it), to welcome any signs of a shift in judicial attitude and to grasp every opportunity to utilise that for the benefit of its members.”
First off, I don’t speak for F4J (I am no longer even a member). I speak for equality and for the right of children not to be half-orphaned by the state.
Within the blinkered logic of the family court, of course, these cases might appear to represent some kind of progress (although there is nothing dramatically new in these as far as I can see), and I am sure there are some fathers who will be pathetically grateful for this. I, on the other hand, see them as nothing more than the fiddling of an embattled judiciary trying to prop up a fundamentally corrupt system.
“what are you suggesting should replace the court system where other methods of resolving dispute have failed?”
“there is one right answer which can be magically arrived at by waving about the proposition that a child has a right to see her father FULL STOP?”
A child should have the right to be raised by both her parents equally, FULL STOP. Do you object to this principle?
Alternatives to the current system are laid out in the F4J Blueprint, previously discussed on this blog (‘Open Justice – Closed Forum’, 14th August). Have you still not read it?
“The logical extension of this of course is that in any dispute of this kind the Mother is going to be in the wrong regardless of the individual facts, and that therefore that judicial consideration of the issue is a perverse exercise from the start?”
“how credible are arguments for parity of treatment between mums and dads when you cannot accept that sometimes the answer is unpalatable to dad and that sometimes Mum is talking sense?
You assume that it is a mother’s prerogative (and a mother’s alone) to exercise her veto over a father’s relationship with his child. And yet the gynocentric prejudice apparent in your comments is completely unconscious, isn’t it, so deeply have you internalised the values by which the family courts operate?
If one parent wants to challenge the equality of the other, then they had better have compelling reasons to do so, and they had better be able to produce evidence which would stand up to proper scrutiny.
The overwhelming majority of what the courts deal with now is chickenshit: petty allegations based on nothing more than hearsay. You know it, and I know it. This is what keeps you in business — busying yourself answering questions which no sane person would think of asking in the first place.
“Do you want equality or do you just want to have it your way?”
Equality. No ifs or buts, no compromises.
“Or is your point that the court system itself is the problem?”
Ah, the penny drops.
“the campaign has never been as much about the needs of the child as the demands of the father”
This is rich: the courts systematically conflate the wishes of the mother with the welfare of the child, and when the excluded parent objects, he is condemned as selfish (demonstrating, by implication, why his exclusion was justified in the first place). Sorry, but that mangy old dog just won’t hunt.
P.S. If you enabled paragraph breaks on this site, the discussion would be a lot easier to follow.
Blog4Justice – sorry for treating you as F4J when you are not. My goof.
I don’t disagree with your proposition about equal parenting rights – as a general rule (although I do think its often impractical to carve up a child’s time into exact 50% pieces, but thats detail). But I do disagree that it is ALWAYS the right answer. In some individual cases it is not. Children and their parents are all individuals and it is doing families an injustice to treat them all the same.
What I do think is that resident parents are treated in the same way whether they are mums or dads, and similarly with non-resident parents. Of course the majority of resident parents are Mums and vice versa, but my point is that if there is any ‘bias’ its in favour of the resident parent not the mum per se.
On a couple of things you say:
‘If one parent wants to challenge the equality of the other, then they had better have compelling reasons to do so, and they had better be able to produce evidence which would stand up to proper scrutiny.’ Yes I agree, but I suspect you won’t agree with me when I say that the courts do their best to enforce this. I spend a lot of time telling female clients ‘if you think that is going to be enough to get you out of contact you’d better think again’ (not in quite those terms of course).
‘The overwhelming majority of what the courts deal with now is chickenshit: petty allegations based on nothing more than hearsay.’ There’s a lot of it about. I do think that most of the time the courts recognise such doo-doo for what it is, but unfortunately it takes time to get to that point. And in my experience mums and dads are equally good (or bad) at the production of your so-called ‘chickenshit’. Parents who have split disagree, and often hate each other. Thats the reality. Someone has to unpick that – but you can’t stop it.
Beyond that: we disagree. Pretty fundamentally. Is there much point in arguing? Its late and its been a long day…
PS I can’t work out how to enable paragraph breaks (sorry) – any hints from other wordpressers gratefully received.
When I attempted to cite DvD in my own case some years ago as an objection to the notion of “contact” as opposed to normal life, I was told that the circumstances of that case were slightly different from my own and hence that it didn’t count. Precedent in family law generally doesn’t operate (unless you are a mother seeking leave to remove and citing Payne v Payne, which precedent will last until Thorpe retires, no doubt), as each case is supposed to rest on its own merits. Judges can ignore previous cases because they have complete discretion in family cases. So, whilst the cases cited by familoo above are interesting and, perhaps, encouraging, they are meaningless, particularly if you are in some provincial court where the judges tend to operate to their own arcane rules. Appeals on the grounds of inhumanity are likely to fail, as did the ones above.
You’re right – family cases are very fact sensitive so often authorities are not directly applicable. And you are right that there is a broad discretion to enable judges to fit the decision to the peculiar facts of a case. Of course this does make it difficult to challenge a decision but its not the same as an unlimited discretion – if that were the case no appeal could ever succeed!
Judges who operate on their own arcane rules ought in the right circumstances to be appealable – often though the cost and practicalities of an appeal mean that local or off-track practice is not challenged. Thats why these and other appeal judgments are important – they are cases where local Judge’s views have been scrutinised and either approved or corrected. IF it can be shown that one of these cases is applicable a Judge in a county court is BOUND to follow them and a failure to do so will be appealable.
Hiya,
you missed out my own favourite, re C (a child) 2006 Civ 235.
which provides a checklist for this ‘paradigm’ case.
It doesn’t change residence totally, but it does provide a shared residence order in the face of one parent’s hostility.
Whilst posting, I’d like to note that one thing which has struck me over the last year or so is the complete lack of overlap between two sets of complaints.
First, so many resident parents, usually mothers, complain on chat boards about the failure of the ‘contact’ adult to fulfil their responsibilities, and the fact that although a court can order a parent to make a child available, they can do nothing to ensure that the adult complies.
Second, so many non-resident adults (surely they can hardly be termed a ‘parent’ if they are denied the parental role) are fighting, through the courts, to be allowed to meet all of their responsibilities towards their children, in the face of a resident parent who wants to exclude them.
Regards
STH
STH – It is interesting how different individuals treat parenthood so differently. I guess there are as many resident parents out there genuinely wanting their ex to play a part in their children’s lives as there are non-resident parents wanting to be allowed that involvement – but whether they are from the same families is the real question! There’s also a whole load of parents whose attitudes are the exact opposite.
I suspect you may not have the opportinuty to form a balanced view here, and I do hope I do not give offence by saying this.
My suspicion comes about because I cannot imagine many resident parents coming to see you about the fact that the other parent does not fulfil their responsibilities – there is nothing that the law can do here in matters other than the financial one. On the other hand, a parent being prevented from playing the parental role they want does have the possibility of some form of redress in the law (no matter how well or how badly the system works), and hence you may get to see some of these people.
Similarly, judges will only see cases where a parent is trying to fulfil their parental role in the face of opposition from the other parent, and not all of those cases where the parent is neglecting their responsibility. How, therefore, can a judge properly assess the position of the applicant if they are unable to see them in the appropriate context?
Although the call for a presumption of shared residence as the starting point when parents separate is almost invariably couched in terms of the child’s right to have their father as an equal-status parent (generally mislabelled as ‘father’s rights’) the other side of the coin is that a starting point of equality would surely make it clear to BOTH parents that BOTH have a responsibility to their child.
STH
You are right that I only see a certain subset of parents in my job and that the majority of applicants want to exercise their responsibility in the face of opposition. Although there are a minority of cases where an application is not made out of a sense of responsibility as much as a bizarre power or mind game with the other parent (sometimes there is a bit of both). Odd as it sounds some people do make applications to the court without being willing or able to take full responsibility for their child’s needs – but clearly this is not the usual scenario.
Incidentally both parents DO have a responsibility towards their child regardless of applications to the court (in the case of fathers always (financially) via the CSA and usually via parental responsibility which the majority of parents of young children will now have (or will be able to acquire)).
The legal position doesn’t seem to make all parents actually take that responsibility on board though, does it? If only it were that simple…
i have to write an essay on this particular sensitive topic and am engrossed om these comments,especially those by ‘familoo’, i still dont know what to think, historically fathers were the ‘Kings’ of the households, so to speak thus in charge of children and family, during the last century it is being recognised that mothers tend to be the primary caregivers, but do dads now lose out when it comes to custody of children?should dads have more rights?is the law in its application unjustly weighted in favour of mothers?should childrens time be more equally divided between parents?would this be a positive change and if so for whom?
these are just some of the issues im considering,and would be grateful for some input from everyone?
I think first of all you need to examine your proposition that historically fathers were the ‘kings’ of the household.
You may find that a little reading explodes that particular myth. What do you mean by ‘king’ – a holder of power? What sort of power? Owner of property, chattels (including spouse) or legal rights, religious or moral authority, breadwinner / holder of purse strings? I”m pretty sure there are many historic examples of social and cultural set ups where the wife / mother has been the effective holder of power in a household, both in terms of her central place in the management of relationships between family members and through her economic contributions. I’m no historian but I believe if you look at the feudal system and more recently at the role of women in households during the first and second world wars you will find two such examples. You will also find many examples of matriarchal family set-ups in literature.
There was an interesting article / review on this topic in G2 a month or two ago I think. If I find the reference I’ll post it.
I would question if fathers were the kings of the household, I’m not sure what that means. If they were, was that a good thing? If they are no longer, what has changed and why?
And what do models of parenthood or family roles primarily based upon authority and dominance mean from the perspective of a child?
Thank you very much!
Much needed!
NB I have edited this comment partly because it is long and partly to make absolutely sure that the writer does not accidentally publish data which identifies the child concerned, which would be a contempt. I have marked with a [...] where i have removed detail. Familoo.
On reading the cases at the top it sounds as tho things are getting better for fathers and the right choices are being made but i dont feel that things are getting better i meet fathers all the time who have been denied contact with there children by the mothers most of the time they are denied for the stupidest of reasons.
i myself am going through the courts because i was denied contact with my daughter simply because she wanted to change her name to the boyfriend she was living with at the time and she hoped over time she could do this by saying i was an absent father i made numerous phone calls and sent letters asking to please let me see her however this did not help so i decided not to waste anymore time and went to a solicitor for advise in an attemp to sort things out avoiding court lots of letters were sent out to the mother including asking her to attend mediation but heard nothing back
eventually we ended up having going to court to which she did turn up and made a different excuse as to why she stopped me seeing her! no allegations were made against me contact had stopped since the [...] and it was now the [...] the judge was only willing to give me 1 hour on a sunday with the mother present which she did her best to ruin over time things have increased to every other weekend from friday till sunday which is much better however there has been alot of weekends she has not brought her over i was given a court order for christmas 2008 to have her [...] which i did not see her! her mother made the excuse that my daughter did not want to come over.
she has said many horrible things to my daughter over the years including
that im not her real dad her boyfriend is.
[...]
that daddy has tried to get her locked up(because i asked for a penal notice to be attached because she breaks the court orders when it suits her).
[...]daddy doesnt care.
[...]
i could write page after page of problems ive had and things that have been said all of the things that have been said to her are terrible things to say and are untrue im really worried about the damage that is being done to my daughter while she lives with the mother. my daughter loves me very much and i love her with all my heart and it breaks my heart to be told by my daughter what her mother and boyfriend say about me my family and my girlfriend.
unfortunatly the courts really are not interested in doing the right thing infact the last time we went to court she fluttered her eye lids at the judge and told him a pack of lies saying everything was fine when it wasnt to which the judge turned on me saying i was wasting his time and that he could take away my contact with my daughter and that i was just as much to blame for all of this as the mother was.
i never got the chance to speak to tell him things were not fine and that she was telling lies i walked out of court feeling robbed! to make things clear here i have never said a bad word to my daughter about her mother i have always been nice for my daughters sake and have paid her child maintenance without fail up until now because [...] i cannot afford to pay the normal rate and by no surprise she has stopped me seeing her again!
please does anyone have any advise for me?
No easy answers: Keep plugging on and don’t lose heart. Ask your solicitor / barrister if there are any avenues which have not yet been explored – can they try a fresh approach? Best of luck.
hi again
ive spoken with my solicitor and i have been given the option of attending a different court in my area however i have been warned the same judge as i have at the moment also resides there as well so i could end up with the same judge handling the case.
the problem i have is i feel the judge has made his mind up on the case and is more in favour of the mother than myself which i feel is crazy as i have done nothing wrong.
as i mentioned above i was told by the judge i could lose all contact with my daughter and that i was just as much to blame as the mother which is absurd because i only went to court to get contact with my daughter as all other avenues had failed.
i really feel that the legal system has failed in my case like so many others and i would like the case to be dealt with by a different judge is there anything i can do to ensure i see a different judge?
and is there anything else you think i could do to help my situation?
many thanks for your time
Because of restrictions on the way that barristers operate I can’t advise you about your case on this blog, and it would be silly for me to do so without all the information. Your solicitor is better placed than I am to advise you. Also, I don’t really understand what you say about changing courts – a case will usually proceed in the court nearest to the child’s home and a party is not able to pick and choose location or judge, so I’m not sure what your solicitor has in mind.
But on your general question about how someone can get their case heard before a different judge I can make some general remarks which might be useful to other readers too: Occasionally if a judge has a conflict of interest or where it might be perceived to that he was biased he will recuse himself (i.e. stand down from the case) but this is relatively unusual and wouldn’t ordinarily happen just because a judge disagrees with one party (after all they disagree with parties all the time because it’s their job to decide on disputes). It is always open to a party to indicate to a judge that there is a perception of bias and ask the Judge to recuse himself but this is a risky practice particularly in a local court circuit where the numbers of judges are limited and the judges will tend to all have a similar approach to their cases – a party would run the risk of ending up stuck with the same judge and even less popular, or of finding that his colleague is no more favourable. If a case is coming up for final hearing and is listed for the hearing of evidence a judge might be more open to the politely worded submission that since he has expressed a strong view of the case it would be more appropriate for the matter to be heard by a colleague. But often a judge who has a strong view on a case will want to reserve it to him in order to ensure that it is dealt with in the way that they think appropriate. So there is no easy solution to this, although it helps to have a solicitor who is familiar with local listing practices, judges working patterns and court staff.
My ex and I split before she knew she was pregnant. I was told when she was 5 months into it. Since that day over 7 years ago i have done everything (and I mean EVERYTHING,) to try and keepa good atmosphere for my son to grow up in.
My ex has refused contact for up to 6 months at a time, never turned up to any of 9 court hearings, never cited a reason for any disruption, provided obstacle after obstacle in my relationship with my child, and even recently abandoned my child to a step parent in order to start a new family. She has never worked and ‘breeds’ to move into larger council properties. The step parent is just as bad.
The court has only ever made 1 judgement in her absence, and that was never enforced despite applications to the court. I am not even likely to get residence, as moving a 7 yr old child 30 miles is apparently more distressing then the current situation; despite the childs constant please to be moved from the situation.
I know this is only my personal case, but after 7 years i pretty much get the feeling you can take the worst mother in the world, and the father can put the child first endlessly and go through hell to maintain contact, and the courts will still treat you as a sub par parent because you have a penis. It’s a disgusting system that leaves loving parents broke and emotionaly sick, and resident mothers who can do everything necessary to show they have no interest in the childs welfare get everything handed on a plate.
i am in a court case right now fighting to see my 3 sons my baby mother repeatedly brakes contact and brakes court orders but she has never been help in contempt why? she almost had me arrested saying i gave my oldest son a black eye which turned out merely to be a sty which caused redness of the eye and still she gets away with it what can i do to stop this stupid behaviour if every one is on her side because she is a struggling single mum of 3 boo hoo i would like to gain residence over my children as they are forever saying they hate their mum and her new partner and i keep getting told they smack my children which is not on if anyone has some really good advice for me please email me at [I have edited out your email addres in case this makes your children identifiable. Lucy] thank you
Please help me I have just received notification via my Solicitors that my daughters father wants to serve me with an enforcement order. I have never gone against my Court Order and feel this is madness, he states that it’s because I am late even though if truth be known thats him and that I am unflexible with telephone contact but he hasn’t rung her for the past 4 weeks? surely she isn’t expected to just sit around and wait for him to ring when he can be bothered?
What can I do it’s total rubbish and I cannot afford Court again, will be the 3rd time.
Thanks in advance for your help
You need to speak to your solicitors for advice about the particular facts of this case. And you need to not panic.
For reference an enforcement order is an order that you undertake community punishment, but it is not a criminal conviction. You cannot be sent to prison under an enforcement order. It can only be made if the court is satisfied beyond reasonable doubt you are in breach and there is a defence if you have a reasonable excuse for not complying. See s11J Children Act 1989.
By way of general guidance, if you are unable to afford solicitors you may find it helpful to write down a list of when contact was due and what happened on each date – whether it took place and if not why not, and if late why. Don’t write an essay. Take 3 copies to court with you (one for you, one for him, one for the judge). Even better send it to him (or his solicitors) and the court in advance. That way even if you are representing yourself and get tongue tied the judge will be able to piece together what has preceded the application.
If you don’t have a lawyer you might like to take a friend into court for support (they can’t speak on your behalf but can sit next to you and assist you). Tell court staff and the judge you want to bring a ‘McKenzie friend’ into court. Don’t bring someone who will not be able to behave themselves at court!
I’m afraid that is only very general guidance, if you want specific advice about your case and the details of it you will have to instruct a solicitor – rules prevent me from advising the public direct.
Good luck though.
Familoo
Thanks for that but the thing is contact has never been broken and telephone contact was never refused he just decided not to ring. He apparently states he is doing this because of my attitude, is that possible? and I never have an attitude I’m just sick of him taking to me to court again when he gets bored. I read up on this and I’m appalled to find I could end up doing community service even though I work part-time 4 days a week and have 2 small children or could even be liable to pay him compensation. Why and how is he allowed to do this, I have never stood in the way of him spending time with my daughter as I feel this is important for her. What can I do?
I’m afraid I can’t really add much to my previous response because I’m prohibited from offering legal advice to you direct. I suggest that even if you don’t have the finances to secure representation to deal with further hearings that you try and find the funds to meet with your solicitor for an hour or so to get some advice on how to handle applications of this kind and what measures they can suggest to discourage or limit such applications in future. I don’t think they’ll have any magic solutions but they will be able to advise you better than I can because they will have all the information to hand. You may find this document helpful.