Parenting should of course be a joint venture, involving both the mother and the father. And the fact that the parents may have separated shouldn’t change this, unless the court specifies otherwise.
The joint nature of parenting is regularly recognised by judges, and any parent who takes the view that they are entitled to make important decisions regarding their children without reference to the other parent is likely to be criticised by the judge.
Which is exactly what happened in a case in the Family Court at Milton Keynes, the judgment in which was published recently.
The case concerned an application by a father for a child arrangements order in relation to his two children, who were then aged 10 and 9.
The judicial criticism stemmed from the history of the matter, which was as follows:
1. In May 2019 the court ordered that the children should live with their mother and see their father on alternate weekends, and half of the holidays.
2. In November 2019 a financial provision order was made requiring the father to provide a housing fund for the Mother in the sum of £410,000. The order recorded that the intention was that “any property chosen must be in the jurisdiction and within a reasonable distance of the children’s school”.
3. On the 1st of September 2021 the mother removed the children from their school in Redhill, without telling the father. She also failed to inform the court at a hearing on the following day.
4. Unbeknownst to the father, the mother had entered into a tenancy agreement for a property in Buckinghamshire, unilaterally moving the children away, and from their school.
5. The mother then failed to give the father her new address.
6. The father returned the matter to the court, and in October 2021 contact was agreed, with the children being handed over at Watford Junction Train Station.
7. On the 7th of December 2021 the mother emailed the father’s solicitors and informed them that she would not be travelling to Watford Station after the Christmas holidays, as the cost was too demanding.
8. At the next hearing the arrangements for collection and handover were changed such that the mother would take the Children to East Croydon, and the father would return them at the end of contact.
9. At a hearing on the 6th of May 2022 the Mother sought to reduce contact to indirect contact only. The judge commented: “I get the strong impression that she has sought to deprive a relationship between father and children.”
10. In October 2022, the mother lost the use of a car and said she was no longer able to facilitate contact. Instead, she told the father that he could pick them up at any time. The father works in Surrey, and to collect the children driving from work the drive to the mother’s home would take two and a half to three hours. The mother said she simply did not have the funds so could not afford to take the children to East Croydon.
The father returned the matter to the court again, applying for a variation of the child arrangements, and the judgment concerned this application.
The judge was not at all happy with the mother’s behaviour, pointing out that she had an obligation to ensure that contact took place in accordance with the existing orders – if she wanted to change an order it was for her to make an application to the court to vary it.
The judge said that the mother chose to move, without discussion with the father, to an isolated village in Buckinghamshire. She did not ask the father, or the Court. He went on: “She cannot now come to the Court and say ‘because of the decisions I made without asking the Court or the father, I am not able to facilitate the contact and the father must come here’.”
The judge also said this: “The history of the mother making decisions about contact has to cease. There should be no imbalance between the parents, they both have parental responsibility and their voices are equally loud and should be equally heard. But the father having parental responsibility is not enough for this mother: she has not recognised that his involvement in significant decisions is as important as hers. The mother appears to consider she has the ability to make decisions of some import for the children without the need for his involvement.”
The judge therefore made a shared ‘lives with’ order, to send a message to the mother, stating that the children would live with their father on alternate weekends. The mother would have to take the children to Redhill station, with the father responsible for returning them.
The judge also stated that if the matter were to come back before him then he may have no choice but to consider that the only way the children will see both parents is by the arrangements being swapped, with them living with their father, and seeing their mother on alternate weekends.
You can read the full report of the case here.
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