Refusing to drive on a motorway/long distance in a Fiat 500?

Can you not trade your car in for another one ?

AI might be helpful, and there is some YouTube review of car seats that are most suitable for a Fiat… good luck!

You seriously shouldn’t be driving, what if you take a wrong turn one day and end up on the motorway. You would be a danger to other road users.

if you don’t feel safe is the car even roadworthy.

maybe some lessons for confidence or something but the size of your car should not be the excuse of why you can’t do these things

The car is fine for 30min journey. But you don’t need to drive if you feel unsafe just sell the car and buy a bigger older car for the same price.
as far as not affording anything, you need to get out the mindset that you need your exs owes you money. Of course he should be providing but you can’t rely on anyone but yourself.
start be getting a good schedule for the kids get into training/apprenticeship/job with career opportunities and work hard for your future.

Thirty minutes isn’t far. Assuming it’s just rural rather than completely unmade roads at his end, then your car will be fine and perfectly safe. As pp have pointed out, as a license holder you should be able to handle motorway and rural driving. If you can’t, take lessons to build your confidence. It’ll widen your horizons beyond these trips. Good luck OP!

I didn’t say you have to Iive somewhere nice! I’m confused as to how you can live there but not go to schools there. I hope your dc don’t lose their school place due to lies, as that would be even more upheaval for them.

I’m asking why you’ve have to drive to your ex’s house, in order to try and help work out a solution/wording for you ex/your rights etc.

You said ‘there’s nothing to protect you from a crash’, ….sure bigger cars probably protect you more but my small one still saved my life.

the article doesn’t say ‘don’t drive small cars because you will have zero protection’

I'm of the opinion that the Fiat 500 is a genuinely horrible car, but I have no doubt whatsoever that it's safe and entirely suitable for just about any journey on the UK's road network.

I drive any car anywhere, but I understand what you're saying @CheeseSandwich1, it's the diff in size compared to trucks and other large vehicles and of course, if you have an accident with a bigger vehicle, the assumption is the smaller vehicle takes the worst of the impact

It's simple, your DH needs to collect the DCs. You should not be expected to make a journey you don't feel happy to make.

Can you really not get a rear facing seat to go in the back? We've got a joie spin in my DH car and our 4 year old is still in it.

If there's two isofix points in the back, it may just be a case of getting the correct car seat/s to fit? Ex should be paying towards that sot of thing anyway!

You're going to have to think of something if you are going to be doing the school run where he lives every day!

My guess is when you drive your small car on the motorway and it feels uncomfortably small that feeling brings out all of your anger at your ex and worries about the future, and that makes the driving experience feel unmanageable. Instead of being a bit anxious wishing you had a bigger auto you're feeling an overwhelming amount of anger and hurt and fear... those feelings are understandable, but they're not actually about the car and if you let them they'll interfere with your ability to deal with the driving.

Your ex moved only 30 minutes away and it's close enough for you to choose to use his new address for school registration; the reality is that a court would likely instruct the driving for handovers to be split 50/50 and for each of you to do the school runs and other transport on your own days. You can try to negotiate more, but the unfortunate reality is that you probably can't make him do it and you're going to need to find a way to manage some of the driving yourself even if it's uncomfortable and then work towards a buying a different car. Can you look into what rear-facing seat might fit in your car and ask him to purchase that for your DC? And could you negotiate more support with child-related expenses for a set period of time (ex. him paying more for childcare, him assisting with rent, etc) so you can build some savings? He doesn't sound like a great bloke but he still may be more receptive to that than asking him to buy you a car.

But it’s okay to live there 🤔
Let’s hope you’re not looked into for falsely claiming your dc live elsewhere, their school place can be revoked 🤷‍♀️
But again, why do you need to drive them to his house?

Imo fiat 500 is a normal car and a 30 minute drive is a short drive. So I don't get this post at all OP I must admit

Ah apologies I didn’t see your previous post about your marital status. Yes your ex sounds selfish, he should at the very least be paying you the correct cms amount on his actual earnings but as he is self employed that can be tricky to prove. You will have to work hard to get your life back on track. It will be difficult but I believe you can do this. Are you working at the moment. Are you receiving all benefits you are entitled to?

If by hilly you mean Hardknott or Wrynose passes, you certainly aren't being unreasonable - I struggled over those in a 1600cc car!

And people rear face kids in 3 door cars all the time.

Fiat 500 are four seaters, so quite how you drove with four DC, let alone all the luggage, I do not know.

30 minutes? If you think that’s a unreasonable driving distance should you even be driving?