Are these reasonable Child Arrangement proposals?

[ProFiler]

XH has applied to court for a legal contact agreement at my request following serious concerns I have about the way he cares for the DC. We are back in court next week and we’re probably going to have to agree the schedule.

At a previous hearing, I was given a document that he has drafted with his proposals. I just wanted to check what other people make of them and if I should agree? Some of it is straight forward, such as EOW contact and I will be agreeing to that but these are the parts I’m not sure about:

1. in addition to EOW, he wants them overnight one day a week from 6.30 pm until 7 am - my issue with this is that he won’t be spending much time with them as they go to bed at 8.30 pm and also that they will have to get up at 6.30 am. OTOH, it means he wouldn’t be going two weeks without seeing them and it would give me a much needed evening to do other things.
2. He wants me to have them every Xmas Eve into Xmas day (he would have them from 2pm Xmas day meaning a rushed Xmas dinner etc) and every New Year’s Eve into New Years Day (he would have them 1pm NYD) - I suspect this is because he doesn’t want to miss out on the big drinking nights of the year (although the court has made him undertake not to drink for 24 hours before having the DC, not that I think he’ll stick to that) and also doesn’t want to have to buy presents and wrap them (he argued with me when we separated that he wanted to alternate Xmas and NY but in the 5 years since, he is yet to actually have them at Xmas or NYE). OTOH, I get every Xmas with my DC but would miss out on the occasional NYE celebrations.
3. I have to ‘make the children’ available for one week of the school holidays to ‘work around’ his work commitments (we both work btw and there are 2 weeks of the summer where their usual childcare setting is closed - I use AL to cover this at present) - I guess my question on this is should I only agree to him using one of those weeks where the setting is closed or just concede to this?

The midweek overnight would be reasonable if it was from when school closes until dropping them at school the next day. He should be responsible for after school and before school care if having them overnight.

The Xmas is unreasonable as the average person would not have finished Xmas dinner by 2pm. If you've offered every other Xmas and he doesn't want it then offer 5pm Xmas day when dinner can be reasonably expected to finish.

Summer holidays I would be open to accepting a pre arranged week but set timescales for when it is to be agreed by so that you can make plans for the summer.

EOW is fine

Midweek also fine BUT his responsibility from school/childcare pickup to school/childcare opens the next morning. His responsibility to arrange and pay for childcare or juggle work so you don't have to worry about it.

Xmas / NYE swap every year. This year you have them xmas eve teatime to xmas day teatime, then get them NYE teatime to NYDay whatever time. This way you both get a good day (xmas morning/childfree nye party). Swap it next year.

As for holiday arrangements. Much as he has work commitments so do you. Yes make them available but GET THIS IN YOUR COURT ORDER you both need to make arrangements for summer by a set deadline - say Easter weekend or 1st June. If he can't do this then he has to fit around you. This might mean that he misses out on his 'week' for the first year but stick to your guns.

Good luck. It took me a long time for my ex to realise he couldn't just pick and choose when to do his parenting.

Agree to the one night in the week but from school end and he drops them at school the next day.

Switch out the Christmas so one year you have them Christmas and not New Year’s with him having them Christmas Eve and New Years Eve and the next yearyou have them New Year’s Eve but not Christmas Day but have them Christmas Eve.

The summer where there is two weeks shut down you have one week and he has them one week.

That is reasonable arrangement

I'd say you want the whole of Xmas day with them every other year. If he doesn't want Xmas eve and Xmas day the alternate years then he can have them from 5pm (or 2pm) every other xmas. New year's eve/day - again I'd suggest alternating as if he refuses it shows him up for wanting party nights. I think it's reasonable to ask to fix him.for one week of the childcare provider closure unless you want to keep the 2 weeks for yourself. Then agree a deadline by which the week has to be fixed.
The EOW and weekday evening is pretty standard but he needs to cover from after school to school drop off.

I’ve done a 1pm changeover on Christmas Day in the past. The agreement was that the children would wake up with one parent and have Christmas dinner with the other parent. We both bought and wrapped our own presents so children had presents to open at each house.

I tend to think arrangements moving kids part way through Xmas day are always for the parents benefit not the kids. What kid wants to pack up and relocate just as they've opened their new toys?

My kids like to have an official second xmas with waking up to presents and another proper dinner at the other parents house too.

Thanks for your input everyone. They’ve really helped me to evaluate what I think about his proposals.

In the end, it didn’t matter. At the first hearing I agreed to supervised contact for our DC that wants to see him and no contact for the DC who doesn’t. She has some major MH problems and the court wanted more info. I sent through everything they wanted from me and copied XH in.

This time, it was different CAFCASS, magistrates and legal adviser and a totally different experience. I told the CAFCASS officer that I was happy to move the supervised contact to unsupervised but she told me off saying it concerned her that I was willing to do that before safeguarding reports had come back. I didn’t know they were doing them!

XH was aggressive and argumentative in court but they just pandered to him saying they understood his frustrations. He called me a liar saying our DC doesn’t have MH problems but if she does, it’s becayse she’s not seeing him. She doesn’t want to see him since he assaulted her. I was forced to say I’m happy for the supervised contact to continue and he went mad!

During the first hearing they were very firm with him, which is what he needs - to be told what is/isn’t acceptable parenting behaviour. I’m disappointed that he was treated with kid gloves this time and I know this will have bolstered his belief that he’s been treated badly and it’s because of me.

Forgot to say, he doesn’t like spending his money on the dc so unlikely there will be second christmases or lots of presents - it will be a token gift at best.