about issue of guardianship

[trixie123]

genuinely after opinions here - honestly don;t know if this would be a reasonable thing. DP and I are thinking about wills and guardianship of our DC if something happened to us. we each have a sibling with a partner. My sibling is not very maternal I think and we would prefer his sibling to have DC but her partner is Australian and I would want to know that they wouldn't take DC there to live until at least after my parents are gone (morbid, sorry). Is it unreasonable to make this a condition as it would bind them here for 20 years. They have mooted the idea of emigrating but its very up in the air. My parents could not travel that distance for various reasons and could not afford air fare for DC to visit them regularly either. opinions please..

I don't think your will could forbid them from emigrating for 20 years if that's what you're asking

But I suppose you could write it that if they are in the country they would get custody? And you could talk to them about your wishes and concerns and get an agreement from them? I suppose - I am not sure, maybe it couldn't work like that - that if they had custody and then decided to emigrate, the children would go into the custody of the other sibling? But would that be workable, or fair on your children? To uproot them again?

I dunno. I think you need to talk seriously with this couple about your worries and see what they say.

I think it would be unreasonable to put a condition like that in. If you are going to entrust your childs care to someone you have to trust them to make the right decisions for their whole family.

i would personally speak to them and see what they feel if they did emigrate you could maybe put you would like them to send regular photos maintain a regular contact with your parents etc and also visit at least once every 2 years

or spend holidays with your sister each yr or maybe speak with your sister who may by that point become very maternal and want to raise your children

its a big decision so speaking to all involved would be best to raise fears etc before making your choice

You could put it in, but be prepared for them to decline if you do. If you can't trust someone to look after them then you shouldn't ask them to take on the responsibility. No-one will ever do things the way you would have.

My SIL is our named guardian for DS if we were both to die. I am sure she will do things that I maybe would not agree with, but she loves him fiercely and I trust her to put his needs ahead of her own or we wouldn't have asked her to take on the job.

This reminds me, I now have to check whether she is OK with two DS's if the worst happens!

I'm afraid YABU as if they end up with guardianship of children then you have to give them free reign to raise them as they see fit and trust them to make decisions in their best interests. If you try to put conditions on them then it undermines that idea from the very start.

I am pretty sure you couldn't put that condition in the will anyway it would have to be an informal agreement so you could never be sure.

I think it is too much to ask.

Do you think that it would not be in the best interests of your children to move to Oz? Or is it just for your parents?

Thing is if they did agree (which I don't think they would as presumably they will want to raise any of their own children over there if that is their plan) it would be v difficult for your children to lose their guardians to australia when they hit 18/20, especially having already lost their parents. When they had their own children their "parents" wouldn't be around to help out etc.

TBH the more I think about it I think you need to trust their decisions, or choose someone else. And that you should have in your will that if they have already emigrated if/when anything happens that someone else will be guardians as you wouldn't want the kids to have to move to oz on loss of their parents.

I dont think it's morbid BTW it's v sensible to think about all this. We have just done our wills and the guardian thing was tricky.

The bit about "just for your parents" didn't come out quite right!

What I meant was are you against having your children raised in australia, or are you simply wanting to maintain the grandparental relationship IYSWIM

Guardianship is voluntary.

The guardian can agree to your conditions and you appoint them as guardians in your will. But upon your/dp's decease, they can refuse to take up guardianship, notwithstanding they are named as guardians.

Even if they take up guardianship, there is no way (I don't think) of policing that they will not move to Australia.

I personally think it is unreasonable for you to stipulate they cannot emigrate.

It is a huge favour to you/dh and your dcs. You never look a gift horse in the mouth.

My DH's aunt (and Uncle) were killed leaving their three children as orphans. They (the parents) had not made provision in their wills, but all the remaining family and grannys and God parents had a meeting and decided at the time what was best at that moment in time. They were actually all brought up by their Uncle on the other side. We haven't made any stipulation about guardianship for our three as we think it changes almost from year to year. We have asked their Godparents to step in and say what they think is best, but we are trusting the remaining family memebers to come up with the best solution at the time. EG My sister would be great but she is currently divorcing. My brother in law would be good too, but he has a job with a tied house and very little money.
I gather (from speaking to lawyer friends) that even if you do stipulate in your will, if the remaining family members disagree or put forward a good case for an alternative arrangement, that your wishes can be over ridden. Just our thoughts on this!

YABVU. It is an unreasonable request. Also are you sure that they are willing to be guardians?

I agree with massive pants (in more ways than one )

You appoint guardians who you think will make the best decision for your dc at any particular point in time. You can't forsee what everyone's circumstances will be or what they will be prepared to do to help, so you just pick people that you trust to make the best decision. We have 2 grandparents as guardians and have made clear to them that there is no expectation that they will look after the dc themselves, but rather that we are trusting them to make the best decision at the time.

YABU. If you are willing to entrust your children to someone you have to trust that they will do their best for their entire family (which your DC's are now part of)whatever that might be.

thanks = some very useful replies here. LetThereBeRock - we haven't asked anyone yet, this is all at the speculation stage. It would be the issue of them not seeing my parents that I am most concerned about. I really don't think they'd deal with it at all well - they adore my DC and he is currently the only grandchild. I appreciate that legally we couldn't prevent a move (and wouldn't wish to if they really want to go). I like the idea of it being decided at the time as circumstances do change but does that not put a difficult burden on the families, especially if (as on this case) they are scattered all ove the country?

YABU. They are the ones doing you a favour by taking on guardianship (if they do), so you can't impose conditions. Why not give guardianship to your parents?

I'm afraid if it's so important to you that your dc's remain in the UK, presuming that you're here, then you'll have to find someone else as there's always a possibility that they may do so.

It's a huge life changing thing for someone to become a guardian. You can't add further restrictions to their lives on top of that.

you will be dead anyway so won't know!

trixie, I think you are trying to over engineer a result for your dc/gps in a situation that is completely unforeseable and subject to too many variables.

You don't have a right under the law, even with the guardian's consent, to make them take up guardianship and if they do, not to move.

By trying to impose a moral obligation now, with stipulations on emigration, you might actually be disincentivising them from accepting guardianship, when they might the best guardians for your dcs, albeit in Australia, if and when that decision needs to be taken.

The grandparents would not want to be isolated from your dc, but then again, they do not want for you and dp to die either. I am sure they would want what is best for their grandchild at that time in what would be horrific circumstances, even if that meant the grandchild would live miles away in a different time zone.

There will always be ways around that. Alternatively, you could bequeath some money for the guardians to fly over with their family/your dc.

May emigrate I mean, not that they might stay in the UK.

The isolation thing TBH can even be an issue if people live in the next town. No guarantee that the people raising the children will take them to see the GPs on the other side at all.

What you need to do is choose people who you think will make good parents to your children and then trust them to do the right thing.

OR leave it to someone named to decide what to do if and when it happens.

RE the money do you have life insurance/house etc etc that you would leave to children? You could tell the trustees that if they emigrate you want some of the money to be used for a visit for family to come back and see the GPs once a year. That would be fine and depending on size of inheritance could even be paid out of interest on estate.

Have trustees as different people to guardians obviously.

I was all worked up about how to leave money to guardians for costs of raising children but it looks like you simply tell trustees your wishes and they follow them through.

We've asked our parents to be trustees but have made it very clear that our wishes are for particular friends to be guardians (friends have agreed). We've also asked that the trustees make financial decisions based upon what the guardians need in order to care for our DDs; whether that means selling our home and the proceeds being used to fund a larger home, car etc. for the guardians or to rent it out and the guardians having the income to help them with costs.

The guardians know that we'd like grandparents to be sent school paintings(occasionally!), to be invited to assemblies, to have DDs to stay etc. but that we want our DDs to be part of the guardians' family, not be the rich orphans so we wouldn't expect them to gallavant around the country visiting our parents at Christmas etc.

The only other stipulations we've made are that we wouldn't want them to have their ears pierced before starting secondary school and would prefer it if they didn't have flute/violin lessons! We've even discussed that we would want our DDs to feel okay about calling the guardians Mummy & Daddy (if the girls wanted to), that guardianship or adoption would be fine (depending on the girls' ages) and that if our DDs wanted to take on the surname of the guardians that would be fine too

It's about what is best for the children in the event of a situation that we hope will never happen but need to plan for. I know that we want our children to be loved, to be part of a family and to be brought up in a way that is as close as possible as to how we am to. We wanted our chosen guardians to be able to pass on particular messages from us, hence the spelling out of name changes etc. being fine by us.

DH and I have named 2 guardians but have asked in our will that the whole family decides at the time who DC lives with based on things such as school, likeminded family, abilty to see lots of other family etc.

You definitely cannot ask people to be the guardian of your child in the event of their death and then impose restrictions on their decisions as a family! You can make provisions for your own child (eg boarding school fees) but otherwise it will pretty much be up to them.

"we each have a sibling with a partner. My sibling is not very maternal I think and we would prefer his sibling to have DC but her partner is Australian...."

that doesn't make sense to me

What don't you get fab?

You have cut the sentance off before the part where OP says she thinks they may emigrate.

I think if you trust these people to bring up your dc's you need to trust them to make decisions that will be right for them as a family.