Deadbeat dad and child custody

[Beeabbie97]

I have a 5 month old daughter with my ex who I split up with 3 months ago due to him being a massive weed smoker, who didn’t help out with his daughter what so ever!

Since we broke up, i have given him unlimited access to his daughter, but supervised as he doesn’t know how to make bottles, settle her etc, plus is always high. However, he only chose to see her once a week for around 3 hours.

Recently, his temper switched and he turned verbally aggressive against my mother and I. I said I don’t feel he is safe around her unsupervised still and he threatened to turn up and take her away. I logged this with the police.

He is saying he wants to get custody of her. However, he smokes so much weed and so does everyone in his house (and they smoke inside), he can’t do basic things like make bottles, he also told me he has started dealing drugs. So all of this is not a safe environment for a baby.

What is the likelihood of a court awarding him unsupervised visits?

Also, he has now stopped paying maintenance which we agreed at £50 a week for. He told me to apply for the Child Maintenance Service and he would demand a DNA test before he pays anything. So now he is saying he doesn’t think she is his yet he wants custody of her?

I honestly don’t know what to do, does anyone have any advice? Its annoying he is saying all this about not thinking she is his yet he wants to see her and not help out financially!

He’s an abusive twat, try not to let him have power over you. Apply to CMS, he will have to pay for the dna test so is shooting himself in the foot. If you can get some legal advice do, even if it’s to help write a letter about your concerns focusing on safety of baby and offering contact arrangements and you will have that to show you’re being reasonable- let him go to court if he wants to.

is he on the birth certificate? If so he has parental responsibility and you may want to go to court for a lives with order as otherwise the police won’t help if your ex refuses to return him.

good luck.

Offer contact supervised in a contact centre. Do this is writing. You could even write via a solicitor if you think he really will go down the legal route. Cite his drug use, lack of knowledge about basic things like bottles despite having been supported to learn by you and your mim over the last three months, plus the recent agression towards you and you mum. Leave him to organize finding a contact centre.
’Custody’ isn’t even the right word in the UK. Usually there is a resident parent (who the child officially lives with) and ´contact’ with the non resident parent. This can be agreed between parents or it can be ordered by the family court.
While smoking weed sometimes probably wouldn’t automatically exclude someone from seeing their child, being stoned all the time would be treated similarly to being drunk all the time - you can’t safely parent while you’re high, basically.
CMS are the right people to talk to about maintenance, and maintenance is not linked to contact at all (except in calculating how much is supposed to be paid - but only overnight contact is taken into account).

Advice? Stop having children with a massive weed smoker?

Not helpful