Change of school

[Katyem07]

Going through nasty divorce, now stopped 8yr old contact with dad due to repeated anxiety and distress caused by and surrounding visits. XHusband will not leave family home near school, me and children been living in my parents two bed bungalow for last 10mths. I've asked to change school and he's saying no, he's never paid any interest in their upbringing before. Any advice welcome

The difficulty you will have is if he pushes his wishes into the court system. Particularly as you've ceased contact, it's something he could ask the court to make a prohibited steps order about. Or alternatively, you can apply for a specific issues order and let the courts decide, but they would likely want to see contact agreed in a child arrangements order (there's very few cases where contact is completely stopped so it may be a good idea to have a think about how contact might.be resumed ie supervised, building up time slowly etc)
Does he have parental responsibility and is he on the birth certificate? If yes then it's expected he'll have equal say in schools, medical provision etc.
You can make an application to change schools to your local authority using an in year admission application but it can be tricky if he's going to disagree.

Hank you, We've tried building time from a 102 Sunday to a 96 Sunday. This was with the support of mediation. He still wasn't child focused, always questioning her and making her visit difficult. She would come away more upset each time not able to sleep, having nightmares until each time after about 4 to 6 visits she would become hysterical and not want to go . I've spoken to family support who told me I shouldn't allow her to be this upset and to take the decision from her so she doesn't need to worry about what will/has happened with her dad. He's threatening court, but ive just made a court application for finance as I'm still paying half bills on our property so unable to leave my parents home, which is one of the things he throws at daughter ( it's mum's fault you don't have a home)
I will be making a application to change her school if he won't agree as we cannot continue another year running a life, school and clubs over 30min drive from where we are living.

I was recently in a very similar situation to you. I will send you a PM