Parental responsibility?

[giveyourselfashiny]

dh is not the bio father of our eldest child. how do i go about giving him parental responsibility? its come up in conversation recently that if anything happens to me, he has no legal rights to our son.
bit of info on us if it will help, ds born in 2001, father not on birth cert, we were never married, father has NEVER had any contact,( own choice) dh and i married for 8 yrs, have 3 other kids.

You will need to go to court. Even if ex p agrees to it

Would your dh like to adopt your eldest child?

If birth father is unlikely to object, this would give the most security I think.

we were advised against dp adopting. due to the fact that if he adopts both parents, IE me and bio father have to give up legal responsibility for my son if dh was to adopt.

i dont think bio father has parental resp so he wont have to agree to it.

I think that you have been wrongly advised re adoption.

Take a look at this...
www.direct.gov.uk/en/Parents/Adoptionfosteringandchildrenincare/AdoptionAndFostering/DG_10021340

we were told that in our situ it was not worth doing, bio dad has no part in our lifes, causes no issues and never has. also adopting is a long affair and costly and involves social services, speaking to schools, drs, family etc.

Ok -different if you don't want to go through the hassle of adoption, just did not want you to think that you as birth parent would be giving up your PR.

It is possible to get a Step-Parent Parental Responsibility Agreement form

www.direct.gov.uk/prod_consum_dg/groups/dg_digitalassets/@dg/@en/documents/digitalasset/dg_181743.pdf

The original link I gave has some really useful information re adoption and PR.

Thanks, its not so much taking away legal right from bio father, as he has none anyway, its insuring dh has legal rights.

Do you have a will appointing your dh as guardian?

Nope

vj32 makes a good point - naming your dh as guardian in the event of your death would automatically give him PR.

If you want it to happen now this gives you a step by step guide...

Thankyou very much, I will have a read. Anything else I have been dim enough to not think about in regards to this situ?

Please do not give yourself a hard time about this. Your thread has just inspired me and dh to do something about our wills

You have done a public service!