Child arrangements order wording

[MG08]

Can anyone with a child arrangements order clarify how holiday arrangements work as there is a dispute between parents.

Our child lives with mum and the court order states -

"Summer holidays
. * shall spend 2 blocks of 7 nights with the father, not consecutive and separated by at least a week."

Over the summer holidays period our child spent the above time with dad, 2 blocks of 7 nights.

Our standard arrangement is for every other weekend. Summer holidays, Easter and Christmas arrangements are specified in a different section of the order. To me this means the standard arrangement stops and the holiday arrangement begins. In holidays where there hasn't been a different arrangement specified, such as October and February half terms, my understanding is that the standard arrangement of every other weekend would continue during these times.

Dad is stating that during the summer holidays he should have had 2 blocks of 7 nights, as well as every other weekend on my time, however I disagree.

Can anyone advise on whether holiday arrangements supersede the standard contact schedule please?

I said next year, this year is was 7 nights, next year is 14.

So what?

I missed this

And next summer our child can have 14 consecutive nights with her dad according to the court order but she won't be coming home (I can say home, I have a lives with order!) for the weekend in between, so she wouldn't be going to her dads for the weekend in between her weeks with me either, because every other weekend arrangements are replaced by the holiday arrangements.

Your attitude stinks.

'I can say home, I have a lives with order! '
But Why is it so important to you to do so?
It's madness like this that affects children so badly as they get older... feeling like they must favour one parent and see them as somehow more important.... inevitably feeling like the have to choose... just do your kid a favour and cut it out.

So what if mum wants a holiday is she not allowed 7 nights in a row? Or is it allowed to be flexible?

Every other weekend stops when our child is with her dad but not when she is at home? She she spends more time at his that at home? Where she lives and where her friends are?

She has two homes.

Yes because her relationship with her dad is viewed as being hugely important... (just not by you). In term time you have her far more than him. If he has her a few extra days around his extended holiday time with her that goes some way to evening it out is the idea...

Tell me the maths you’ve done to come to that conclusion. I’m not sure you’ve done it correctly.

Its EOW all year. Barring the EXTRA days in the holidays. That in no way equates to more time at his, otherwise the other would say LIVES WITH DAD. Which it may well end up saying if you crack on like this.

Easter holiday of 2 weeks. Dad has 7 nights during Easter holidays. So say she breaks up from school on the Friday and she goes to her dads that weekend as normal until the Sunday, he then has his extra 7 nights, taking us up to the following Sunday, so 9 nights in a row. There's only 7 nights left of the Easter holidays where she is then with mum.

Your maths for the Easter holidays also doesn't add up. There are 3 weekends in the Easter holidays.

So if it's 7 nights if Easter surely it depends whose weekend is the first one of the holidays?

If it's yours then she goes to dads Monday morning and comes back the following Monday in the morning? Or even shock horror on the Sunday night if that works best.

Why are you being so rigid about this - this won't do your child any favours in the long term

You're being deliberately obstructive.

Easter holiday of 2 weeks. Dad has 7 nights during Easter holidays. So say she breaks up from school on the Friday and she goes to her dads that weekend as normal until the Sunday, he then has his extra 7 nights, taking us up to the following Sunday, so 9 nights in a row. There's only 7 nights left of the Easter holidays where she is then with mum.

The first weekend won't always be Dad's weekend though, it will vary by year as it's EOW. It's just luck what that weekend falls as so sometimes you'll have more time in the Easter holidays, some times he will.

When you look at it over the full year instead of just your selected holidays - you still have her a lot more than he does.

She is a lucky Girl having both parents in her life that want to be involved. Don't ruin that for her by purposely obstructing his time because of your own agenda.
You seem to purposely be ignoring every poster here telling you how unreasonable you're being and that if he decides to take it back to court because of it, they don't take obstructing lightly

It sounds like it should be additional time, however, with that set up you wouldn't be able to do a Saturday to Saturday holiday away, so I would be asking for an adjustment to allow that to happen

Op,

Can I be blunt with you here? for 12 years dp was back and forward to court with his ex as she continually broke the court order making up her own rules as she went along, she was very much like you and would read what she wanted and not what it actually said so basically going against the judges order. In the end my dss was removed from her care and placed with us full time. There were other factors not just this but the judge did not take this lightly at all.

I really would tread carefully, this is not about you this is about your dd spending quality time with her dad, your feelings really do not matter, its not about you.

OP are you being deliberately obtuse?
What is the issue with your child spending further time with their father? you sound very possessive

It seems badly written to me. If your child does these two weeks plus EOW with their dad, then do you end up with any blocks of sat-sat time to go on holidays with them? If not and that impedes in your ability to plan summer holidays then that’s a reason to negotiate a rhythm with dad that works for everyone. (And is for the right reasons, not just to minimise time with dad, which your OP does seem to sadly imply.)

It's not about reducing time with dad, it's about increasing the time she spends where she lives. As you say I wouldn't be able to plan a holiday without having to negotiate the arrangements with dad if it was EOW as well, whereas he can book a holiday without having to change anything with me. Court order also states I can take her child on holiday for 4 weeks without needing permission from dad, which is why I think its 14 nights with dad, so 2 weeks, and the remaining 4 with me. It's also for those 4 weeks to be spent with her friends as well which she cannot do when with dad.

Women like you drive me nuts. Even when a final court order is made, you still cannot accept it or stop trying to control every damn thing. I can see why he felt the need to get it rubber stamped, your arguments are fucking tedious

Fascinated by the black and white answers when not one single person has actually read the order.

OP - the order needs to be read for anyone to give you a definitive answer.

During school holidays the normal interpretation would be that term time arrangements stop in favour of the holiday arrangements and then resume immediately after the holidays. But it WILL depend ENTIRELY on the wording of the actual order.

I suggest you take it to a solicitor and ask them to review it for you. If things turn out to actually be unclear, then you can return to court for a variation.

Thought I'd logged into Fathers for Justice for a moment there!

OP take the order to a solicitor to see where you stand. It sounds like it has been poorly worded if there is still room for disagreement. Court order are supposed to provide clarification, not more confusion.

Most of you all are forgetting there's a court order in place. Parents don't go to court unless there's serious issues somewhere. You don't know the full background, OP doesn't need all the sarcastic comments.

Your dismissing a "live with" order. It's visitation, not living

I’m going against the grain here - on my child arrangements order the every other weekend is just term time only and holidays are separate and not a continuation of the every other weekend.

Yup mine too.

Specifically says that's tern time arrangement stop in favour of holiday arrangements. Other op may not be able to have a holiday with her child - especially when the holiday arrangements change next year. The Easter one also seems unfair on op.

It's odd that 50/50 holidays wasn't granted. Why is this op? It would have made things a whole lot easier.

Thank you for all the new comments, they're very helpful.

I think 50:50 holidays weren't given because dad didn't ask for that, and also we live far from dad and so holidays at his means our child can't see her friends, so that's why I think its more time spent at home. My thinking is it is 2 weeks with dad and 4 weeks with mum over the summer because in reality if it was weekends on top it would be more like 3 collective weeks for dad in terms of the number of days, which would be 50:50 if we had 3 weeks each, but the arrangement isn't for 50:50.