Can my ex stop me moving abroad with the children?

[ManicPanicAddict]

I'm a teacher and I have the opportunity to take up an amazing job (2 year contract) abroad. It comes with a house, flights for all, medical insurance for all, paid school fees etc. Ex husband has EOW and some holiday contact that adds up to 80 days a year. I haven't broached the idea with him yet but we talked about doing a similar thing when we were married, and agreed it would be an amazing opportunity for DC.

If I said he could still have the same number of days contact (school holidays), can he stop me going? I know he can apply for a prohibitive steps order but surely a judge wouldn't agree it on those terms? We don't have a child arrangement order in place or anything, but it is stated in our financial order that he has EOW.

Any advice welcome

The other thing to think about is some countries require dads permission in order to issue resident visas for the kids when they are in-country.

Well, I read it more as 'how would they slot back in?' but yes, you're right that families don't tend to just mooch back to the UK. Teachers who've 'escaped' the UK system don't usually want to walk back into the cage!

Op's xh would really need to be on board with things on a potential long term basis. My appalling ex came round in the end, & to be fair to him, he's been punctilious about holiday contact.

Definitely not as simple as 'he can't stop me'. He probably can.

@TheCrystalPalace

"I suspect the OP won't be back"

+++

It's always the case on MN that whenever an OP doesn't get responses that agree with her or she was looking for then they generally just don't come back.

The other issue is that the children will spend their entire holidays away from their every day friends. We're encountering this now with my step son, he has a lovely group of friends in the country he resides in and so a long stay back in the UK is really not so appealing, his friendships here have fallen away.
What do you expect your children to do for weeks at a time with their father?

Of course you would need to get his permission. And hopefully you won't. There is no amount of overseas adventure that can make up for the absent parent. I assume you are not thinking that you go alone and see your child in the school holidays. Stop being so selfish.

Great opportunity but you can’t remove the children to another country without consent of other parent. The maximum you can take the children out of the country is 30 days. It would be in everyone’s interests to try to reach an agreement that everyone can live with, especially the children.. if they see their dad every other weekend it will be a huge wrench for them to see him less frequently but if it’s a decision everyone is happy with and you work hard to make it work right maintain their relationship with their dad it’s possible. I think you need to position it and accept that the onus is on you to maintain their continuing relationship with dad as it’s you who wants to make the move. I would think through and come up with a plan to propose that achieves this and make sure the children are happy with it too. If he objects and goes the court route I think from experience it will be unlikely a court would agree that you can take them. First and foremost the court would place a continuing relationship with their dad over a more prestigious school or better standard of living. This just isn’t an argument the court would be interested in. The children and their dad have a legal as well as a moral right to a continuing relationship. It would be best to try to reach agreement of how this would work and their relationship would be maintained outside of court. Also if the children are keen to go and also maintain their relationship with their dad this might help reassure him that it’s an opportunity they would like and he might be more willing to support a move.