C79 action

[Sparklingwineandcheese]

I will keep this suitably vague, in case the family are on here, I’ve named changed it the question seems familiar.

I really need to go back to Court around passport/travel on a CAO. Ex has the passport which I should have and is about to go abroad without giving me dates/getting permission etc, which is criminal according to the Order.

Attempts have been made to sort this out, but ex ignores the passport issue (he is not ever going to give that back to me meaning I can’t travel abroad) and refuses to give holiday dates/details.

Ex very controlling and difficult. Has blocked me on every form of contact, and has changed email address to prevent me emailing. I write via signed for post and he has now stopped signing for them, so I actually cannot contact him at all. We have only had a small amount of contact last week because he wanted to change the drop off times when I suspect he’s away. I refused to agree until he complied with the order, so he re blocked me. His holiday plans are continuing even though I have warned I will need to go back to court.

Latest letter (which he won’t sign for) threatened court.

My question is, if I go back is this a fairly quick thing to do? The CAO took nearly 3 years so I have palpitations over starting that again. My experience of Court seems to be they like to last the whole thing out, we’ll go, they’ll decide they need to make directions around evidence, we need to go back, they decide they need something else etc.

To me it’s quite straightforward the order says X my ex is not doing X and is dishonest and underhand over it. I use a Bartister and I don’t want to end up almost bankrupt doing this. I don’t mind if it’s short, but if I’m looking at months and months with the costs involved I’m not sure where I go. I feel I have tried everything to remedy this, and only Court can sort this, but I have to be sensible over my finances.

Ex unfortunately does not like to be “told” what to do. He feels the Order is there so I can be told what to do, but that he can act however he wants. Reasoning or discussion is just not possible. Even my threat of court will be a “challenge” where he will basically say “she’s not telling me what to do”

Can anyone advise on timescales for this please?

I can't answer your actual question, but if you haven't given permission for children to leave the country and it is against a court order I thought there could be an alert sent to "all ports". The instance I knew about was around 20 years ago, so it may not be the same and may well depend on your local police force.

If I've understood this correctly, your ex is taking your child abroad without your permission and has breached the court order?

Yes. And has got hold of the passport and won’t give it to me, which is also ordered. I would give permission but he is meant to give times/dates/location, in writing 28 days before. This has not happened.

I need to enforce it, but reading about it it doesn’t seem as quick as I hoped, involving several court hearings and a Barrister fee for each

I'd make an urgent ex-parte application for a prohibited steps order. I'd also report the passport lost or stolen. That will prevent him going immediately. You have to take him back for breaching the order. The level of control these arseholes have 🤬

I'd report the passports as stolen. This means they can't be used at airports or ports.

Yeah, I'd just report the passport as stolen and not tell him

That will really teach him

I wouldn't hand over DC for contact as you believe he is planning to take abroad and may not return.

Thing is he didn’t steal it. He renewed it as it had expired, but without telling me, and without handing it over as per the Order.
He obviously didn’t tell the passport office about the Order and he lied and told them it was lost/stolen in order to renew it (I had the old passport, he found the number on some documents from a few years ago)

I have asked about the passport several times and reminded him I need to have it several times. He just simply won’t respond to me.

Anyway, it’s not stolen and I know that I can get in trouble if I claim it has been.

I just want the holiday dates and the bloody passport. I’m now trapped unable to ever book a holiday as he’s never, ever going to give it back. Hence enforcement, but that appears to not be as quick and easy as I hoped for.

@Sparklingwineandcheese how could he get a renewal without both of you signing for it and getting it witnessed? Apologies if it is different in the UK as I am in Ireland.

Have you or he currently got the kids? If you have then I would not be handing them over again until this is resolved.

Have you had a conversation with the passport office about this? That might be an idea. Tell them you have a court order. Alternatively tell them it's lost. That's not a lie. It is lost to him. Is he going to own up to keeping it in breach of an order?

I’ve spoken to everyone at the passport office. Apparently him finding the number allowed him to bypass them asking me about it. Only one person with PR needs to sign and they rely on honesty over Court Orders. Basically they won’t cancel a passport that has been issued.
They suggested Court.

My last court case against him cost me about 8k and I don’t have this available again. I had thought enforcement was quick (naive really as I spent several years in Court and Court does not move at any kind of pace) but to me this is really straightforward, he has ignored part of the Order that is in bold and he’s been bloody crafty to do it, then he’s just stopped any form of communication with me at all.

Obviously I’ve looked into it and realise it’s a directions hearing, then a hearing for evidence, then potentially another two hearings. It could easily be over a year to get the bloody passport back!!

@Sparklingwineandcheese ah ok well then you are definitely UK not Ireland and I have never understood that rule over there either but thats pointless now.

Have you currently got the kids or has he?

Just don't let him have them again. He will then go back to court and you can say what happened with the passport.

If he won’t sign for a letter then just send it via normal post, email it and put it through his door. Take a photo of posting it etc.

Your OP sets out a number of issues but it’s not clear what your primary issue is. The most obvious concern is that you don’t want to spend money on a barrister. I don’t think you have to if there is an existing CAO that deals with the holiday and passport issue. You just need to go back to court and state your case.

I agree the passport is not lost and you shouldn’t report it stolen. However he doesn’t seem to have permission to take the children out of the country. He can be stopped doing this at an international port if you report it.

However there is a lot of escalation here over a holiday you don’t object to in principle. If you just want dates and times then focus on this. The passport should be kept at their primary residence. Do you need it for a holiday at the moment or in the near future?

How old are the children?

I have a couple of Primary concerns.

First is that he renewed the passport (which is fine) but he has kept that secret from me, despite two requests to know whether or not he was renewing it and requesting it he had it was given to me (I am RP)

Secondly he booked this holiday months ago, but has not given me the dates or the location, nor has he asked my permission. I only know because he asked for extra time a couple of days ago.

It might not seem massive but if I tell you he has ignored every single aspect of the Order that he doesn’t like it gives an idea of how life is.

Yes, I would agree to the holiday, but he now has control of the Passport, and believe me when I say it won’t matter what I’m trying to book, that passport will never come back into my control, so he has just ignored two large parts of the Order.

I don’t want to return to court, the whole court case with hideous and took forever, I was LIP for quite a lot of it, but things didn’t improve until I hired a good Barrister, but frankly I don’t have the funds for that.

Re contacting him, he has changed his email and won’t give me that either. I am only able to contact via letter now. He has had my recent letter, I handed it to him but he said he was too busy to read it.

How do you arrange contact if he has you blocked everywhere?

The contact is in the Order. When holidays are coming up I send him a schedule, via post which he does read (he reads what he wants to read) other than that he ignores me.

I have no ability to contact him in an emergency as he’s needlessly blocked me to prove a point.

I got a SARS from the Passport office and I had an appointment with my Barrister who wrote a letter, which he has refused to sign for, or read when I gave it to him.
I attempted to enter into a passport discussion with him when he did briefly speak to me to ask for extra time, and requested the passport, he ignored what I was saying, said we would discuss all that another time, as what he needed was more important, then when I refused to discuss anything until we sorted the passport he said “suit yourself” and blocked me again. During this he “offered” to give me the holiday details, then didn’t.

My Barrister wants to go back to Court, he believes this, on top of several other things, is way beyond what the Court will believe is reasonable, but understandably I am hesitant. Due to the way he is if I get enforcement over this then he will move to something else and I can’t keep going to Court.

He’s aware it’s a criminal offence to go abroad without permission, but he really does not care.

It turns out he has had a new passport for months and has ignored my questions over it repeatedly. His levels of deceit are a concern to me, because he wanted the Court order, yet he doesn’t follow any of it (he took me to court)

Are the kids currently with you or him?

With me currently

Well then as you have no way to contact him and no way to know where the passports are or when he is planning to illegally take them out of the country then do not bring them to the next contact agreement time till he gets his finger out of his ass and starts to communicate. And yes do bring him to court. Get the police involved anything. If he has the passports he could leave the country and never come back for all you know.

Its very difficult and fraught. Im sorry you are going through this. As I see if you have several options:

• Contact the police and ask them to issue a Port Alert if your child will be taken abroad within 48hrs. They will be stopped at the boarder and not allowed to travel. This is a nuclear option.

• Follow your lawyers advice and go back to court. Think carefully about what you are trying to achieve. Its daunting and costly but can compel him to give you details and hand back the passports after the holiday. However he could continue to play silly buggers. It can be years of back and forth with a million 'last chances' despite some stories courts often don't do much 'punishing'. I wish they would but when you're fighting for your children you have to do everything you can.

• Let it go. Of course this depends on the age of the children and if you fear for their safety. If they are very young or you worry they will be in danger overseas then of course you can't. But if they are older, sensible and likely to be safe then hes using this to get to you and its working. Grey rock, go along with it, let them go and ask for the passports when you need them to go abroad, if he kicks of about it then he will look awf to the court and you will look like the one working towards solutions.