Leave to Remove

[FikaFreya]

I wonder if anyone has advice on my situation? I’m in the process of speaking to different solicitors, including my existing one.

I have sole custody but ex DP is currently taking me to court for joint custody.

He has never paid child maintenance and owes around £10k in arrears. He sees our DC every Weds evening for dinner and every other Saturday 10am-7pm.

He has revealed in court papers that he has now lost his job (with a month to go until next hearing). He is also subject to an ongoing investigation for tax fraud.

In the meantime, I’ve been offered a job in Sweden on double my current salary. I have family there already, and I speak Swedish fluently.

Is Leave to Remove a possibility given these circumstances? It would be nice to get away from him as he’s very aggressive but that isn’t my motivation. As we would only be a 2hr flight away I would expect a lot of travel to UK and for him to visit us in Sweden to continue regular contact anyway.

Grateful for any and all input!

How old is your child? Do they speak Swedish.

I don’t think CM will come into it. They will just consider the regular pattern of contact and how stopping that will impact on your children

You need to separate the issues out because legally they are separate.

Child maintenance & tax investigation have nothing whatsoever to do with his contact with his child, they are irrelevant.

It will be focused on the impact on your child, not seeing their other parent.

Ok thank you for the info.

I mention it because we are currently struggling financially due to the unpaid CM. So I am quite worried about the future as things stand (my current employer is rumoured to be considering redundancies).

If I were well off I would simply stay put.

Child is 2 and they speak fluent Swedish and English.

Thank you.

Does the potential for ex DP going to prison need to be of concern to me or the court?

It is a factor to be considered among all of the other factors but it isn’t an automatic yes or no decider. It depends on the nature of the offence, violent/sexual offences for example carry more weight than say fraud offences.

Assuming no safeguarding concerns as he currently has contact twice a week.

If he ended up with a custodial sentence for tax fraud I believe there would be less chance of being able to take his DC to another country as the ex would obviously not be able to visit his DC. You would be expected to facilitate visits to him in order for Dc to maintain a good relationship with his father.

All you can do is present the facts, that you want to relocate because of the improved family support you would have in Sweden.

Consider how the father could continue to have access if you live in separate countries and whether you could pay for that.

There was one raised by CAFCASS. Alcohol being consumed in the morning when they visited.

This was looked at because his alcoholism ended our relationship, but he did recover for a decent while and up until recently there was no report to back up my concerns so I was under a lot of pressure to facilitate contact. I kept an open mind for DC sake.

He has however started drinking a lot again, I assume partly due to the job loss. He was ordered to undertake a P-ETH test and his result was at the high end of moderate.

Thankfully, I have not noticed any negative effects for our DC, possibly because his gf actually tends to do the childcare when they visit and she seems perfectly nice & stable.

Then this isn’t going to be relevant really for your leave to remove as he is currently having contact twice a week.

Thank you. I assumed it wouldn’t make much difference as it’s quite nuanced. And I’m not sure it affects his ability to parent at this stage.

When do you have to give an answer about the job I'm Sweden? Because the process won't be quick anyway

They want someone to start by Dec 2026. New department being created now.

Interesting, thank you!

I wish these things were decided by jury! I’d let you go.
I fear the judge and Cafcass officer that I encountered would not.

Im not a lawyer but unfortunately I think that it’s unlikely that you’ll get leave to do this when he is seeing them regularly and consistently.

Is there any chance of doing it the other way round? Keep uk as a home base, work the new job from home, and spend one week a month in Sweden doing in-person meetings etc with DC being looked after by family those days?

Dates-wise if you leave on a Thursday before your weekend and return on a Wednesday morning then you get 3 office days spend across 2 weeks without having to renegotiate his days.

“IANAL” - so nothing to base your opinion on.

OP - you have a reasonable chance of getting LTR. No one can call it at this stage but you MUST apply to court NOW for an order. Find out what date you need to accept the job offer by and make that become the factor that turns your application in to an urgent case.

This is a really interesting idea. Thank you!

Thank you 😊

Since I posted there have been some developments.

• Lies he has told CAFCASS have emerged, and are documented & now known to court
• Photos of our child at his home have shown significant amounts of alcohol open & on table top at 10am
• He has recently threatened me during handover which was caught on CCTV
• He has told the court that he “intends and expects” to be unemployed for at least 1-2 years

We have just put in a LTR application that included my job offer letter, details of our family support in Sweden, confirmation of a nursery place available at a highly regarded Swedish day nursery that runs a specialist bilingual programme, a plan for me to cover the cost of 4 weeks of visits to UK plus one weekend a month for my ex to fly to us in Sweden, also all expenses paid.

In addition to this, we collated and chronologically logged 130-odd incidents of domestic abuse I suffered, along with evidence supporting every one (photos, text messages where he apologises, a letter admitting abuse and saying he will get help, etc) and witness testimony from his ex gf who describes a long history of alcoholism and abuse that was actually worse than my experience of him.

I now await the hearing with anxiety and hope.

Good luck. I hope you get to go.

The only person I know who managed to get approval to leave the country against her ex’s wishes offered monthly flights and accommodation for the ex when visiting, the ex never bothered visiting at all

Blooming hell, as someone who loves Sweden ( we lived in Copenhagen for 20 months) and would now go to Sweden in a shot if Brexit hadn’t made it a total no go ( we are self employed) if I was him I would jump at this!!!

Jeg er dansk og vil også flytte tilbage til mit hjemland. Jeg har lige sendt min ansøgning to relocate 2 dage siden, men jeg har sendt min ansøgning som urgent.

Hvor langt er du nået i din proces?

Would he say no? Thats your first step, to ascertain his view.

If he says no, then you go to court to apply.

Ive worked with a number of parents who wished to move abroad, despite it not really being in the child's best interest to lose that contact with the other parent (nearly everytime it was the father), the court agreed for the move to take place

The applicant must set out how they are going to maintain the contact, even if it needs to be really creative. I dont know how you would do twice a week with any meaning (would be remote probably)

Many families set out a rather pie in the sky plan, talking about regular visits and flights, you know when talking to them thats never going to happen but a court cant say 'I dont believe you'

The only chance you have is if you commit to robust planning to enable your child to maintain an ‘effective relationship’ with their father . The ‘rights’ here are focussed on the child. It is the child’s right to see their father not the father’s right to see the child.
we successfully defended DH ex relocation with the kids solely down to the fact that they had a solid, regular and effective relationship that would be broken by relocation.