I need some advice

[celia35]

I want to take my children on holiday next year but i've got to apply for passports for them, do i need permission from my ex-husband or can i go ahead without his permission as were not on great speaking terms with each other.

Assuming you're in England (I'm not sure about the law elsewhere in the UK or abroad) then anyone with Parental Responsibility can apply for a passport for a child without agreement from the other parent. You will have PR as a matter of course. Your ex will also have PR as you were married. So, yes, you can go ahead and organise getting the passports sorted out.

The other thing to consider though is permission to go abroad. When you divorced, what was the arrangement regarding your children? Do you have a Sole Residency Order saying that they live with you or was it some other agreement? If you have a Sole Residency Order then you can taken your children overseas for up to four weeks without having to even tell your ex. If there isn't a residency order, though, then strictly speaking you need his agreement to take your children out of the country (and vice-versa). You would be advised to take along written evidence of his agreement.

You will undoubtedly hear lots of people saying "Well, I took my kids out of the country and I didn't bother getting my ex's agreement and it was fine". And that may well be true. But it's like doing 90mph on the M1 - a lot of the time you will get away with it. Sometimes you'll get caught.

Some countries are more aware of this than others - it's very unlikely you'll get stopped going to France, for example, but try it while going to the US and you're much more likely to get stopped and potentially put back on the next plane home.

The British passport application form asks for father's passport number if father is a British passport holder. My ex refused to believe this was on the form and refused to give his passport number. I phoned the passport office and was told to put 'father refuses to give passport number' on the form instead.

Due to irregular contact with ex, I haven't always told him when we have travelled abroad so have never had written permission, not sure he would ever have bothered with it.

I heard that it was impossible to take children to Canada and Mexico without this but fine anywhere else providing it was just for a holiday. I may have been asked if DS was mine when we went to the US but nothing more than that despite having different surnames and different nationalities.