I'm wondering at what age would family court take a child's opinion on contact with an unreliable parent into consideration?
DD is 7. Her DF has always been unreliable. Messed her around, let her down, we've heard every excuse in the book.
After not hearing a peep from him for 3 months he took me to court to get contact with her before she started school. He was given Tuesdays and Thursdays a couple of hours at a time. This lasted for a couple of weeks.
We are now, all these years later, at the point that DD is suffering from anxiety and is extremely clingy with me. One Christmas he didn't turn up until an hour after bedtime after she'd waited all day (a year ago). This Christmas he skipped entirely. We've heard nothing from him for 3 weeks and it's her birthday tomorrow. She has taken his lack of contact very hard in the past few months. It's gone from sporadic with ridiculous last minute or days later excuses. But he's never entirely missed out Christmas or her birthday before now. She says she does not want to see him or speak to him any more. If at some point he does try to contact her again and I refuse to let him see her as per her request and if he manages to raise the funds to take it back to court, will they take her opinion into account? Any advice would be very much appreciated.