Child welfare hearing on monday.... Lawyer saying Iabu!!! (Long sorry!)

[Pinkmist]

Okay first, a bit of background.

I had my son in 8/05 with my then partner, he stayed in wales with his parents while on a uni course and I moved to be with my parents in scotland for support ect while pregnant. ex would visit, 2 weekends a month, but this changed to maybe 1 long weekend a month when son was born.

We split in feb 06, and ex stopped contact with son, although when i got my own house in may 06 i invited him up for contact but he never replied to my invites.

in july 06 i recived a letter from a solicitor stating ex wanted contact. I got legal representation and contact was agreed the first sat of each month. This happened with a few visits missed because of either side. 2 on mine 2 on his. Mine because i had plans for one week and lo was being looked after by new partners parents and lo gets v. v. v. upset at hand over as he does not know ex and his family so was not fair to ask someone else to have to hand him over. The second because I had just moved house then was having a tumor removed from breast and did not recover well, so could not text to confirm and give new address. His missed visits were because of a family illness and a holiday.

In august 07 i was visiting my parents in wales (they moved back down late 06) so contact took place there. Ex did not show up to collect or return lo, his parents did it. The asked if they could travel up and have him the week after the day after lo's b/day. I told them we already had plans that had been made weeks before but if they could be changed i'd let them know asap. they couldnt and i text to let them know, and said they could have him another day if they wished. they replied saying they would sort something. But ex or his family did not send anything for lo's bday.

the next month I had lo ready for contact and they didnt show, text ex to ask why and he informed me that cause i 'messed' him about with the birthday visit he would be sorting contact out via 'someone else'.

didnt hear anything till late dec 07 when i recived a letter saying that there was an intern hearing in jan at the sheriff court, and they wanted to take lo away from friday to sunday to wales once a month. this is a 300 mile journey!!!

went back to my original lawyer. he said because of lo's age they would be unlikley to be granted the weekend visits yet. also lo does not know them and when contact does take place he screams when they arrive.

monthly contact was started again and child welfare hearing is on monday. My arguments are that

1. I think he is too young to be taken so far away from me as he has only been away from me one weekend and has night terrors only i can calm him out of.

1. ex has no contact between these monthly visits and has not paid a penny for him since day he was born

3.ex wants to drive lo around. i have always said no to this due to the fact he is a bad driver, and has wrote 3 cars off and is always speeding.

1. ex is a tosser, but doubt that would stand up in cort
2. last visit they brought him back in wet soaking trousers claiming his nappy fell off. the time before they didnt change him in 8 hours, despite me providing nappies, wipes and bags.

now lawyer sent me an email giving me some info about the day and put in the bottom paragraph

'To the extent the parties agree contact, the sheriff will not usually disrupt that decision between the parties; if the parties can?t come together, the sheriff will necessarily ?split the baby.? One side will get something they want and the other side will get something they want and neither party will be given everything they want, unless the request is unreasonable. I will be the first to let you know that your request will be viewed as unreasonable, for it is not good practice to have your client viewed as having ?unreasonable demands.? ? the sheriff would be more likely to dismiss the unreasonable parent?s requests all together.'

this is a short version belive me, and i wish i could word this better. my lawyer seems to be on my exs side, with the way he words things.

I'm so scared, I'm only 20 and don't really know what I'm doing. I cant even think about them taking my baby aways for the weekend, then building to holidays etc. guess it doesnt help iam 35 weeks pregnant.

oh poor you. I am a family lawyer but in the english jursidiction which is slightly different.

I did not glean from the bit that you have quoted that your lawyer was saying that you were being unreasonable-just that if you were at some future date he would be the first to point this out to you.

Given the stop start nature of contact so far there has to be an argument for contact to be built up gradually before moving to full weekends-particularly given the child's age.the distance between you does make that difficult.

You need him to show a commitment to contact and to make an effort to get to know your child so that he is comfortable in going away for a full weekend.

I suspect if comittment is shown and the child is happy then contact will build up to weekends-it has to given the distance involved.

You sound very child-centred. I hope that this does not cause you too much stress

i wouldnt say what you are saying is unreasonable. he cant have weekend access until your lo knows him and is happy with him, so he needs to have supervised access first, then a couple of hours out then a day out etc. until your lo knows him well enough to go down for weekends.

dont have much advice though sorry!

Thanks for the replies, I have emailed my lawyer asking what he meant by that part of the email.

I just get so upset about this subject, that i end up in tears at every meeting with my lawyer and at every hand over. I just feel I have raised my baby boy to be a polite, happy clever little boy, and now he wants to barge back in and take credit for it.

And i know he should have contact with his son, but then I see how upset my son gets and I think how can this be good for him? He see's my new partner (who I've been with since lo was 6 months) as his dad and calls him daddy, (even though we never told him that new partner was his dad) and hes so happy normally, I just dont want to upset and confuse him.

I just have a lot on at the minute I guess, the court case, baby on way in 4.5 weeks and we move on the 11th to our first bought house. its just such a busy stressful time.

It is so stressful-and the upset that your little one shows at handovers is not unusual. The transitions are really hard for them to understand-but that doesn't mean that he doesn't enjoy the time he has with his dad. It is so important for him to know his dad-but he has to play his part too and he must show a real comittment to this contact.

You're obvioulsy going to find all of this difficult given your pregnancy-don't be too hard on yourself.

pinkmist - Im sorry you are going through this. honestly dread the day my ex decides he wants access again.

chipkid would you mind if i asked you a question?

My ex took me to court and got parental responsibility and access, broek all the access from day one and hasnt seen my lo since he was 2 and a half (hes 6 in 2 weeks)

I am getting married next year and would like my DS to take on my new partners surname so he is the same as me, his dad (my DP) and his brother. I know for a fact ex will not let this happen. Is there anyway i can get around it. Can i get PR taken away from him. ?

Julez..on the naming your child front, you can put whatever name you want on the birth certificate, which is why you can double barrell names on a baby's birth certificate.
Only the mother is legally required to register the birth and fill in the certificate so if you go along and register it in your chosen name there is bugger all your ex can do.
I know this because a friend deliberately omitted the name her DH wanted from the birth certifiacte as she hated it.
It was legal...and it means that unless your child changes their name by deed poll this is the name they must use on legal documents although they could call themselves something else entirely in day to day life.

Confusing eh?

Pinkmist: sorry to hear of this. Write down a list of questions you need to ask your solicitor. Get a second opinion if necessary. Keep a written record, so even if you are upset and start crying you can still remember to ask all the questions you have and you can write down the answers and you have them afterwards.
PR is always with the mother unless she is proved legally incompetent.

I think your ex is not being unreasonable in wanting to see/look after his dc for one weekend a month. I do think it is in your son's long term interests to have a relationship with his bio dad & grandparents - it is part of his identity etc.

From your ex's point of view he may truly believe that you have been deliberately dificult about allowing the planned contact to happen hence his back it reallyup over the situation.

I think you would be best stating that in principle you are happy for what your ex wants to happen, however you feel it is in your son's best interests to work up contact to this being the situation. For example to achieve this would it be possible for your ex to see your son every other weekend for the day (more frequent would really better to let them establish a relationship).

I think you have to ignore the maintenance issue - pursue him through the CSA as a complete seperate issue but from his point of view why would he willingly support a child that he never gets to see (yes he should support him though).

State in writing that you are presently worried about his ability to care for your son on a pracitical level because of past care and the night terror issue, ask how your ex thinks you can overcome this issue.

I know it must very very hard for you but if you turn it into an all out fight the person who will suffer the most is your son.

I wish you the best of luck to get it sorted, with such a long distance it is difficult especially when they are so young and your ex doesn't really know him yet.

When this started in january his letter from the solicitor said he wanted PR as although he's on the birth certificate, at that point the law hadn't changed in scotland, so at the minute he doesn't have any pr rights over my son at all.

Ds has my surname. dc2 will have my dp's surname and One day so will I. Can I change my ds name seeing as he has mine and not ex's??

I have never been difficult over access though, he just stopped turning up without telling me. He has rearranged the dates twice, as I have. Once being when I was stressed about the tumor!

I offered access well before he decided to go through a solicitor and make it 'official' and then he broke it anyways.

I have always stated he can build up contact gradually, but he doesn't want that, he wants to just take him down to wales ( a 6 hour journey each way) on friday and bring him back sunday with ds having no idea who he is and ds is clearly not happy in their care.

Also what annoys me is that ex's father keeps popping in to my mum and dads shop in wales asking questions about me and ds (yesterday he was in asking my mum if i was pg) , but ex has made it clear I cannot speak to his family only him, but will not give me his contact details, so really I cant win!

pinkmist then you have nothing to worry about if it goes through official mediation etc, just stay being reasonable and make your requests officially as well, such as your ex contact details etc.

Julezboo-your ex sounds like he doesn't deserve PR but unfortunately he has it and it is quite difficult to have it taken away (although you can apply to Court for his PR order to be revoked).

Unfrotunately-if you want a legal answer-you are required to obtain the consent of anybody with PR before undertaking a major step in the child's life such as changing its surname. Therefore in your case legally you cannot change the child's name without the consent of its father or an order from the Court.

Courts are very reluctant to allow changes of name-particlularly these days in situations where the mother wants the child to have the same name as herself on remarriage or upon reverting to her maiden name. It is no longer considered unusual for children to have different names from their mothers, half-siblings etc given the increase in divorce and blended families.

That said-your ex has fallen out of your lives by his own choice-this may make a difference. However be aware that if you start proceedings to change the child's name-you could re-awaken an interest in your ex-which you may not want.

Miggsie-it is not only mothers who have Pr unless considered legally incompetent. Mothers always have PR, Fathers married to mothers at the time of birth automatically have PR and since 2003, any father named on the birth certificate automatically gets it too. Furthermore a natural father can apply to Court for PR and whether he gets it or not has nothing to do with the legal competence of the mother.
At least that is the position in England and Wales.