Ex-husband driving me nuts

[clairepf]

Hi all. I'm after some advice please. I was married to my ex husband but separated due to his violence and cheating. We have two kids together ,8 and 5. It's been 4.5 years since we split up and he's only paid £300 to help with childcare. I recently took him to csa but he left his job so he won't pay anything. He's been verbally abusive to csa, they have it on record, and he hit his extra girlfriend and she took him to court. His cousin told me he is working self employed. He comes to see the kids for about 1 hour twice a month. He doesn't like having them overnight cos he's very outgoing.
I'm not sure whether to cut him off the kids and get a court order, this way I won't have to chase and ask him why he hasn't been to see the kids when he says he would(happened a couple of times) or get a private investigator to get hard evidence that he's working without telling hmrc? Am I allowed to stop him contact with kids until we resolve this in court? Since there's no court order in place. I'm also scared for my kids cod ive been told he has left them hungry at times when he had taken them over or not changed our daughters nappies so she came home sore. Also heard he shouts at them at lot. I'm just torn cos I don't know where I legally stand in all of this ):

I'm confused. You say he doesn't like to have the DC overnight but then you say he leaves them hungry and doesn't change his DD's nappies. Does DD have health issues, as she clearly isn't a baby? Why does she need nappies? And if he sees them at yours, when does he get the chance to leave them hungry?

I can't imagine a private investigator would be any use. They might be able to prove your ex is working but they will have no way of finding out what he's telling HMRC or how much he's earning. He can always claim he did a few days work. Unless you are prepared, and able, to pay for a lot of time watching him, you won't be able to prove otherwise.

I have to say, I find it quite hard to work out what's going on. Perhaps you could explain a bit more?

Thank you for your reply. I should have been more clearer. In the first year of our separation he took the kids overnight 3 times that year. He now lives about 15 minutes from where I live and he comes to my place to pick them up and take them to his place and that's when ive been told by his cousin that when he takes them to his place they are not well fed. He mostly has his friends watching football so my son has concerns that he doesn't get quality time with his dad

But he has them for 1 hour.
He possibly thinks that you will have fed them before/after because 1 hour is nothing to make something to eat and eat it.

Maintenance and visits are two seperate issues. If you went to court to stop contact because of lack of cash, courts wouldn't care.
PI will be expensive and not really a true indication of income.

Bloodyteenagers is right, OP. Contact and money are two separate aspects. You can't refuse access because he's not paying. She's right about the PI too. Showing he's working doesn't prove income. Nor, unless you have him watched for weeks, will it show he's working long term. It could just be a few days, or at least you wouldn't be able to show different.

Thanks for explaining a bit more, OP. Why complain about your DD's nappy when it was 3.5 years ago? Tbh it sounds as if you're scraping up anything bad you can think of to justify stopping him seeing the DC.

Access to his DC isn't for his benefit. It's for their benefit. Unless he's a risk to them they deserve their DF in their lives.

You have all my sympathy OP. But you've got to go about this thinking what is in the best interests of your children re. contact. If he is as negligent with his children as he says, I wouldn't push for overnight contact myself.

If you mean that you want to take him to court to set out in stone when he's got to have the kids then I would tell you not to waste your time, money or hope.

Any court-ordered contact will only mean that YOU must have the children available for contact at a specific time. It DOES NOT mean that he has to take them. No court can force contact (and would you really be happy sending them off with him if he was reluctant as well as 'negligent'?)