emea

All

need some advise please and what are my friends chances..

my friends divorce was bitter with his ex wife and he has a 5 year old boy in uk living with his my and she has re-married.

Up to now he had to use the british courts to get access and contact orders with his son and has stuck to his CAFCASS order fully without any breach for almost 3 yrs.

Now he wants to share his sons school holidays here in UAE instead of UK , so he will go over and get him from uk to UAE so he can spend a week on all 3 major holidays ( easter, summer, xmas etc )

he has a court hearing coming up soon in uk to get the court approve this request so he can take his son outside the UK jurisdiction to here in UAE.

what is his chances? are the british law/court orders more kinder to UAE laws and british citizens living and working here in UAE?

The father is a British citizen , who lives , work and a perm resident her in UAE.

Also he has registered his son and himself with the british consulate here in dubai..to improve his chances and give assurance.

has anybody here in UAE been through this situation and got the british court s approval to take a child outside UK jurisdiction ?

please let us know

thank you

glynster

Any info anyone? Very interested as I am in the same position,well nearly.

Eva

Any Brief worth their salt would advise against allowing a child to travel to a country not signed up to Hague Convention on International Child Abduction.
Last time I checked(albeit a while ago) UAE hadn't.Would love to be corrected on that though as I do love AD.

emea

is there is any local Lawyers can advise us on this please ?

commander

spot on...I have looked into this, and whereas Scottish and English law differs for child welfare, i think the outcome would be the same...

No chance.....

Eva

Remember a local lawyer will probably opine against a backdrop of Sharia law which favours the father greatly and contrasts somewhat with UK Lex.

Imho, I think the matter should be resolved outwith the adversarial Court system altogether and a remedy pursued between the two parents ...with
the help of Mediation(there are plentiful practitioners out there) if needs be.
Of course, if the child is of a competent age,his/her wishes should be majorly cosidered too.
When all is said and done,retaining a legal suit to request that your child join you on holiday- at say £120 a time per communication isn't going to change the mindset from 'no' to 'yes'.

Painful and timeconsuming though it might be, would be best to work towards a civilised level of dialogue with other party in the child's interests to be with both parents rather than chuck money at legals..
If you google Scottish Family Law Association and 'choice solicitors' -iirc,
you may get some pointers.Good luck.

highlander393

mediation is only worthwhile if both parties want to work towards an agreement.


In this case I would say there is little or no chance if she is opposed to the idea , even if he struck it lucky and got a sympathetic judge and cafcass officer and a variation to the contact order was granted it is very easy for the resident parent(mother) to break it. Then it would be back to court to get a penal notice attached . He would probably end up having to go back a number of times to get it enforced.

At 5 years of age the courts will attach little credence to what the child says as it easy for him to be coached.

I would suggest that he just bites the bullet and accepts that he is going to have to holiday in the UK. he is lucky that his ex is abiding by the existing contact order as it is easy for her to break.many non resident parents( mainly fathers) do not see their children at all even though they have contact orders in place

going back to court is likely to reopen old wounds and make things worse and could affect his existing order.I would strongly suggest that he drops the case and spends the thousands he will save on lawyers fees on his son while on holiday.

he may find this site usefulhttp://www.fnf.org.uk well worth joining will cost 10 minutes of a lawyers time and give you if not more useful advice.

emea

i find that difficult to believe , UK law is a very fare one for both parents and the child...

highlander393

most people have the same opinion until they experience it themselves . as has been mentioned on this forum before UK family law is some of the most backward in the western world.

glynster

Well I have not seen my son for 3 years now,he turned 6 last week,I tried for 2 years to see him before coming over here out of the way.My ex was a manager at the county court on the family section, I went through mediation and that was useless,they said I was not suitable,because my work took me away from home almost permanently. I never used the tools available to me i.e. slagging her off as they knew her as a loyal servant and blue eyed girl. So now I send him cards etc and hope he is not totally brainwashed by the time he is able to contact me,hopefully with web tools now like facebook he will contact me.
Other than that my hands are tied.

shakh your bootie

Best of luck, old chap, but my experience was that I spent every holiday sitting in court or with the CAFCAS officer, trying in vain to get them (and naturally the ex) to agree to allowing my kids to visit me in the UAE. In 5 years, and after wasting a lot of money on legal fees, my kids were not able to visit on a single occassion - I gave up and came back to the UK.

You may get lucky and find a sympathetic judge, but the cards are always kinda stacked against the partner with the penis...

I do wish you the very best of luck, and hope that your kids end up enjoying some fantastic holidays with you.

emea

i think we all have a story tell here and have different circumstances ..

my friend since the ex cow left him , been visiting his son 4-5 time each year , thats every month, 2 nights per visit as per original cafcass order , he stuck to the letter of the law for 3 years and never defaulted. now that teh ex cow has remarried he wants to spend more quality time of his son and get to know him and see if is under any harm from the stepfather etc..

instead of going back to uk every month he wants longer stay with his son in UAE during his school holidays , his son btw spent 3 years of his life in teh uae , went school hear and had the sun , sea and the beach life that we have here.

he has been a top dad and only asking for what his entitled , what is wrong with that ?
isn't the father not important in the kids life ?
Isnt that why you have law and court to help in situation like ?

does UAE have lots if cases of child abductions , we don't here about it much here ?

highlander393

[QUOTE=emea;7837338]i think we all have a story tell here and have different circumstances ..

my friend since the ex cow left him , been visiting his son 4-5 time each year , thats every month, 2 nights per visit as per original cafcass order , he stuck to the letter of the law for 3 years and never defaulted. now that teh ex cow has remarried he wants to spend more quality time of his son and get to know him and see if is under any harm from the stepfather etc..

instead of going back to uk every month he wants longer stay with his son in UAE during his school holidays , his son btw spent 3 years of his life in teh uae , went school hear and had the sun , sea and the beach life that we have here.

he has been a top dad and only asking for what his entitled , what is wrong with that ?
isn't the father not important in the kids life ?
Isnt that why you have law and court to help in situation like ?

does UAE have lots if cases of child abductions , we don't here about it much here ?[/QUOTE

don't look a gift horse in the mouth , i suggest you tell your friend to look at all the solid advice given above and then make up his own mind.I helped run a national helpline in the UK for a number of years for parents who don't see their children and believe me your friends case is nothing unusual

Eva

Last point first. It's not about what's gone before, it's about risk factor when the case presents.[/COLOR]
Moving on, of course the father is important in the child's life,it seems though universally,that the consistent parent happens to be the mother.
About Law and Courts...Law is a human construct and in UK, is based on legal positivism which means there is no room for moral content.
You are a good friend to pursue this issue on behalf of your tacit friend-is that person your current partner?







[QUOTE=highlander393;7837434]
[COLOR="Blue"]I am sorry to read about those parents who are deprived of the company of their issue due in the main to the two parties not being able to broker a compromise on how each should intervene in the child's life.
I do not think their remedy lies in the Chancery courts or ADR but in both of them getting over the failure of their relationship(that's dead,leave it,bury it.)
and moving to a new plateau of communication-for the betterment of their child.
Dialogue.Communication.
Forget lawyers and Courts,they have no business in your past relationships and kids' lives-except of course if there is criminal activity-but that's an entirely different scenario.

You have to get to a level to resume dialogue with the mother of your child-unless you wanna miss Graduation, Marriage, Baptisms etc, etc.
Get over the history and concentrate on building a future of communication.
Lawyers, Courts blah don't care about this, to them you are just a number on a petition and fee sheet and plenty Yankee dollar.
Last note.In terms of contact ,everything you do, everything you send, everytime you try to phone,note it down in a diary.
It might be one line of biro to you but .....[/COLOR]

emea

thank you all for input , and will let you know the outcome in few months time ..i hope we can prove you all wrong ..