Sometimes parents are worried about their children’s safety or care with the other parent. They need somewhere to raise their concerns and have the parenting arrangements for their children clearly worked out. When parents are unable to come to an agreement about plans for their children themselves, they need to go to the Federal Magistrates Court or Family Court for decisions to be made.
The Court is required to consider principles in the Family Law Act 1975 and to make parenting arrangements which are in the best interests of the children. The children’s interests are given priority over the parents interests.
Decisions regarding parenting arrangements
The court assumes in the majority of cases that it is in the best interests of children for both of their parents to share parental responsibility for them. This means both parents should jointly make decisions about what school a child attends, what religion (if any) they worship and the child’s health needs.
A court must then consider what practical living arrangements are in the particular child’s best interests to maintain a meaningful relationship with both parents, in the following order of priority:-
- The child spending equal time with each parent (either on a week about basis or some other combination such as four days in one week and three days in the following week)
- The child living with one parent and spending substantial and significant time with the other parent, including week, weekend and holiday time
The court is strongly focussed on facilitating shared parenting where it is practical and the child is not subject to any risk of harm in either household, and provided such arrangement would be in the best interests of the particular child.
Some tips to ensuring that a shared parenting arrangement works for your child are:-
- You can communicate with the other parent (if you disagree about something, talk about it when your children aren’t there).
- You don’t criticise each other to your children (this confuses children and upsets them because they feel disloyal when they hear these things).
- You don’t use children as messengers.
- You don’t undermine the other parent’s ways of discipline, routines or the way they live. Children can cope with differences but not undermining.
- You keep in mind that children are different. Some children find it easy to live at two houses. Others get confused and find all the changes difficult. If your children don’t seem to be coping, talk with the other parent about how to sort out the problem.
- Both parents need to present a united front to their children, so that children are not able to manipulate or play parents off against each other
- Have a joint approach to organising appointments and activities, for example, parties,
Contact DA Family Lawyers Online for more information on Parenting Issues.
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