Squiffy Teddy Does… Parental Responsibility
Parental responsibility: Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?
You will never see women in Lycra at the top of a local or national landmark. There are two main reasons for this.
1. Most women would not want their wobbling cellulite hanging out of a Wonder Woman costume with the local media around. They wouldn’t have the time anyway.
2. Mothers automatically have parental responsibility for their child. Something not all fathers are entitled to.
It is easy to mock those who commit desperate acts under the banner Fathers 4 Justice. But just what causes fully-grown men to don the outfits of super heroes and scale the heights of the local clock tower?
The answer can be found on Directgov – the official government website for citizens
The current laws governing those who have parental responsibility are hopelessly flawed.
Parental responsibility is about having the personal responsibility of bringing up children. Providing a safe, loving, caring home and providing for their needs. But It is no longer a Janet and John nuclear family society that we live in. That parental responsibility may be mum and mum, dad and dad, mum and dad or a various combination. It doesn’t matter as long as the parents are contracted into the old fashion notion of marriage. If they are not the laws blow.
It would be naïve to assume that the natural parents would have parental responsibility for their children. That would be far too easy. Even in 2008 there is an unnatural bias in family law for the mother to have full parental responsibility for her child.
Having children these days is a messy business. There are too many decisions to make from passing the pregnancy test and it seems that everyone has a say. Or do they?
Married parents of a child or jointly adopted child have equal parental responsibilty.
BUT
Unmarried parents do not.
An unmarried mother automatically has full parental responsibility for her child.
BUT
A father does not unless:
He marries the mother
He has jointly registered the birth with the mother – only after December 1st 2003
By a parental responsibilty agreement with the mother (unlikely when relationships go pear-shaped)
By a self-finaced Parental Responsibilty Order made through the courts.
Also parental responsibility does not automatically pass to the father when the mother dies. In some cases we cheer the law here, for others cases we boo loudly.
However all parents have a legal duty to finacially support their child whether having parental responaibility or not.
Many mums would cheer that their child’s father has no legal say in the upbringing of their children, and can rest easy that they will have no rights over them if they died. Many fathers do not deserve to have a say in their childs life in any case.
But there are loving and loyal fathers out there who by law do not have automatic rights in the upbringing of their children. They may provide financially. They may be there any hour day or night that they are needed. They love their children and would love to have them full time. But they do not have that right. They have no say. This is what sees desperate men take desperate action.
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Parents/ParentsRights/DG_4002954
http://www.parentscentre.gov.uk/forum/view_all_categories.cfm?catid=23
http://www.fathers-4-justice.org
http://www.realfathersforjustice.org/