seperation to anorher country

dbnavan

Have friend of mine who is married to a canadian who has just left him, they have a 2 year old, and now she has decided she wants to move home, he is an excellent father and adores his daughter, but does see the use in fighting wife for custody as he doesnt believe child should be away from her mother at such a young age, but wants wife to remain in ireland so he can have access to daughter more then once a year, if that.

Any advice

Nevyn

Get legal advice from a firm that deals with family law.

Carrigart Exile

dbnavan wrote:

Have friend of mine who is married to a canadian who has just left him, they have a 2 year old, and now she has decided she wants to move home, he is an excellent father and adores his daughter, but does see the use in fighting wife for custody as he doesnt believe child should be away from her mother at such a young age, but wants wife to remain in ireland so he can have access to daughter more then once a year, if that.

Any advice

she needs his permission to take the child abroad

gregc

As the legal guardian of a child, which your friend would be if he is married to the mother (before or after birth of child) your permission is required for the child to leave the country.

Having said that, if the mother applies to the courts, it is extremely unlikely that any judge will make the woman a prisoner in the country, and she will be given permission to leave the country regardless what the father might say. The only real chance your friend would have, would be to apply for custody or joint custody of the child. Realistically, this will only be granted if the father can demonstrate that the mother is incompetent for medical or other reasons to care for the child. Even still it is unlikely to be successful. A trip to court will create a lot of ill feeling, and will make all further negotiations extremely difficult. Given the age of the child, many judges will apply the "tender age" concept, and will not even grant overnight access to the child.

The best bet would be for your friend to try to negotiate that mother and child stay in the country for a little longer, until the child gets older and is more able to deal with longer seperation. He might use the threat of court as leverage to stay at least the 6 months or so that he may be able to keep them here with legal wrangling, or whatever other leverage is at his disposal.

Being married to a Canadian citizen, and the father of a Canadian citizen, he would be in an extremely strong position to acquire a visa to live in Canada, so might consider spending a year or two over there until the child is old enough to deal with the long distance relationship.

It is an unfortunate situation, very similiar to my own, I wish your friend the very best of luck. It is important that they get some legal advice from a solicitor who is expert in family law, and fathers law in particular. I can pass you a name offline if you like. But this is more from the perspective of understanding their legal position, than any likelihood of bringing successful court proceedings.

Hope this helps,
Greg