Peaceful co-parenting at Christmas

Posted on 11th December 2023 by McAlister Family Law

Peaceful co-parenting at Christmas

As the festive season is rapidly approaching, most parents are busy planning the Christmas shop, visiting Santa and ensuring that the Christmas elves know what is on their children’s wish list. Here, Amanda McAlister, Managing Partner of McAlister Family Law, looks at the stresses of separated families over Christmas and offers her top tips for peaceful co-parenting.

For separated parents, deciding how the children are to spend their time over Christmas can be extremely stressful, especially when they do not agree. If arrangements are not finalised before the festive break, this can lead to tensions becoming even more fraught, the result being that no one actually then looks forward to Christmas, never mind enjoying it.

As expert child and family lawyers, we are starting to see a significant increase in client enquiries surrounding Christmas contact. Such enquiries vary from how a parent can prevent the other from seeing the children, to imposing a contact arrangement that is unfair to the other. As Christmas is the most magical time of the year, emotions are high, and people do tend to become entrenched in their positions.

I am a divorce parent with two children. I share care with my ex-husband and therefore have experience not only as a children lawyer but also as a parent who does not always see my children on Christmas day. I recently appeared on the BBC Morning Live programme to talk about my top tips for peaceful parenting over the festive period which are:

Children come first.

Remember that Christmas is about what is right for the children. Not what is right for you personally, Grandma or Christmas routines that have previously been in place. Children can adapt and should grow up having memories of special times with both parents. Not just one.

Santa can multitask.

With notification, Santa can multitask and deliver presents to multiple addresses.

Whilst the law does not set out precise rules on how contact should be divided, the view is that children should spend Christmas with both parents. This can be achieved by one parent having Christmas Eve until 2pm on Christmas day and the other having the rest of the time on Christmas day through to the 27^thof December. This arrangement would then be alternated the following year.

For those that don’t relish the thought of a child’s Christmas day being interrupted by going to the other parents halfway through the day, they can agree an arrangement which will involve the children spending Christmas Eve to Boxing day with one parent and then boxing day through to the 27^th or 28^th with the other. Again, this is alternated. This has always worked for my children as they then get to relax and enjoy presents for the whole day and are less grumpy on boxing day when they come to me or go to their dads.

Grow with the children.

Arrangements that were right for a child at 4 years of age may not be right for when they are 14. Trying to force arrangements on older children can create further upset and distress which should be avoided. If you have teenage children, talk to them about what would work for them. This way they feel that they are being listened to and will actually engage in the family celebrations.

Christmas giving

Whilst relations with your ex may still be raw or tense, it is important that this is not seen or felt by the children. If they know that one parent is not happy with the arrangements and makes that clear verbally or through actions, it will impact on the children’s ability to relax and have a good time. This can have consequences in terms of how a child in the long run will recollect their enjoyment of Christmas. Always try to buy a small gift for the children to take to the other parent’s house and encourage them to write a nice card to take with them. That way the children feel that they have the endorsement of the parent that they are not with that day to have a good time.

Co-parenting can be tough but if you always have what is right for the children at the forefront of your mind you will get it right. My son is now approaching 15years of age. He regularly reminds his father and I that we are an “embarrassment” and “sad”. The message that I am trying to get across, is that time flies and before you know it, they do not really want to spend time with either parent. The creation of special memories is what life is about and finding peace is the key to that.

If you or someone you know is affected by the issues raised in this blog post, we can provide you with expert legal advice. For more information, please get in touch with our specialist team at hello@mcalisterfamilylaw.co.uk

A loving home – best Christmas present ever

Posted on 6th December 2023 by McAlister Family Law

A loving home – best Christmas present ever

One year ago, John Lewis’ Christmas advert aimed to shine a light on the importance of foster carers, yet new figures from OFSTED have shown a loss of foster care families and an increase in children being placed far from home. Here, Nick Hodson looks at the situation and how The Department of Education plans to turn it around.

Let me take you back 12 months to the 2022 John Lewis Christmas advert. In it, a middle-aged man is on a mission to learn how to skateboard. He spends weeks trying to master this difficult skill and suffers some bumps and bruises along the way. It is revealed at the end of the advert what his hard work was all about. Along with his partner, he was expecting the arrival of a foster child, Ellie, who loves to skateboard. Ellie was nervous at first about the new house but softens when she spots the carer’s skateboard and poorly arm. His hard work was designed to make Ellie feel comfortable in her new home.

This week, new figures from OFSTED, have shown that there has been a net loss of 1,000 foster care families in the past year and a record number of children being placed far from home. Social workers have described scrambling to find friends and family to take children in urgent need of safety and reported that children are sometimes placed in hotels.

It is estimated that 6,000 new foster families will be needed to meet rising demand.

“We need a lot more foster carers,” said John Pearce, the president of the Association of Directors of Children’s Services. “You used to be able to get a place quickly for younger children. But in significant parts of the country that’s not the case anymore, and that’s driven by a significant increase in the children coming into care.”

In some cases, councils lacking local foster vacancies are sending children hundreds of miles away, breaking family and school ties. There has been a 7% increase in the number of children in care since 2019 in England. But in the past year almost twice as many households quit mainstream fostering than joined. Reasons cited include the rising cost of looking after children and older foster parents choosing to quit after the pandemic.

The Department of Education is launching a £27m recruitment and retention programme, which began in September in the north-east, where demand has soared, and will spread to more than half of England’s local authorities from next April.

One of the joys of representing children is seeing the impact of a positive foster placement on the child’s wellbeing. It can provide them with the safety, stability, and love that they might been deprived of by their birth families. For older children, it can give them the best platform to enter adulthood.

Let us hope that the new campaign will bring the thousands of new families into the fostering system and that many more children like Ellie can live in safe and loving homes.

Will a history of alcohol misuse prevent you from spending time with your children?

Posted on 17th March 202222nd March 2022 by McAlister Family Law

Will a history of alcohol misuse prevent you from spending time with your children?

It is no secret that the UK has a renowned drinking culture. In England there are an estimated 602,391 dependent drinkers. According to the charity Alcohol Change UK, only 18% are receiving treatment. (https://alcoholchange.org.uk/alcohol-facts/fact-sheets/alcohol-statistics). Indeed, it was the re-opening of pubs, even in the early stages of pandemic, which signalled relief for many UK citizens and the feeling of getting back to “normal”. In this blog post, Melissa Jones discuses whether a history of alcohol misuse can prevent a parent from having contact with their child or children.

Research by Alcohol Change UK showed that almost three in ten drinkers found themselves drinking more in 2021 compared to 2020. Further, around one in six drinkers felt concerned about the amount that they had been drinking since of removal of lockdown restrictions and 25% wanted to reduce the amount they will drink in 2022.

There are of course different levels of drinking. The Chief Medical Officer’s guidelines for men and women state:

To keep health risks from alcohol to a low level, it is safest not to drink more than 14 units a week on a regular basis;
If you regularly drink as much as 14 units per week, it is best to spread your drinking evenly over three or more days. If you have one or two heavy drinking episodes a week, you increase your risk of long-term illness and injury;
The risk of developing a range of health problems (including cancers of the mouth, throat and breast) increases the more you drink on a regular basis;
If you wish to cut down the amount you drink, a good way to help achieve this is to have several drink-free days a week.

Of course, there is a world of difference between drinking alcohol and misusing alcohol and/or having an alcohol-use disorder. Misuse of alcohol is defined by the NHS as regularly drinking more than 14 units of alcohol a week.

Alcohol misuse can affect parents if it takes precedence over their other commitments and responsibilities and starts to impact their family life and their relationship with their child(ren).

Child contact and the law

The law currently presumes that it is in the children’s best interests for each parent, even when they have separated, to continue to be involved in the lives of any and all of their children, unless such involvement may subject them to a risk of harm.

The misuse of alcohol often features in cases coming before the family court, where one parent seeks to prevent another from contact with the couple’s children because of concerns around the safety of the children. That allegation may set in motion assessment (undertaken by the courts, CAFCASS or Social Services) of the risks that may be posed to the children involved.

As family law solicitors, we are all too familiar with such cases coming before family court and it is not unusual for an ex-partner to allege the other parent should have limited or no contact with the couple’s children because of previous drug and alcohol misuse and the risk such misuse poses to those children.

What measures can the court take?

The court has a number of ways it will establish and manage any potential risk:

it can order regular testing and monitoring of alcohol use, which might include hair strand testing, breathalysing pre and post child contact, the wearing of a SCRAM bracelet* or using a Portable Alcohol Monitor** (https://www.alphabiolabs.co.uk/legal-testing-services/legal-alcohol-testing/);
it can require an undertaking that the parent will not consume alcohol while having contact with their child(ren) and, in some cases, this can extend to include the period up to 24 hours before their contact with the child(ren);
it can require the parent’s attendance on specific therapeutic and remedial courses.

With parents that do experience difficulties with alcohol misuse from the perspective of the courts, there are ways of working through cases involving a parent experiencing difficulties with alcohol misuse so that children can maintain positive relationships with both parents. Experiencing such difficulties does not have to be a barrier to having contact and a relationship with your child(ren).

If you are affected by any of the issues raised here, please get in touch today. We are here to help you.

*Like a breathalyser for the ankle, the SCRAM Continuous Alcohol Monitoring (SCRAM CAM) bracelet provides 24/7 transdermal alcohol testing, automatically sampling the wearer’s perspiration every 30 minutes.

**This is a portable breath alcohol testing device with built in camera and GPS tracking, it can be set up for scheduled, random or on demand testing. This device allows for instant on demand monitoring.