VIC Will the Family Court Orders Still Stand After Relocation?

[sammy01]

Has she moved back? I'd refuse anything.

One more thing... Do you live in the country? 60km is nothing in the country and as such, you could seek additional time once she is back. Sadly, if you guys only see the kid alternate weekends, then it is kind of a moot point. Why? Well, it isn't like you're integral to the kid's life.

Short version, once you have 5 nights a fortnight, then the court will be less inclined to grant relocation. However, you'd also have the ability to argue that mum keeps coming and going and that ain't good for the kid either.

Solution time? Agree to her request to move with a caveat. She can only move if she can get a letter from a doctor explaining that the other child has ongoing health concerns and for the welfare / health of that child, mum has to move closer to medical services... It is a reasonable request that she won't agree with. Why? Well, work it out for yourself...

 

[Corinne]

The exact wording of the relocation order is as follows:

'That the mother will not relocate with the child to an address further than 20 kilometres from her current residence without the consent in writing of the father or a Court Order permitting her to do so.'

She sent a wad of text messages last night. Among these she raised a couple of points, one being that she will potentially be dragging their son to and from the closest major city (3.5 hours away) whenever his half-brother has specialist appointments and another message saying that if she needs to move in future because of his half-brother's health, that she'll be taking their son with her regardless.

After he disagreed to her relocation clause via text, she asked for his lawyers details (we don't really have one, we filed an application and settled the consent orders on our own).

Is a Rice & Asplund variation achieved through a new initiating application?

Thanks for your help.

 

[Corinne]

@sammy01 yes, she moved back about 2 weeks ago. All was quiet for the first week, now all hell has broken loose.

She already gave us a letter at the start of the year from a paedriatic endocrinologist saying that she's not supposed to move back here. She blatantly ignored it and moved back anyway.

We are in the country and had started talking about moving closer to them.

Before their son commenced school, it was every weekend.

 

[Corinne]

I disagree about not being integral to his life.

He constantly comes over here and says that his mum doesn't play with him or spend any time with him. He can't see the friends he's known since he was born when he's with her because she had a falling out with the kid's mother, who was a long term family friend (can't maintain stable relationships). But we make sure to organise sleepovers at our house with them during school holidays. From what I can gather, she just sits him in front of Netflix.

She constantly fills his head with useless comments such as how she owns her house and we're only renting so 'her place is better.' She tells him she paid for everything we own which is complete rubbish, she lied about which property she was moving back into for no reason (compulsive liar). The real estate from the property she just left is chasing her for $3.5k in damages.

He's always saying, by his own accord, that he wants to live with us. His dad taught him how to ride a bike, takes him fishing (he caught his first fish last weekend) and started familiarising him with letters and numbers before he started school.

None of this holds any weight in court obviously, but it's motivation to ensure that he has a stable environment available to him nearby, to dilute this utter craziness hes subjected to otherwise.

 

[sammy01]

Ok, so you've taken me the wrong way. Yes, integral, but not consistent. It is easier for a judge to approve relocation if one parent is only seeing a kid for about 20% of the time as opposed to 50/50.

So she has moved back. Great - problem solved. She can't move without your consent. So don't give it.
I'd be organising mediation and working towards getting extra time and only move closer once that is confirmed in writing and ignore everything about her forcing you to agree that she can move whenever she wants. Just say nope. She might do it anyways, but let's deal with that at the time.

My thoughts - if you only have the kid at weekends and live 60km away, then it is easy to justify the kid staying with mum if she wanted to move because to live with dad would be just as disruptive as far as changing schools, etc. goes.

 

[Corinne]

Yeah, sorry, I got carried away there.

I do agree. We've thought about that situation arising and would try to counteract it by saying if she needed to leave, we would move there in order to keep him in the same school. My partner was born in that town and still has friends and family there.

Thanks for your help, mediation always seems like the way to go.