FATHER WANTS TO HAVE A LONG WEEKEND ARRANGEMENT WITH HIS CHILD
Madgwick & Dale (No.2) [2020] FCCA 3294 (19 November 2020)
This case involves the father seeking extension of the time with his child based on the child’s wishes where there is an existing order that the child lives with the mother and spends time with the father.
Facts:
There were interim orders made on 26 February 2019 at a time before the COVID-19 pandemic began and when the father was a fly-in-fly-out worker in Western Australia, which is leaving his home in South Australia and flying to work in Western Australia. However, with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, the father has not been able to fly into Western Australia or fly out to work and he has been at home.
The father seeks effectively an extension of the child's time with him on an already extended time regime which would see the child spending from Thursday to Tuesday with him on alternate weekends which would be an extension of the time. He relies heavily on the fact that X has expressed strong and repeated wishes to spend more time with his father.
The family consultant who has prepared a report, an experienced family consultant, expressed misgivings about the way in which the expression of those wishes has come about. Further, she raised concerns in the family report about what she saw as a degree of subtle emotional manipulation of the child by the father.
Counsel for the mother, Mr. Roberts, said, as did Mr. Hemsley ultimately, that the recommendation of the family consultant for the interim should simply be adopted. That is, while the father is not working, the regime should return to a more conventional arrangement of alternative weekend time. In the case of the mother, at least, she sought that the time run from Friday to Tuesday. Mr. Robinson for the father had submitted to me that the father was seeking a long weekend arrangement with the child.
Issue: Should the court grant the relief sought by the father of having a long weekend arrangement with the child?
Law:
- Family Law Act 1975 s.60CC
Analysis:
The court accepts the submissions of Mr. Hemsley on this point and the court is of the view that considering the very real question marks about both the genuineness of the child's wishes and whether or not those wishes are in the best interests of the child, the court proposes basically to adopt the recommendations of the family consultant.
The court have regarded the matters in section 60CC(2) of the Family Law Act. There is no real reason why the regime recommended by the family consultant should in any way deprive the child of his entitlement to a meaningful relationship with both parents. Ordinarily, with a 13 year old child their wishes would carry significant weight, but particularly at an interim hearing level, the court must approach the expression of those wishes with a degree of caution and circumspection.
Conclusion:
Court orders that child X born spend time with his father each alternate weekend from the conclusion of school Friday (or 5pm if not a school day) until the commencement of school on the Tuesday (or 9am if not a school day).
