Fathers rights

i totaly agree with your comments but what rights does the child and mother have when the father refuses to be in their childs life ? i have never stopped my childrens father from seeing them but he has not contacted them for over 3 and half years and even before that it was only when he wanted to see them, then 4 weeks ago i got a solicitors letter asking why i hav stopped him seeing our children ! he wanted to write to them but aftre 4 weeks i have still not heard from him yet its me who has toexplain to the kids

I completly agree with you too, a lot of fathers are complete wastes. My eldests father has never seen her, and refuses to acknowledge her existance, and I think its men like that which give other fathers, ones who want to be there a harder time to proove them selves in the court system. On the otherhand though, there are mothers out there like yourself who is desperate and willing to allow the father to see their children, but the fathers just aint interested. I do think there needs to be some kind of rules or way of dividing and sorting between these groups of people that give both mothers and fathers a bad name. At the moment me and my new partner are going through a situation where as, he will give as much as he can money wise to his ex wife for their daughter, and is prepared to buy items thier daughter needs. But she is not prepared to allow him to see their daughter. At court recently she actually admitted there was no reason for her stopping the contact, just that she couldnt be bothered. Can you beleive that!!! My partner has fought constantly for the past 3 years that i have been with him for his rights to see his daughter, but unfortunatly he seems to loose out every time. the contact that was every alternate weekend has now been cut down to 3 hours once per week. Reasons she had given in the past was that their daughter had gotten nits from my children, which at the time my son was about 9 months old and my daughter just over 1 yr. and other reasons are that, she felt that my partner wasnt giving her enough money (she wants around 40 - 50£ per week) when we are both actually full time students at the moment, everything just seems to revolve around money and i do think that is wrong, yes money helps in every situation, but i do also feel that most people know what its like to be broke and should be understanding if the father is going through a hard time with money his self. Sorry this seems to be a long lot of babble, but im just trying to get accross that this is the reason why i think that fathers need some help to see their children, the ones who want to, and other fathers who WONT see their children also need something bringing in to put them right too!!

Hi, I totally agree fathers should be able to see their children, but how about doing something about situations such as mine & also my mums. My mum was a parent of 6 children & my dad walked out for another woman brought her children up & had every opportunity to see us & chose not to. My ex of 3 of my children also was not denied access to his children after walking out on me & returning to his mother, [to this day i do not know why]. But after seeing them for roughly a year. Found out i was with someone else & stopped seeing his children & never bothered again in over 6yrs despite solicitors letters asking why he wasn't seeing them which never got replyed to & also knowing my mums address, telephone number to get in contact still to this day Has not. I was brought up not having my father in my life despite my mum trying, i didn't want the same for my children. So how about doing something about this too.

Hi CNBM, Sorry to hear you are having such a hard time with your partners ex. She needs a boot up the backside for treating him and the child like that. However regarding peoples suggestion that "Something should be done" to force these fathers to take responsibility and see their children is not something I would say was a good idea. If the estranged parent does not want to see their child yet is forced to, the child will feel the resentment and suffer for of it. My father was forced by his mum to visit my brother and I. it was very obvious he begrudged doing this. I would have preferred it if he had just cleared off for good. Though seeing him and knowing his attitude to us children was enough for us to get our own opinion of him not our mums biased opinion. If a father is willing and able to see his children then the 'powers that be' should fall over backwards to help them, not just use the father for creating a bank balance. If the parents stay together you would expect the father to do more than just bring a wage in, this should not change just because of a divorce

hi. i was quite interested to read this topic especially as i have been through something very similar. when me and my ex split up my ex had the children against my wishes. i had no idea where he was as he moved house and his parents apparently did not know where he was either. my solicter even had problems tracing him. eventually he made contact with me but was still being funny about letting me have the children. (he was after a council house). i only saw the children once a week but did not keep them as i didnt want to disrupt them furthur by messing around with them from piller to post. i wanted it to be done properly. i provided clothes and bedding which i gave to my ex and paid for school trips. eventually we came to an agreement where we share them. i now have the children 3 days a week, their dad has them twice a week and their grandparents have them twice a week. the children are happy with this as they see us all including my exs other new children but hes taken me to the csa on a number of occassions. ive fought and fought and eventually someone listened to my case but i still have to pay a back bill of arrears which i got whilst contesting the fact that he was able to do this to me in the first place. he made me suffer by not allowing me the contact and then by doing that with the csa and i have always wanted my children and supported them best i can. even though i actually have my children more than my ex i cant claim benefits because he gets them (child benefit)i feel for any parent that has been made to suffer where there children are concerned. children should not be weapons against each other. they are supposed to be cared for, loved, protected and you should enjoy the time spent with them.