Parental Responsibility in UK Law

It is wrong to place undue and therefore false emphasis on the rights and duties and the powers comprised in 'parental responsibility and not to concentrate on the fact that what is at issue is conferring upon a committed father the status of parenthood for which nature has already ordained that he must bear responsibility.

The right to receive a copy of Form C6A is not limited to those who are able to establish that they are entitled to the protection of Article 8. The right to receive a copy of Form C6A exists for the benefit of every father whom a local authority 'believes to be a parent without parental responsibility for the child' irrespective of whether or not that parent has de facto family ties.

Parental responsibility is not automatically conferred on fathers who are not married to the mothers of their children. There must, accordingly, be criteria against which an application for parental responsibility falls to be judged. The only statutory criteria are (1) that it must be in the interests of the child for such an order to be made and (2) that the making of a parental responsibility order must be better for the child than making no order.

Fourthly, and perhaps for that reason, the English courts have been tempted to overlay the factual concept of habitual residence with legal constructs.

6. No minor of whatever age has power by refusing consent to treatment to override a consent to treatment by someone who has parental responsibility for the minor and a fortiori a consent by the court. Nevertheless such a refusal is a very important consideration in making clinical judgments and for parents and the court in deciding whether themselves to give consent. Its importance increases with the age and maturity of the minor.

The courts generally set their face against depriving a child of such contact and urge reluctant caretaking parents to make contact work, however difficult it may be for that parent who very often does not understand the importance of that continuing contact.

Residence orders are, as their words indicate, practical orders which settle the arrangements to be made as to the person with whom the child is to live. Shared residence has a different psychological impact from residence with one, contact to another because, as contact is defined, it requires that the parent with whom the child lives, must allow the child to visit or stay with the other parent.