Z v Z (Refusal of Contact: Committal)
| Jurisdiction | England & Wales |
| Judgment Date | 1996 |
| Date | 1996 |
| Year | 1996 |
| Court | Family Division |
HIS HONOUR JUDGE ORRELL
Contact – mother failing to comply with order for contact – penal clause included in order – mother still refusing to comply – mother committed to prison for contempt.
The parties were married in July 1990. Their daughter was born in September 1991. They separated in November 1992 and the child remained with mother. The mother had an older child as a result of a previous relationship. Later in 1992 the mother petitioned for divorce on the grounds of the father's unreasonable behaviour. The mother claimed that the father had a problem with alcohol and that he was in fact an alcoholic. In February 1993 the father applied for an order for defined contact claiming that the mother would only allow contact with the child in her (the mother's) presence. The mother did not at that stage dispute the principle of contact but because she felt unable to trust the father she indicated that contact should be in her presence.
The father later went abroad to work for a number of months. In his absence the application for contact was dismissed. The father had had limited contact to the child and in particular returned to England for her birthday in September 1993. Contact took place in the mother's presence. The divorce was made absolute in February 1994. By April 1994 the father was back in England and requested contact of a more liberal nature. There was a dispute concerning some matrimonial property (ancillary matters had not been resolved) and thereafter the mother denied all contact between the child and her father.
A second application for defined contact was filed in June 1994. Directions were given in July 1994 and a court welfare officer was appointed and asked to prepare a report. The respondent mother refused to partake in a joint meeting of the parents which the welfare officer attempted to arrange. In addition, she refused to permit contact between the child and her father in the presence of the reporting welfare officer. The latter wished to be in a position to report on the quality of the relationship between father and daughter.
The matter came on for final hearing in December 1994. The mother gave evidence that the father's consumption of alcohol would have a detrimental effect upon the child. The court accepted the mother's genuine concern but ordered contact at a contact centre the mother accepting...
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“Dear Judge, I am writing to you because I think it's pathetic”: Re A-H (Children)
...(n 1); Fourman v Fourman 1998 Fam LR 98; Re G (Children) [2006] UKHL 43, [2006] 1 WLR 2305. Cf Z v Z (Refusal of Contact: Committal) [1996] 1 FCR 538. While the facts of Re A-H (Children)55[2008] EWCA Civ 630, [2008] 2 FLR 1188. might be depressingly familiar, the judgment, delivered before......