ADVICE WITH PARENTAL RIGHTS & RESPONSIBILITIES

WHAT ARE PARENTAL RIGHTS & RESPONSIBILITIES ?

A parent has the following responsibilities towards a child:-

1. To safeguard and promote the child’s health, development and welfare; an example would be to choose suitable schooling for that child and to ensure access to medical treatment.

2. To provide direction and guidance to the child in a manner appropriate to the stage of the child’s development; for example to advise, guide and direct the child as the child grows older and begins to express their own preferences on which activities they enjoy or which subjects they enjoy at school.

3. if the child is not living with the parent, to maintain personal relations and direct contact with the child on a regular basis; an example would be where are divorce, a child does not live with parent but that parent has a responsibility as well as a right to maintain relations with that child; and

4. to act as the child’s legal representative, for example if the child is charged with an offence by police, the parents have a right to consult with and instruct that child’s solicitor.

Only those parents or parties with parental rights & responsibilities (PRR’s) have authority to control & direct that child; for example, an absence of parental rights & responsibilities would mean that a GP could refuse to discuss medical conditions or school may not disclose how a child is performing at school.

WHO HAS PARENTAL RIGHTS & RESPONSIBILITIES ?

A child’s mother automatically has parental rights & responsibilities in relation to her child. It is irrelevant whether she is married to the father of the child. Since 2006 and the passing of the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006, both parents are given parental rights & responsibilities if they register the child’s birth together; this takes effect through both parent’s names appearing on the birth certificate.

For children born in Scotland prior to the passing of the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006, parental rights were established if the child’s parents were married or became married later. The father can obtain parental rights and responsibilities by either: -

1. Marrying the mother of the child

2. By agreement with the mother or

3 By requesting the court gives them to him ( after showing suitable evidence )

ARE PARENTAL RIGHTS & RESPONSIBILITIES RESTRICTED ONLY TO PARENTS ?

Other family members with an interest in the child can apply to the court for an award of parental rights & responsibilities. For example, in the event of the breakdown of a relationship grandparents or aunts may ask for parental rights. An award of parental rights is awarded if a sheriff grants a contact or residence order.

A successful party would claim an interest in that child by demonstrating they could deliver direction and guidance for that child. As always, the court would only make that order having considered the welfare of the child as the paramount consideration, the child’s age and that if the court is certain that it would be better for the child for the order to be made than not made.

CAN PARENTAL RIGHTS & RESPONSIBILITIES BE REMOVED ?

Should a holder of PRR’s fail to safeguard a child’s health, development or welfare or directly subject that child to violence or indirectly expose that child to violence, then the court can be asked to extinguish that holder’s PRR’s.

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