QLD Communication and consent orders

Australia's #1 for Law
Join 150,000 Australians every month. Ask a question, respond to a question and better understand the law today!
FREE - Join Now

LouiseThomas

Well-Known Member
21 March 2018
93
1
289
A question regarding communication and co-parenting.

My sister's ex husband (as explained in previous thread) is onto her for not working full time. I believe she should work in some capacity, as all kids are now at school. Ex is complaining about her lack of communication as this is something they have in their consent orders. The consent orders state that all communication is to be respectful and co-operative.

My sister has her back up.....majorly, but I don't want her to shoot herself in the foot. They have orders where the dad gets XXX amount of care but he has asked for extra time beyond the orders and says that this is what should occur as both parents need to facilitate each other's relationship with children. There is no abuse or any concerns for either parent and he has mentioned this in recent emails.

She's only ever given him the time in accordance with orders (half holidays and every second weekend). It appears he has seen a solicitor so that is why he is saying that she should be willing to facilitate extra time with his kids. She thinks that she only has to do what the orders say but is that right? If she CAN facilitate extra time with the dad then is she required to?
 

AllForHer

Well-Known Member
23 July 2014
3,664
684
2,894
She's obligated to comply with the orders, and she's not required to do anything outside of those orders...

...but is she acting in the best interests of the kids by just doing the care minimum?

My husband's ex-wife asks for extra time a lot - for trips the airport, for dinners, for christenings, everything. She is also a very unpleasant individual who never facilitates extra time for our events, and even when it's Court-ordered, she will make it such an ordeal that it's not worth it.

At times, we want nothing more than to refuse her requests and use the orders just to punish her.

But does my stepkid benefit from that?
Nope.

Are we better than that level of pettiness? Yep.

Do we really need 32 parenting orders to tell us what's best for our kids? No way.
 

sammy01

Well-Known Member
27 September 2015
5,154
721
2,894
how old are the orders?
So when orders get made they are in the present.. So for example, my first set saw me having less time with the 2 yr old than the 4 and 6 yr olds... That was appropriate at the time. And the parenting plan before that gave me even less time. When all this started the youngest was 6 months old. So I had an hour twice a week...

So now the kids are older. (they live with me these days) but if they didn't... Sure the ex could still enforce that the now 6 yr old still have less time because that is what is in the orders... So the problem with orders is they are written for the circumstances that exist at the time. They can include increasing time as the kids get older, but clearly these ones don't.

Does she have to provide more time? nope.... But if there is no problem with dad having more time, then why stop it? If the answer is because it could impact on her child support payment, well I don't think that is a really good excuse... TRUE?