IMPROVEMENTS TO CONTACT ARRANGEMENTS

What improvements to contact arrangements would divorced dads would like to see? An equally good question is what improvements would mums like to see?

The recent DfCA study showed that parents would like the following:

What is clear from this study is that over 30 per cent of resident mothers would like the fathers to have more contact with their children. This demonstrates the willingness of many mothers to promote better contact for the dad with their children, and can only be positive for both the father and the child.

The reasons for dad not seeing the kids as much as the mum would like are, of course, complex. Some dads don’t spend enough time with the kids because they cannot be bothered, whilst others are unable to do so. It may also be the case that some dads disagree and feel that they do spend enough time with their children.

Many parents work together and agree contact arrangements informally. In these cases, improvements can be made quickly and effectively, ensuring that the children benefit from any changes in the adults’ circumstances. So in this survey they are likely to have stated that no improvements are needed.

But this is not the true picture because parents who are subject to a court order know they are the devil to change, and making any improvements in a court order means going back to court and going through the whole process again. As such it stands to reason that any improvement needed in these cases will be much more difficult to achieve, leaving fathers and mothers dissatisfied with contact arrangements for a longer period of time.

As well as seeing the kids more often, parents wanted other improvements to the contact arrangements. And the following statistic was revealed – that nine per cent of divorced dads want custody of their children, whereas none of the mums stated it as an improvement.

Responding parents of children from the non-resident parent sample reported that custody of the child would improve the contact arrangements (9 per cent) and a small number (3 per cent) said that the contact arrangements being honoured would improve the contact arrangements. None of the responding parents in the resident parent sample stated this as an improvement to the contact arrangements.

What is alarming is that 14 per cent of mothers stated that whilst they were not happy, they did not think that any improvement could be made:

Fourteen per cent of parents of children in the resident parent sample who stated that they were not satisfied with the arrangements, reported that nothing could be done to improve the contact arrangements. All of the responding non-resident parents gave at least one improvement that they would like to see to the contact arrangements.