for by grandparents or foster parents or other relatives. The law deals with this problem by allowing courts to make orders transferring the legal responsibilities of parenthood to somebody else, or changing them in various ways. These are parenting orders and as such, the court will make whatever order appears to be in the child’s best interests, having regard to the evidence that has been put before it. Each parent has parental responsibility for their child unless a court makes a parenting order or other decision transferring parental responsibility, or some part of it, to another person (refer to s 61C(3)). The law’s changing terminology In years gone by, the court frequently made orders giving one parent and ‘custody’ the other parent In 1996 these terms were dropped from the Family Law ‘access’. Act. gave one parent greater rights over the child than gave to the ‘Custody’ ‘access’ other parent. Parliament wished to reinforce the idea that both parents continued to be important as parents and not merely as visitors or playmates, after separation. So the law was changed. Instead of orders’ the court made a ‘custody ‘residence order’ in favour of the person with whom the child would mainly live, and a ‘contact order’ in favour of the other parent. The law was also changed at that time so that the parent’ had no greater decision-making powers than the parent’. ‘residence ‘contact As a result, each parent has responsibility’ (formerly and ‘parental ‘guardianship’), there is no legal connection between decision-making and arrangements for the children to live with or spend time with parents. In 2006, with the passage of the Family Law Amendment (Shared Parental Responsibility) Act 2006, Parliament took the view that it is better to avoid all language that might suggest that one parent was the winner and the other the loser, or that one parent was more important than the other. It was therefore decided to stop calling orders or Instead, the Act now simply says that the ‘residence’ ‘contact’. family courts can make orders dealing with various topics, including with whom the child should live and with whom the child should spend time or communicate – resulting in with’ orders, time with’ orders and with’ orders. ‘live ‘spend ‘communicate
for by grandparents or foster parents or other relatives. The law deals with this problem by allowing courts to make orders transferring the legal responsibilities of parenthood to somebody else, or changing them in various ways. These are parenting orders and as such, the court will make whatever order appears to be in the child’s best interests, having regard to the evidence that has been put before it. Each parent has parental responsibility for their child unless a court makes a parenting order or other decision transferring parental responsibility, or some part of it, to another person (refer to s 61C(3)). The law’s changing terminology In years gone by, the court frequently made orders giving one parent ‘custody’ and the other parent ‘access’. In 1996 these terms were dropped from the Family Law Act. ‘Custody’ gave one parent greater rights over the child than ‘access’ gave to the other parent. Parliament wished to reinforce the idea that both parents continued to be important as parents and not merely as visitors or playmates, after separation. So the law was changed. Instead of ‘custody orders’ the court made a ‘residence order’ in favour of the person with whom the child would mainly live, and a ‘contact order’ in favour of the other parent. The law was also changed at that time so that the ‘residence parent’ had no greater decision-making powers than the ‘contact parent’. As a result, each parent has ‘parental responsibility’ (formerly ‘guardianship’), and there is no legal connection between decision-making and arrangements for the children to live with or spend time with parents. In 2006, with the passage of the Family Law Amendment (Shared Parental Responsibility) Act 2006, Parliament took the view that it is better to avoid all language that might suggest that one parent was the winner and the other the loser, or that one parent was more important than the other. It was therefore decided to stop calling orders ‘residence’ or ‘contact’. Instead, the Act now simply says that the family courts can make orders dealing with various topics, including with whom the child should live and with whom the child should spend time or communicate – resulting in ‘live with’ orders, ‘spend time with’ orders and ‘communicate with’ orders.
parenting-orders-handbook.docx