custody rights

[danchip]

my brother in law got his on/off girlfriend pregnant and during this time and after her stabbing him and him punching her they decided to split up, the baby was born and he visited it occasionally but she went on as if she was trying to get back with him so he started going round less.

He then moved 80miles away from the baby and mother and rarely saw his son because he was more interested in working and having nights out, the mother finally got sick of this and stopped him seeing the child due to him arranging to pick up the boy and then not turning up.

She rang him one night and said she was moving to italy and she was leaving for the airport in 3 hours and if he wanted to sort things out then he had to go to her house. Due to him being a total pr**ck he didn't bother going because he had lost his driving license and couldn't be bothered travelling the 80mile on a train or asking family/friends for a lift, plus he thought she was bluffing and wasn't going to leave.

she did leave and had been gone for about 3 months and came back for 1 week to visit family, during this time she contacted him to arrange for him to see his son.

Can anyone advise me on what the legal situation is with this, can he stop her from taking the baby abroad again

[mrs_overall]

In a word, no.

[zzxxee]

no a hope in hells chance

[daffy654]

Is he named on the birth certificate as the father? If he is then he does have a right to seek legal advice to prevent the mother from taking the baby/child abroad permanently.

[daffy654]

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Parents/ParentsRights/DG_4002954

Who has parental responsibility?
In England and Wales, if the parents of a child are married to each other at the time of the birth, or if they have jointly adopted a child, then they both have parental responsibility. Parents do not lose parental responsibility if they divorce, and this applies to both the resident and the non-resident parent.

This is not automatically the case for unmarried parents. According to current law, a mother always has parental responsibility for her child. A father, however, has this responsibility only if he is married to the mother when the child is born or has acquired legal responsibility for his child through one of these three routes:

(from 1 December 2003) by jointly registering the birth of the child with the mother
by a parental responsibility agreement with the mother
by a parental responsibility order, made by a court
Living with the mother, even for a long time, does not give a father parental responsibility and if the parents are not married, parental responsibility does not always pass to the natural father if the mother dies.

All parents (including adoptive parents) have a legal duty to financially support their child, whether they have parental responsibility or not.
Applying to the courts for parental responsibility
A father can apply to the court to gain parental responsibility. In considering an application from a father, the court will take the following into account:

the degree of commitment shown by the father to his child
the degree of attachment between father and child
the father's reasons for applying for the order
The court will then decide to accept or reject the application ba

[mrs_overall]

Further to daffys answer - if he is named on the birth certificate then he CAN make an application, but given his performance as a father, hell would freeze over before he was allowed custody.