Protective orders

Holidays can be an emotive issue for parents with broken relationships. Where lines of communication are strained, the need to ask the estranged parent's permission to take the child for a day trip to Calais, to a villa holiday in Spain or a family wedding in Hawaii, is not always appreciated.

In families with international connections, one parent may be anxious that the other parent is planning to steal away with the child permanently. Parental consent to holiday plans may be withheld out of a desire to create obstacles and frustration. In that case, the holidaying parent will have no option but to make an application to the court. The courts have proved themselves practical and robust in devising protective orders to put the remaining parent's mind at rest.

Child abduction
Child abduction is the removal or retention of a child across an international border by one parent without the consent of the other parent or in contravention of a court order. If the travelling parent absconds to a country that is not a signatory to The Hague Convention there may be no remedy for the abandoned parent to secure the child's return.

Protective orders
In one case a six year-old girl lived in England. Her mother was English and the father Egyptian. The court said that contact with the father in Cairo was in the child's interests so that she could see her Egyptian heritage, and maintain relations with her paternal family. However, first the father must enter into an agreement in Egypt confirming that the child would leave Egypt after contact in that country and the father would place no obstacle in the way.

The court went further in the case of a little boy who was three years old and had spent his life in England. The mother wished to take the child to the United Arab Emirates to visit her family. As a precondition the mother was ordered to deposit the sum of £50,000 with the court by way of a security bond, to provide the father with copy travel tickets, full details of the travel itinerary and to give solemn declarations on the Koran granting the safe return of the child.

When going abroad it's not just the air tickets and passports that need to be remembered; both parents must be in agreement with the proposed travel plans or a court application may be required.

Georgina Vallance-Webb, Associate at Stevens & Bolton LLP, matrimonial department

Contact: georgina.vallance-webb@stevens-bolton.co.uk or call 01483 734211