Petition: Give legal right of contact between grandchildren and grandparents

How can it not be relevant?
If the grandparents had been in evolved, presumably it wouldn't have had such tragic consequences.
I haven't read the case, though.

Bah! Involved. Not evolved.

The law focuses on children's rights yes on paper but tragically for too many, not in practice.

Anyone remember Maria Colwell? I was 14 when she was murdered by her stepfather and remember the news coverage and how 'this was never going to happen again' but how any times has this happened since 1975.

The law is failing children when it comes to their rights from one extreme of the right to be safe and protected from harm, to the other extreme of their right to know their extended family.

Some can't even see one of their parents because of the vindictiveness of the other one.

If grandparents being involved saved all the children, surely they’d just be given to grandparents once they were born. Bypass the parents all together.

As that would be ridiculous, we have to rely on the fact that in the majority of cases, no harm comes to children for not having grandparents in their lives.

The letter linked earlier mentions that one grandparent wanted veto power over a step parent adoption!! Grandparents should not have more rights than parents, which is what this petition is asking for.

If grandparents being involved saved all the children, surely they’d just be given to grandparents once they were born. Bypass the parents all together.

Don't be silly. You are deliberately missing the point.

Parenting is the parents’ choice, not the grandparents! If that includes them not wanting relatives in their family’s lives for any reason, that has to be respected. The idea of making it some sort of legal requirement is absolutely balderdash.

For any reason at all?

Gaining access to the grandchildren doesn't stop abuse. It just changes it

Generally from physical to emotional which is shown to be just as damaging

Been there

And there are some who have been there and are no longer around.

MissAdventure

And there are some who have been there and are no longer around.

What magic happens to make an abusive person safe because Nan and grandad have a monthly visit?

VioletSky

MissAdventure

And there are some who have been there and are no longer around.

What magic happens to make an abusive person safe because Nan and grandad have a monthly visit?

Grandparents can also be abusers.

MissAdventure

And there are some who have been there and are no longer around.

My suicide attempt was all due to emotional abuse

The physical abuse stopped when my father gained access visits. Actually that made my mother a hell of a lot worse, just in a different way.

Did my father ever know how unhappy I was? Absolutely not, children are conditioned to hide abuse and will hide unhappiness to enjoy time away from the house

OP is asking for a Parliamentary debate but she knows that this has already been debated - on 2 May 2018. I linked to this yesterday - bottom of page one of this discussion. Here it is again:

committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/108146/pdf/

Follow the bit.ly link within that document to the debate.

It was moved by Nigel Huddleston and debated for an hour. The then Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice, Lucy Frazer contributed to the debate. Little was achieved. Frazer said she was new to the post and would look at how the court system could be improved.

Frazer was appointed 9 January 2018. She lasted until 9 May 2019 and is now in her seventh post since then, currently at the Department for Media, Culture and Sport.

Since Frazer was moved on from Justice there have been seven more Under-Secretaries of State, currently Lord (Christopher) Bellamy KC who assumed office on 7 June 2022.

It is unknown what progress if anything has been made since the debate but having had the debate and secured a promise of sorts to review the court system, wouldn’t it be a better use of time to be petitioning the Ministry of Justice directly?

It would have been more helpful if OP had worded the petition to outline what progress has been made since the 2018 debate. Her petition makes no reference to that at all. Where is the source of her claim that 1 in 7 grandparents are prevented from seeing their grandchildren? That sounds excessive. Is this another extrapolation based on a very small survey sample? What specifically were these attempts to change the law and why specifically did they fail?

It’s all so woolly.

There is never going to be legislation giving all grandparents automatic access to grandchildren. That would set a very dangerous precedent. Where would be line be drawn as regards grandparents who should never have access to the child under any circumstances? These matters have to be resolved via the courts as every case is different.

Theexwife true and statistically, abusive/neglectful or addicted parents are likely to have come from abusive homes

Some people just never give up. This is a prime example.

No, I won’t be signing either. The paternal grandparents of DGD have behaved despicably and have only their own interests and (perceived) good name at heart. I think it’s desperately sad when decent GPs are separated from GC but, as another poster has said, it can just be another layer of manipulation by adults.

Germanshepherdsmum

I was thinking about divorce proceedings maddy.

Yes, I realise that GSM.
I just thought it was worth noting.

That goes against the Children Act AmberSpyglass which exists in part to protect children's rights.

Nan and granddad may pick up on their GC being abused VS even if they only see their GC once a month and could also be seen by the child as a safe adult they can confide in.

There is no perfect situation or solution. Abusers come in all shapes, sizes, and ages. Grandparents can be abusers, parents can be abusers, so can any adult that a child comes into contact with during their childhood. The most common abusers are step parents, or partners who are not the child’s natural parent, particularly males, but also females on occasion.

More commonly, some parents use their children to abuse their ex partner, and are obstructive with regard to anything and anyone in the child’s life. This is not to hurt the child, it is to hurt and control the ex partner. Sometimes grandparents are also included in this, and it seems to me to often be the paternal grandparents who suffer from this scenario. However, I’m not an expert. Perhaps the courts should consider the whole of the child’s life, people who were part of the child’s life before the parents separation and are important to the child. However I am very much aware that the courts are absolutely overwhelmed with cases such as these and trying to sort out parental access is difficult enough.

Anyway it’s not going to happen anytime soon.

Nan and Grandad may pick up on their GC being abused

They may, as may other members of the extended family, but remember little Star, I think that was her name, murdered by her step parent, and the grandparents had reported their concerns more than once, and were ignored.

They do maddy. For a GP to have any chance of success to obtain a contact order they need to prove that they've been a constant and regular person in that child's life.

If a parent is prepared to do everything the can to prevent the other parent being a part of their child's life, and we know that some do, what realistic chance do GP's have?

Smileless2012

That goes against the Children Act AmberSpyglass which exists in part to protect children's rights.

Nan and granddad may pick up on their GC being abused VS even if they only see their GC once a month and could also be seen by the child as a safe adult they can confide in.

Unlikely

Yes I do remember Little Star maddy which is why you're wrong when you it's Unlikely VS.

Smileless2012

Yes I do remember Little Star maddy which is why you're wrong when you it's Unlikely VS.

No I'm not

Go to Stand Alone, read the statistics on estrangement

The number one reason given by estranged children is emotional abuse

The average age of estrangement is about 35 because it took the average emotional abuse victim that long to realise what it was

Then read their stories, 9 out of 10 will tell you the grandparents abused their abusive parents and the parent chose to continue the cycle rather than seek help

Most families don’t become estranged from both sets of grandparents though, so they are often in their lives even when the other set are estranged, or they maintain contact with other family members so they aren’t totally isolated, surely?