On 22 April 2014 residence orders were abolished and replaced with child arrangements orders. 

A residence order will not affect the parental responsibility of either parent when it is made; it will only determine who the child will live with upon separation. The Court has quite a wide range of options available to it when deciding on making a residence order; it can make a residence order in favour of one parent, and give the other parent a contact order in their favour, or it can also make a shared residence order.

Shared residence orders are becoming increasingly more popular with the Courts, and their objective is to specify the periods during which the child is to live in the different households involved. So the Court can order that the child lives with one parent for 3 days of the week, and 4 days with the other. The Court can also order that the child alternates each week living with the other parent, or even who the child lives with during term-time and school holidays. What you need to bear in mind when it comes to a residence order is the fact that the Court will only make a residence order if it believes is in the child’s best interest to do so. When considering a shared residence order, the Court will look at how the child should divide their time, and then after this, they will decide whether this should be expressed as a shared residence order, or a residence order in favour of one parent with a contact order attached in favour of the other parent.

Residence orders can be made in favour of a non-parent, and this will give them parental responsibility of the child, but that parental responsibility will only run for the duration of the residence order, and will not affect the parental responsibility of the parent(s).

When a residence order has been made, it affects two aspects of parental responsibility :

1. When the residence order is in force, no-one can cause the child to be known by a different surname without either

• Written consent of everyone with parental responsibility
• The leave of the court

2. When the residence order is in force, no-one can remove the child from the UK without either:

• The written consent of everyone with parental responsibility
• The leave of the court

However, the person who has the residence order in their favour can take the child out of the UK for periods of up to 28 days without any consent.

For more information please contact us today for a free no obligation discussion by calling either our London or High Wycombe offices on the telephone numbers at the top of this page, or by email: family@curzongreen.co.uk