[Solved] Contact arrangement order

hi,

you could ring them every few days and see if theres any earlier dates. sometimes other cases are re-scheduled. for me my court app was sent off in december. first court hearing was 31st jan. was not much of big deal for me as ex was letting me see kids every saturday at the time.

As Bill suggests, give them a call and ask if they have a cancellations list.

With funding cuts, and more unrepresented people applying to court, the backlog is growing at some of the more busy courts...apart from checking in with them, there’s not a lot you can do about it.

Use your time to prepare a brief two page position statement to take with you to the hearing, it helps the court to have a little more info about the background and what you would like them to do.

All the best

Guys I've just got back from families need fathers (FNF) meeting. Due to time constraints, I couldn't talk in detail to the man and couldn't ask back many questions due to other people waiting to have their turn. So not quite convinced he had the full picture before advising me. I may be wrong!

Anyway, the man at FNF was telling me to fill out a C1A form and submit it to the court to supplement the C100 I sent last month. He states I should list ex's behaviours of hitting me and also jumping out the car when I was driving because she got annoyed (albeit wasn't moving very much I must admit).

I'm in 2 minds about this. Whether I should just wait till the cafcass phone interview and mention in there or actually send this additional form. I understand it will go to ex and she will see it and have chance to respond.

Knowing my ex who is a narcissist i can see it backfire and turn it in to [censored] for tat and make allegations against me. On the other hand, I also fully expect my ex (who I've now realised doesn't care about boundaries) will most likely already make allegations of DV.

What do you think guys, submit this C1A form or just mention the incidences in my cafcass interview but coat it with "I'm concerned about my child's welfare because ex has hit me in his presence and tried to leave a moving car, I'm concerned about my child when my ex loses her temper". If i submit C1A the family will reject the letter and return to sender as they won't open any letters marked from court address now following a c100 which they received and already opened but refusing to acknowledge with c7. I'll be setting myself up to fail if I send c1a now and they return to sender, at courts they'll argue they didn't get and will say look "we returned c1a so that's proof we didn't receive c100 either. My ex are extremely manipulative and those who don't know them fall for their lies

Your thoughts please...

If your son was a witness to any of the events then submit the C1A and have it on record. Don't play down things like the speed you were going at. Yes she may turn around and accuse you of DV but as long as you stay away from having any direct contact with her and her family it will be historic. Judges are use to both sides throwing allegations at each other.

CAFCASS are known to make things up that neither party said even when parties are in agreement about certain things, so I wouldn't rely on them.

In regards to serving her - talk to the court clerk about the best way to serve her if her family does that for court letters. Though you could put the letters in different envelopes/parcels with different people writing the address each time and sending them special delivery so you know they have been delivered.

Btw unless someone has a formal medical diagnosis of being a narcissist or any personality disorders/traits make sure you don't use that term in court, with CAFCASS etc. Just state her actual actions and on the rare occasion you have to describe her behaviour regarding contact or your relationship lumped together use terms like unpleasant, problematic, troublesome etc. (Get a thesaurus and dictionary out then check any words you want to use could not be interpreted as rude/derogatory/sexist)

I used Unreasonable, Irrational and hostile when referring to my ex's ways to CAFCASS and Courts for her refusing to extend contact.

CAFCASS and court both said that she was being unreasonable, irrational and guilty of implacable hostility towards contact in several reports and hearing judgements!