[Solved] I need some PSO Hearing advise when there is no PR

Hi and welcome to the forum, I have tried to answer your questions by annotating your original post;

I am mum and was the carer with all the PR as we were unmarried for my 15 year old daughter.

I lived with daughter and dad saw her about one day a week during the weekend. This was all informal. A month ago daughter went abroad with Dad and upon picking her up refused to come with me saying she wanted to now live with Dad. She also expressed she did not wish to continue being homeschooled, I told her I was happy for her to go to school living with me. It was very stressful as everything happened too quickly.

The following day she was left alone in the house and I was concerned so I went to the house to ask her if she could come with me. Daughter was unhappy and thought I had gone to get her and called her dad who called then called police that I was there to get her.

She then made a claim I had tried to dragged her so I was arrested for assault and later bailed with condition not to contact her.

I have now received court papers from my ex. There is a PSO hearing soon where he wants an order that she is not removed from his care or anyone he entrust. He also wants me not to remove the child from any school she is enrolled. His argument is I hate schools which isn't true as she has been homeschooled only for 4 years. She had suffered a lot of bulling and was really behind in school and there is no history of me ever trying to remove her from school. She did some of her GCSE early and she passed brilliantly.

Now how can I defend or stop this PSO being granted. He completed the domestic violence form too and I won't know if the police will press any charges or let me go until after the hearing and it seems unfair to be judged on an allegation.

You will have to attend the hearing and put your side across to the judge, you can prepare a short position statement, no longer than 2 to 3 pages, provide a bit of background and what you would like the court to do. The court will order a wishes and feelings report to be carried out as your daughter is 15 and therefore old enough to have her wishes considered. The court's decision may depend on the outcome of the police involvement with regard to the allegation from your daughter.

He has also applied to have PR and Residence order but that hearing is later on in the year.

It's possible the court may deal with both matters at the same time.

Also who makes decisions now about her education? Dad applied for schools without my knowledge even before the alleged offence. And he has not involved me in any way. He has challenged and been undermining a lot of what I have done with her. So where do I stand? He has applied for schools etc and left me out of it completely yet I have sole PR.

You can try to exercise your PR over the education matter but it's likely if Dad is able to show evidence of the nature of the court proceedings in place that the LEA will accept the application from him in the interim.

How can I convience the judge this is not in the child interests. I have looked after her single handedly without any support from him and he had shown no interest in her welfare or education and never attended and events at school when she was in school.

As detailed above, you can provide the court with a brief position statement at the hearing. If you google the welfare checklist, this will show you what a court use to make a decision, however, as your daughter is 15, much of the decision will rely on her wishes and feelings.

I don't want to waffle but I need to write my points well and show that I have best interest for my daughter. I have no problems in her staying with him but I still need to be involved in important decisions. I am happy for her to be in school but I want to be involved in decisions. Also how will the court look at the issue of him applying for schools without PR and not even trying to contact me to discuss what's best.

If your daughter is to remain in her father's care, you can ask the court to include your involvement in her education in any order made.

Good luck and feel free to ask any questions.

I contacted dad to see if we can have out of court and I am meeting with him later but I wanted to find how to go about it.

Let's say I agree for him to have PR and we agree on the other issues. When we go to court do we have to state what we agree on so will the court then give this PR....

I really don't want to fight in courts for my dad daughter's sake. But I want to know the procedure of what to do next regarding PSO if we agree on matters by ourselves.

...It's great that you have been able to arrange a meeting with the father to discuss solutions to this, however because you have been bailed for assault with the condition that you do not contact your daughter the court may want to make an interim PSO and ask for a section 7 report, as mentioned by Yoda. If they do this then I think PR will automatically be awarded.

Where there have been allegations of domestic violence made, even if you reach agreement before the hearing the applicant will need to ask the courts permission to withdraw the application.

At your daughters age her wishes will carry a lot of weight and as it stands you must be very careful not to break the conditions of your bail.

I agree with what has been said above. Realistically, your best way forward is to reach an agreement with the father, and in fact I would be inclined to suggest that it should be a meeting where your daughter is included, because she's now at an age where her wishes are going to carry a lot of weight in court, if it were to go that far, and even if the court were to make an order that she were returned to you, if she absconds from your house and goes back to her father, the police are extremely unlikely to intervene (aside checking she's safe) and the courts would probably then agree she lives with the father, so I can't foresee a situation were you would get a good result in court. Giving him PR isn't really going to achieve a great deal for anyone, again, at her age it's becoming irrelevant.

The only way I can see this working out well for everyone is to simply talk it out and for all of you to compromise - in addition to coming to an agreement, it may well improve the situation between you and your daughter if she realises that her opinion counts for something.

Many thanks. I do not want anything that aggravates my daughter so I am happy for her wishes to be upheld, I really don't know if understand what I am actually going to court for but I have written what the paper says below

So the papers I have say in summary
1. The First Hearing Dispute Resolution shall take place on XXXX in Dec
2. List for hearing of PSO on xxx October 2015. Time Estimate 30 minutes.
3. The mother (me), is prohibited from removing daughter XX from the care and control of her father or from anyone who he has entrusted care. She is to further not remove the said child from any school at which she is enrolled. This order shall continue further of the court.
4. X council is to file and serve a report persuant of Section 7 by 4pm on x day in December setting out history of its involvement with family and its recommendations for the living arrangements for the child/ren to include contact.

I have summarised the court order. So my question is. Is point 2 and point 3 linked. Its point 3 I oppose, I do not wish to have that condition imposed. Allegations are that I tried to forcibly remove her from her dad's house so I am wondering if I can use the following points as arguments.

- Daughter still hasn't found school place so condition is unncesessary. I also have a bail condition not to contact her so there is no risk for her from me
-Child was in school for 7 years and was removed because of bullying and she has since become a very confident girl achieving good GCSE under my care. I value her education therefore I would never remove her from school
-I understand the courts takes her wishes seriosuly and would support whatever decision my daughter decides.
-I had a clean record and no prior criminal records and this was a one off unfortunate incident

Lastly my ex, applied for schools before the alleged incident without telling me and with no PR. How will the courts look at that, he will argue because my daughter wanted to live with him but shouldn't he have followed proper legal channels then?

I feel like my ex has been using manipulative tactics to get my daughter to live with him. He asked to go on holiday with her for 2 weeks abroad, the longest he has. Whilst daughter was with him he started calling me challenging every single way I have been parented her and challenged how I educated her but my daughter passed all the GCSEs she did early this year. I was abroad at the time too and the next he tells me, and my daughter doesn't want to live with me anymore. On return from abroad when I was due to pick her up, he came out to tell me that she wasn't coming with me. He then said we should have an emergency meeting there and he summoned his daughter to explain what she was unhappy about. It all happened too fast and the following day I tried to get her to come home with me and that's when my alleged offence happened that I tried dragging her.

Despite my feelings right now about the whole thing I just want what's better for my daugther and her current wishes to be upheld.

From what was written on the papers you have, it sounds to me that the father has already obtained an interim PSO which would have been granted ex parte, this means without you being informed.

The hearing in October is set to allow you, the respondent, to defend your position and oppose the interim Order if you so wish.Your ex will have made an application for what is called an urgent no notice PSO which it seems the court have granted, but when this happens the respondent is given a chance to challenge this., hence the hearing in October.

I doubt you will be able to stop the PSO as you are currently on bail for assaulting your daughter and this will be a big factor in the courts decision, that and your daughters wishes. The courts are always extremely cautious where the safety of a child is concerned and they will want to wait until the Section 7 is filed and the outcome of the situation with the assault is decided.

You will be given the opportunity to put your side across when the Section 7 report is being compiled, you will be interviewed for the purposes of the report, as will your ex and your daughter and from that the reporting officer will make their recommendations.

As far as the courts position on the ex looking for schools prior to the alleged incident, in my opinion it won't have much effect on the case as he could say that his daughter had expressed the wish to live with him, I wouldn't put too emphasis on the possible repercussions for him....the court are really not interested in anything but the childs welfare.