My thanks to Jailhouselawyer for drawing my attention to this story in The Times today. It concerns the case of Re A Minor (Family Proceedings: Electronic Tagging) [2009] EWHC 710 (Fam), which was reported back in March. In that case the mother, who had twice wrongfully removed the child from the jurisdiction, agreed to be electronically tagged whilst the child was with her, in order to allay the father's fears that she might try to remove the child again.The Times states that: "Tagging and curfews could now be extended to hundreds of family court cases where mothers or fathers try to prevent access to children". But is this really the case? As The Times story goes on to point out, only three tagging orders have thus far been made in family cases, and it has been made clear that such orders would ordinarily only be made with the consent of the individual concerned. If this continues to be the situation, then I really cannot see them becoming very common. As for my opinion, I'm in favour of such orders if there is a genuine fear of removal and consent of the person to be tagged - anything that helps to ensure that the child will continue to have a relationship with both parents must, surely, be a good thing.
Somewhere around 3,000 children a year are illegally removed abroad, I understand (without checking the figures), and if this ensures that more remain here so much the better.
ReplyDeleteWhat I find interesting is that the courts are using this option despite the fact that the government rejected the idea; they were of couse quite happy to introduce tagging for non-payment of child support.
Dare I suggest that the judges seem to have more sense than the ministers?
It wouldn't take much...
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