Hello dear lawyers (again)

[lovingboth]

Just checking - section 111 of the Adoption and Children Act 2002 finally came into force on the 1st December.

It gives unmarried fathers 'parental responsibility' iff they're named on the birth certificate (until now, you've needed a specific agreement with the mother or order made by a court).

But it only applies to (re-)registrations made on or after that date, doesn't it?

Comments

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

IANAL, but my understanding was very much that this (signing the birth cert with the mother) was a new, additional way of getting parental responsibility under the Children Act 1989.

My guess is that you're right that this can only apply to (re-)registrations made after the new Act came in to force. It's very, very rare for law to be retrospective, even when there is a compelling reason, and I can't see one here.

Unless I'm much mistaken, you can still get PR in the following ways:

- If the mother agrees, making a PR agreement - fill in form C(PRA) from your local county court/family proceedings court, take it back to the court with ID, then send it off to the Registry of the Family Division in London - there's no fee for this. The mother has to sign too.

- If the mother doesn't agree, applying to a court for a Parental Responsibility Order, or for a Residence Order (which gives you PR automatically).

- Marrying the mother. I think the mother has to agree to this one too :-)

You definitely very much want PR if you are the father and want to be sure you'll be recognised as such by professionals (teachers, doctors, etc) and the courts - but you knew that anyway :-)