Parents are still parents even after divorce

Divorce does not change the status of a parent. A parent is always a parent explains family law solicitor Kathryn McTaggart.

It always surprises me that people expect their status as a parent to change just simply because they are separated. Spouses come and go, partners separate but parenthood is something that you are stuck with for life.

The Family Justice System has striven to remove labels from family cases and certainly we have moved away from custody and access to residence and contact and more recently much more simply child arrangements which to me makes much more sense if we take the view that parents are still parents, they are just not living in the same house. We don’t need to talk about conferring extra rights and responsibilities or ‘superior’ parent status, we just need to sort out where and when children spend time with both parents which is a beautifully simple approach and makes absolute sense. Parents can and do parent differently when they separate and there is nothing wrong with that.