Judge’s difficult parenting call

Should a child be in the care of his methusing father or his alcoholic mother?

The father wants to change, has reduced how much methamphetamine he uses and is getting help.

The mother admits binge-drinking in the past or only drinking a little when she has care of the children but is not getting treatment for it.

The boy knows his father takes drugs and that his mother drinks. He wants to live with his father.

The difficult question was considered by a Family Court judge earlier this year. Mary O’Dwyer had to decide the case after Oranga Tamariki determined there was not sufficient information or concerns for them to intervene.

She said the paramount issues for her under the Care of Children Act were the boy’s safety, continuity of his care and his cultural identity.

The parents have been separated for three years and a final parenting order was made in September 2017.

But last year his mother brought a new application before the court concerned about the father’s drug use and the boy’s exposure to unsuitable people.

Changing the parenting arrangement would mean moving the boy from his school and community.

The father admitted using a tenth of a gram of methamphetamine weekly, in the garage away from the children. He used to use four tenths of a gram a week.

At a hearing, he acknowledged he was working on it and had reduced his use.

The father proposed he would abstain from drug use, undergo drug testing once a month and attend counselling.

‘‘Overall, my assessment of the evidence is that [the father] has only recently begun to face up to the risks of exposing [the boy] and the other children, when they come, to drugs.’’

The mother has a history of excessive alcohol use and the judge said she was troubled that she was not getting any treatment for it.

The mother had accepted that in the past she binge-drank, she had been drunk in public and police were contacted over inappropriate sexual behaviour in public.

The judge said the mother claimed she only drank minimally when the children were in her care and when they were asleep but the judge said her description was not frank.

Judge O’Dwyer said while the mother was a dedicated parent she had personal challenges with alcohol use.

The judge spoke to the boy without his parents and he impressed her as a very polite, very calm young man. ‘‘He has got a lot on his plate.’’ The judge decided that the boy should live with his father provisionally and dependant on a number of factors.

‘‘I would not be making this decision in this way because the risks of methamphetamine are too great.

‘‘I would not be making this decision if there was not a very strong love involved between [the boy] and his dad and the younger children and their dad, if I did not think there was the potential here for healing.’’

The judge made a number of orders including there be no family violence between adults or toward the children, that the parents are not be critical of the other parents or verbally abusive, that no person on bail or subject to district court proceeding should stay at their homes and they undertake substanceabuse programmes and provide reports to the court, and the father was to do hair follicle drug testing.

‘‘He has got a lot on his plate.’’ Family Court judge Mary O’Dwyer