Dispute leaves family ‘homeless’

A mother says a Family Court battle with her ex-partner has left her and her three kids homeless.

The 26-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said she has been raising her children, all aged under 3, since her ex-partner disappeared with another woman in late 2018.

She was happy to be offered a job as an executive assistant on a good salary in Brisbane, seeing it as an opportunity for a fresh start. She made plans to move across the Tasman with her three kids in October.

But three weeks before she was due to move, her ex-partner filed a without notice application in the Family Court to prevent the removal of the children from New Zealand. It places a border alert on the woman’s name, and means the children can’t be taken out of the country.

In his application, the man claimed he had only been informed of the move three weeks before her departure. He said he saw the children every second weekend, and wanted to continue regular contact.

The reason he gave for the application being made urgently was ‘‘risk to personal safety’’.

However, the woman said she told her ex-partner in August that she and the children would be moving to Australia, and he agreed to it.

She said he was difficult to contact, with a history of methamphetamine use, and had only seen the children twice in the past few months.

She has a protection order against the man, shown to Stuff, after she provided evidence to the court that he physically abused her and made a phone call to her mother threatening to ‘‘destroy your daughter’s f ...... life’’.

The woman said her lease had expired on the property she was renting – due to the imminent move overseas, she had not intended to renew it – and she was now criss-crossing the country, staying in motels.

‘‘He’s done this not for the kids, but because he wants to keep me here and control me. He’s using his guardianship rights as a tool,’’ the woman said.

‘‘It’s like the courts are condoning the power and abuse cycle.’’

After the man’s initial Family Court application, a judge issued a memorandum saying his evidence was ‘‘very limited and there is no context to it’’. The judge gave him leave to file further evidence by the following day.

The man then provided to the court an email purporting to show he was only informed of the woman’s departure three weeks beforehand. But the email was fabricated, the woman said, and she believed urgent applications to the Family Court shouldn’t be granted without compelling evidence.

Auckland family law barrister Catherine Townsend said parents were facing long wait times for hearings in the court. She had just had a hearing scheduled for one of her clients that wasn’t until May 2020.

‘‘He’s using his guardianship rights as a tool.’’