Minister backs children’s right to see grandparents
YOUNG people from broken homes should have the right to keep in touch with their grandparents, the children’s minister has said.
Nadhim Zahawi, a minister at the Department for Education, said he backed contact between grandparents and children as long as it was in the child’s best interests. Mr Zahawi spoke out after The Daily Telegraph revealed that the Ministry of Justice had pledged to examine whether grandparents should get an effective legal right to see their grandchildren after family break-ups.
The minister told the BBC: “We all have had cases in our surgeries of terrible tales of grandparents not being allowed to see their grandchildren, when it is clearly in the interest of the child.
“If it is in the child’s interest, as it may be, to see their grandparents, then that is what should happen. If we keep the child front and centre, we will always do the right thing.” MPS from all parties are backing an amendment to the Children’s Act 1989 to enshrine in law the child’s right to have a relationship with their grandparents and other close members of the extended family. They complain that some “alienated” grandparents are being investigated by the police for harassment for sending birthday cards to their grandchildren.
The proposed change would require judges to put greater weight on attempts of grandparents, uncles and aunts, to win access to their grandchildren after a family break-up.
Currently grandparents face a twostage process, first applying to court for the right to apply for access, and then going through the formal process of applying for “child arrangement orders”.
Two thousand grandparents applied for orders in 2016 – up 25 per cent in just a year. The process can cost thousands of pounds in legal fees and take years. The review is backed by Anne Longfield, the children’s commissioner, who said that children get “huge benefits” from having grandparents around them.
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, she said: “I really want grandparents to be involved – there are huge benefits from children who can spend time with grandparents, especially when parents are rushed and have busy jobs and busy lives.
“It is a fantastic benefit. I can see the huge hurt and loss when grandparents can’t get access to their grandchildren – be that because of distance or because of whatever is going on within the family.
“It is a very important thing that should be looked at and I am pleased that the Government has said they are going to look at it.”
Ms Longfield also said parenting lessons could form part of a long-planned overhaul of the sex education curriculum because many new mothers and fathers were picking up tips from television programmes such as Supernanny.