Parental Responsibility
“Unlike the mother, the unmarried father has no 'automatic' parental responsibility.”
To what extent is this an accurate summary of the law on parental responsibility? Consider whether compulsory joint birth registration in the case of unmarried fathers would be a helpful reform.
The Children’s Act defines parental responsibility as “all the rights, duties, powers, responsibilities and authority which by law a parent of a child has in relation to the child and his property”. The law does not tell us exactly what this means but in a broad sense it is fairly clear what is meant by this. ‘It is much easier to define a ‘normal’ family – a husband and wife and the children of their marriage – than it is to define the powers and responsibilities of the people in it’. Even though the law does not give us the exact meaning of parental responsibility in a list, it does tell us that all parents receive parental responsibility on conception of a child except unmarried fathers who do not. There is also no clear understanding on why unmarried fathers do not receive parental responsibility but we can look at different factors in which help us understand why that may be the law, and how if possible we could improve on this law.
From the point of conception the mother of the child has responsibility over that child. The mother has complete control over whether to carry on or terminate the pregnancy. From this fact it becomes quite obvious that unmarried fathers have no automatic parental responsibility, if they did then the future of the child would not just lay in the hands of the mother, but in both genetic parents. Parental responsibility lies differently in different cases of parentage; there are different circumstances in which it would be a problem if the unmarried father was given parental responsibility automatically. Improvement of the law with such thing as the compulsory joint birth registration could cause problematic towards single mothers with children
To what extent is this an accurate summary of the law on parental responsibility? Consider whether compulsory joint birth registration in the case of unmarried fathers would be a helpful reform.
The Children’s Act defines parental responsibility as “all the rights, duties, powers, responsibilities and authority which by law a parent of a child has in relation to the child and his property”. The law does not tell us exactly what this means but in a broad sense it is fairly clear what is meant by this. ‘It is much easier to define a ‘normal’ family – a husband and wife and the children of their marriage – than it is to define the powers and responsibilities of the people in it’. Even though the law does not give us the exact meaning of parental responsibility in a list, it does tell us that all parents receive parental responsibility on conception of a child except unmarried fathers who do not. There is also no clear understanding on why unmarried fathers do not receive parental responsibility but we can look at different factors in which help us understand why that may be the law, and how if possible we could improve on this law.
From the point of conception the mother of the child has responsibility over that child. The mother has complete control over whether to carry on or terminate the pregnancy. From this fact it becomes quite obvious that unmarried fathers have no automatic parental responsibility, if they did then the future of the child would not just lay in the hands of the mother, but in both genetic parents. Parental responsibility lies differently in different cases of parentage; there are different circumstances in which it would be a problem if the unmarried father was given parental responsibility automatically. Improvement of the law with such thing as the compulsory joint birth registration could cause problematic towards single mothers with children
Bibliography: Brenda M.Hoggett, Parents and Children: the law of parental responsibility (4th Edition : London, Sweet and Maxwell Ltd 1993) http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/09/25/rapist-wants-visitiation-with-child-borne-by-teen-victim/ department for work and pensions, Joint birth registration June 2008 (Home Office, 2004; Dodd et al., 2004; Dobash and Dobash, 1980; Walby and Allen, 2004) [ 2 ]. Brenda M.Hoggett, Parents and Children: the law of parental responsibility (3rd edition sweet and Maxwell ltd 1987) 3 [ 3 ] [ 10 ]. Andrew Bainham, Shelly Day Sclater, Martin Richards, What is a parent? A socio – Legal Analysis. (4th edition, Hart Publishing 1999) 27 [ 11 ] [ 12 ]. Andrew Bainham, Shelly Day Sclater, Martin Richards, What is a parent? A socio – Legal Analysis. (4th edition, Hart Publishing 1999) 31 [ 13 ] [ 16 ]. Brenda M.Hoggett, Parents and Children: the law of parental responsibility (3rd edition sweet and Maxwell ltd 1987) 77 [ 17 ]