parental alienation
Child Arrangements  |  Child law  |  Family law

How the court deals with parental alienation claims

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Walker Family Law
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Parental alienation is a term that comes up frequently in a family law context, including in the mainstream media, and especially on social media.

But the term is often quite misunderstood, and few non-lawyers will know how the family court will deal with a claim by one parent that the other parent has alienated their child against them.

Such claims will normally be made in the course of child arrangements proceedings, when one parent has applied to the court for an order that the child live with, or have contact with, them.

But before we look in detail at how the court deals with parental alienation claims we first need to examine what exactly is meant by the term ‘parental alienation’.

What parental alienation is, and what it is not

As mentioned above, the term ‘parental alienation’ is often misunderstood.

For example, it is often referred to as a ‘syndrome’, as if it was capable of being diagnosed.

But this is not how parental alienation is viewed by the courts.

There is in fact no legal definition of ‘parental alienation’. Perhaps the closest thing to an ‘official’ definition is the approach taken by the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (“Cafcass”), which uses the term “alienating behaviours” to describe behaviours where one parent or carer expresses an ongoing pattern of negative attitudes and communication about the other parent or carer, that have the potential or intention to undermine or even destroy the child’s relationship with their other parent or carer.

Cafcass also say that: “These behaviours can result from a parent’s feelings of unresolved anger and a desire, conscious or not, to punish the other parent or carer. Alienating behaviours range in intensity and their impact on children.”

As to exactly what type of behaviours can be involved, it has been said that: “These behaviours can include negative attitudes, communications and beliefs that denigrate, demean, vilify, malign, ridicule or dismiss the child’s other parent. It includes conveying false beliefs or stories to, and withholding positive information from, the child about the other parent, together with the relative absence of observable positive attitudes and behaviours.” (Johnston and Sullivan, 2020).

Whether there have been any such behaviours by one parent is simply a matter of fact for the court to decide. As the President of the Family Division has said:

“What is important, as with domestic abuse, is the particular behaviour that is found to have taken place within the individual family before the court, and the impact that that behaviour may have had on the relationship of a child with either or both of his/her parents. In this regard, the identification of ‘alienating behaviour’ should be the court’s focus, rather than any quest to determine whether the label ‘parental alienation’ can be applied.”

All about the evidence

The court will deal with allegations of parental alienation in a similar way to any other allegations that one parent might make against the other. In short, it will be all about the evidence.

The evidence will generally take two forms: the evidence of the parties (and any other witnesses they may call), and expert evidence.

The parties will give their evidence in two ways: in the form of written statements and orally in court, when the other party will have the opportunity to cross-examine them.

Whether or not an expert (for example a psychologist) is instructed to give evidence is a matter for the court to decide. If the court does direct that an expert be instructed, it will usually give detailed directions as to who should be instructed, and the remit of their instructions. The expert will carry out those instructions, prepare a report, and give evidence orally in court.

The court will normally decide the truth of the parental alienation allegations at a ‘fact-finding’ hearing. At the hearing the court will go over the allegations in detail, and decide whether they have been proved.

The findings will then be used at the final hearing, when the court will decide what order or orders should be made on the child arrangements application.

The way that the court deals with parental alienation allegations can be illustrated by two case studies from real cases, one in which the allegations were found to be proved, and one in which they were not proved.

Case study 1: Parental alienation proved

The first case concerned a father’s application for a child arrangements order, for his son to live with him.

The background to the case was as follows.

The parties were unmarried. They had an on/off relationship, which ended when their son was born in 2016. Thereafter, the father had extensive contact with his son, including staying contact.

In or around December 2020, the mother made an allegation to her GP that the father had inappropriately touched the child. She also informed the father that he may not be the biological father, and that she was moving away.

According to the father, this coincided with him requesting parental responsibility. The father stopped seeing the child in January 2021, when the mother suddenly relocated from Kent to Manchester, without giving the father her new address.

The father then made his application, in April 2021.

The court ordered a psychological assessment of the family and for the local authority to investigate the case and prepare a report.

Both the psychological assessment and the report were clear that there had been parental alienation on the part of the mother which would cause significant harm to the child, and that the child had already suffered emotional and psychological harm in the care of his mother.

The local authority also very clearly recommended a change of residence for the child, from the mother to the father.

The mother had been found to have been continually reporting that the child had been sexually harmed by his father, despite an investigation by Children’s Services finding no evidence of this. The allegations against the father had been made in order to alienate the father after he had indicated to the mother that he wanted to be named on the child’s birth certificate, to enable him to have parental responsibility.

In the light of these findings the court made an order in June 2022 that the child should be moved to live with his father, pending further assessment and a final hearing.

The final hearing took place in March this year.

The evidence at the final hearing was clear: the child had suffered, and would continue to suffer, from significant emotional harm if returned to the care of his mother.

Accordingly, the judge had no hesitation in concluding that the child should remain living with his father. She therefore ordered that the child should live with the father.

Case study 2: Parental alienation not proved

The second case illustrates a not uncommon phenomenon: an allegation of alienating behaviour being used as a counter-allegation to an allegation of domestic abuse.

The case concerned a mother’s application for a child arrangements order for the children, who were aged 12 and 9, to live with her. At the time the children were having no direct contact with their father, consistent with their expressed wishes.

In connection with her application the mother made numerous allegations of serious domestic abuse against the father. The father, in turn, alleged that the mother had alienated the children against him.

The court fixed a fact-finding hearing to determine the truth of the parties’ allegations against each other. The hearing took place over six days, in March this year.

The full findings after such a long hearing would obviously take some time to repeat. In short, the court made findings of fact in respect of the father’s use of coercive controlling behaviour towards the children and towards the mother, neglect of the younger child’s medical needs, financial control over the mother, making major decisions about the children’s lives without the mother’s consent, providing misleading information to the court and using court proceedings to emotionally torment the children and the mother.

Further, and most significantly, the court made findings that the father had raped the mother.

Meanwhile, the court found none of the father’s allegations to be proved.

It should also be noted that the court made an order that the father pay the mother’s legal costs, which were assessed at £50,445.40.

At the next hearing, a Dispute Resolution Appointment, the father indicated that he did not accept the court’s findings, but did accept that until and unless the findings were successfully appealed they were binding on all parties, and for that reason he did “not oppose anything.”

Accordingly, the court made an order that the children live with the mother, and have indirect contact only with the father.

But that was not all. The court also made an order permitting the mother to change the children’s surname, an order restricting the father’s parental responsibility for the children (including prohibiting him from communicating with their schools), and an order barring the father from making any application in relation to the children without the court’s permission, until the youngest child attains the age of 16.

Obviously, this case was just as much about domestic abuse as parental alienation, but it does demonstrate the lengths that the court is prepared to go to establish the truth of allegations by one parent against the other. Parental alienation allegations are a serious matter, and the truth of the allegations is likely to have a considerable bearing upon the outcome of the case.