Vivienne Crawshaw: Court takes dim view of renegers

Renee had never wanted it to get like this. She had imagined they would grow old together, as her grandparents had, walking along the corridor of an old people's home, both with broken hips.

Here they were instead going up to the 10th floor of the court building in separate lifts with broken hearts.

Tom did not trust her anymore. That was what he had said in his affidavit.

He said she had taken the children out of their home environment once before and she could do it again.

He said he had not been able to see the children for three weeks while he found out where she was living.

As if he had been interested. He was so besotted with his scantily clad beach babe that Renee was surprised he had noticed she had gone.

Anyway, that was long ago, when she was still feeling the effects of his absence and everywhere she went felt lonely.

If she admitted it to herself, she had been in a very slight way heartened to hear the desperation in his voice when he had finally tracked her down.

It wasn't as if it was that much of a detective exercise, actually.

If he had paid attention instead of going off to secretly phone the woman whose sole interest in life seemed to be applying mascara, he would have picked up that her best friend and confidante had moved from Christchurch to Tauranga only weeks before, so Renee decided to settle there for a brief while.

The children were preschoolers then, although granted, she had delayed Amber's start at school by a couple of months while she was in transit, as it were.

She and the children had been living back in Auckland for the last year to be near her mother, who was a great help, although Tom had commented in his affidavit that she was poisonous.

That was a lie. It was just that after a few wines of an evening, she and her mother told it like it was, and they took no prisoners.

It wasn't exactly their fault that Amber and Jason had been awake listening for a few nights running. You had to let your hair down sometimes.

Renee's lawyer got her to sign an affidavit stating that she would not leave Auckland with the children without the court's agreement.

The case for Tom's access was due to be heard. The lawyer told her it would look bad for her if she left, and the Family Court would probably make her come back again.

The lawyer also told her it would not be a surprise if the court did grant Tom more access. After all, the psychologist appointed to the case had said the children needed to have a more regular access arrangement with him, and that Renee's frequent disruption to access for spurious reasons was bordering on behaviour commonly described as alienating.

What did the psychologist expect? Had she been let down by the person she had given her life to? Did she know what it was like hoping that the knock on the door was him, coming to say he was sorry and that he would crawl on broken glass to get her back?

The whole thing was a nightmare. So far, the system seemed to be punishing her for his wrongs! She just could not believe it.

When Renee's mother started seeing a man near Whangarei Heads she thought little of it. After all, her mother did seem to have a way with the older gents.

But later, when her mother moved up to help him run his motel, Renee realised it was serious. She fell into a slump, realising that her main support had vamoosed, just like Tom.

But Renee's mother, Jan, wasn't going to see her girl let down again. She knew there was a way she could carry on supporting Renee and it involved a wee bit of shenanigans but would be worth it in the end.

While Tom was on a business trip overseas - accompanied by the gorgeous Barbie doll - Renee and Jan upped sticks and shifted the family, complete with labrador, up to the Heads. The children were enrolled and started at new schools before Tom had touched down at Auckland Airport.

Renee and her mum had not quite bargained on the court's displeasure at her move. The judge presiding over Tom's latest (and, thought Renee, fairly fanciful) application was scathing at what he saw as a blatant disregard for the children's interests in the sudden move north.

He noted in his decision that he was unable to comprehend what could have led Renee to breach her own undertaking to the court not to move the children from their settled environment.

He referred to the psychologist's report and noted that she considered Tom was better able to promote the children's relationship with their mother than Renee was doing in regard to him.

In fact, Renee's move was consistent with her approach, which was to see Tom as surplus to the children's requirements.

The judge made an order granting interim custody of the children to Tom.

On appeal to the High Court, the decision was upheld, the High Court judge considering that the Family Court had taken into account the children's needs from a wide-ranging and careful perspective and that the High Court would have had no difficulty in making exactly the same decision had the facts been presented to it in the same way.

Interim decisions mostly (but not always) uphold the status quo. But where one parent acts so abruptly as to leave the other parent in a default setting, the court will act quickly to ensure that the children's best interests are preserved in the meantime.

* Vivienne Crawshaw is a family law specialist practising in Auckland. Vivienne@gubbandpartners.co.nz