Care & Upbringing of a Child

The care and upbringing of a child can raise complex legal and practical issues, particularly when relationships breakdown, families restructure (blended families), following assisted conception and when parents, children and families cross international borders. This can create legal difficulties for parents, children, donors, surrogates, carers and modern families under English children and family law, including issues and disputes about:

• Time spent with a child (e.g. with a known donor, co-parent, former partner, step-parent).
• Living arrangements for a child (including sole and shared care).
• Acquisition and exercise of parental responsibility for a child.
• A specific issue concerning a child (e.g. choice of school, medical care, foreign travel, religious matters).
• Financial provision for a child.

We provide advice, assistance and legal representation to acquire, protect and defend legal status, rights and responsibilities in respect of the care and upbringing of a child under English law, including:

• A child arrangements order
• A parental responsibility order
• A specific issue order
• A prohibited steps order
• A special guardianship order
• A wardship order
• An adoption order
• An order recognising  foreign adoption under English law
• Parental order for a surrogate born child
• A financial provision order
• Cases or disputes involving DNA testing

Our preeminent legal expertise resolves legal issues and disputes effectively and efficiently.  We provide innovative legal solutions to suit individual situations and needs to get the best outcome.

Louisa Ghevaert has dealt with numerous leading cases in the UK dealing with arrangements for the care and upbringing of a child,  including:

In Re X,Y and Z (Children: Parental Orders: Time Limit) [2022] EWHC 198 (Fam), acting for male intended parents who conceived 3 children through egg donation, fertility treatment and surrogacy in an important legal ruling where the English High Court stepped in and granted parental orders due to complex international conflicts of law between the US (California & Oregon), Denmark and the UK which caused serious legal difficulties with the children’s legal parentage, citizenship and residence arrangements and resulted in the Danish authorities threatening to deport the children.

AB v CD, EF, GH & IL [2018] EWHC 1590 (Fam), representing an intended mother in international contested assisted reproduction and modern family law proceedings in the High Court concerning 2 surrogate born children. This case marks a legal first in the treatment of blended families in the UK following assisted reproduction, divorce, re-marriage, serious allegations of domestic violence and abuse as well as the legal status and identity of two surrogate born children, their biological, intended and social parents and arrangements for the children’s care and upbringing.

In the matter of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 2008 (Case V) [2016] EWHC 2356 (Fam), obtaining a declaration of parentage in the High Court to secure the legal status and care and upbringing of a child in respect of a woman in a same-sex relationship following fertility treatment at a UK fertility clinic licensed by the HFEA.  The HFEA Consent Form WP was missing from the clinic file. The case for the first time gave guidance on the practice of making interim costs orders in favour of patients to fund litigation and access to justice following errors in the completion of consent forms at UK fertility clinics.

In JP v LP & Ors [2014] EWHC 595 (Fam), acting for the intended father in a high profile complex UK surrogacy dispute case following marriage breakdown and divorce. This case established for the first time a legal framework for the care and upbringing of a child in cases where the legal criteria for a parental order cannot be met, including wardship, and featured in The Telegraph, BBC News and Mail Online (6 March 2014).

In Re C [2013] EWHC 2408 (Fam),obtaining a parental order to secure the legal parental status and care and upbringing of a child conceived through a Californian (USA) commercial surrogacy arrangement. This case redefines the English Court’s approach to the authorisation of commercial payments in view of the UK public policy restriction against commercial surrogacy.

In Re IJ (a Child) [2011] EWHC 921, obtaining a parental order to secure the parental status and care and upbringing of a surrogate born child who was born stateless and parentless in Ukraine. The case highlights the legal difficulties associated with foreign surrogacy and the importance of expert legal advice.

In Re L (a minor) [2010] EWHC 3146 (Fam), obtaining a parental order for British parents who conceived a child with a US surrogate mother (in Illinois, USA). The case marks a legal watershed ruling that the welfare of the child is decisive over the public policy ban on commercial surrogacy in the UK except in the clearest cases of abuse of public policy and featured in The Telegraph (8 December 2010).

In Re X and Y (foreign surrogacy) [2008] EWHC 3030 (Fam), being the first case in UK legal history to test the law for British parents conceiving through an international commercial surrogacy arrangement and which involved complex and groundbreaking legal issues in successfully securing the parental status and care and upbringing of surrogate born children in the Ukraine, featured in BioNews (January 2009)

You can read more here.

“International surrogacy law: existing conflicts unresolved” (BioNews, comment piece by Louisa Ghevaert, 14 March 2022).

Apple podcast with Speak From The Body with Avni Touch entitled “Fertility law for modern families with Louisa Ghevaert” (26 February 2020).

Click here to read more about our media and commentary work in relation to family and fertility law, policy and practice.