Parental Responsibility v Declaration of Parentage

Over the past 12 years or so, I have come to acquire a vast amount of knowledge about Family Law and social service processes but I recently encountered a new legal concept of which I was unaware - Declaration of Parentage.

A declaration of parentage is legal process governed by the Family Law Act 1986 which allows Family Courts to make a declaration that an individual is the legal or biological parent of another person. The declaration can have significant implications for inheritance rights, identity and the accuracy of a child's birth certificate. To the contrary of a declaration of parentage, a court can issue a Declaration of Non-Parentage which as one might expect, states that an individual is not the parent of another person.

A Declaration of Parentage does not confer Parental Responsibility, it only confers that a person is the parent of another person.

To obtain parental responsibility, a person, usually a father because Mothers are automatically granted Parental Responsibility, must obtain a court order from the court which specifies that they have parental responsibility. If they obtain a court order specifying this, it can only be removed by the court.

There are other ways to obtain Parental Responsibility, for example..

• If the father is married to the mother, parental responsibility is granted automatically.
• If the father is named on the birth certificate, parental responsibility is granted automatically.
• If the father is not married or is not named on the birth certificate, he can enter into a parental responsibility agreement with the mother - although personally, I think this is risky if the relationship is rocky or might breakdown. I much prefer concrete agreements.