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Find out why millions of grandchildren are unable to see their grandparents
Grandparents are calling for a change in the law to give them rights to see their grandchildren if the parents separate.
The move comes as the rising divorce rate leaves more than a million children unable to see their grandparents.
At the moment, if grandparents want to keep in contact with their grandchildren, they have to go to court twice - first to apply for leave and secondly for a contact order - which can be a complicated, expensive and very emotional process.
But Grandparents Action Group UK, a support organisation for those not allowed to see their grandchildren, and the Grandparents Association are demanding a change in the law to grant grandparents clearer access rights.
On average 120 distressed grandparents a month call the Grandparent Association helpline after being shut out of their grandchildren's lives. Grandparents have no automatic legal right to see their grandchildren. Unlike estranged parents, who have a right to go to the courts to seek contact with their children, grandparents have to seek permission from the court to apply for contact.
Grandparents groups have now issued "a call to arms" for the government to recognise the support of wider family members. At the top of the grandparents' manifesto is a demand to review the requirement that they have to apply for permission to go to court for a contact or residence order.
Free childcare
About 60% of childcare is provided by grandparents and some 65,000 households consist of grandparents looking after their grandchildren.
The unpaid army of grandparents plays a key economic role. According to a survey by Age Concern, one in four grandparents is the main carer, and grandparents spend on average about six and a half hours a week as substitute parents. More than two-thirds of parents rely on their own parents to provide some childcare.
The grandparent lobby wants to bolster its position in law by ensuring proper policies to implement the requirement under the Children Act that children in care should be placed with family or friends if possible, rather than foster carers or adopters.
The groups are also calling for a review of the arrangements for financial support to family and friends raising a child. "What's so important for many children nowadays is the perceived safety net reliability of the grandparent," says Hamish Cameron, a child psychiatrist who often advises the courts in children's cases.
"In many families they fulfil a psychological stabilising function for the child. This hasn't been valued enough in our society and it is high time it was."
Beyond the role of grandparent as emotional ballast, he points out that 300,000 children are brought up by grandparents, often with little financial support from the state. Many children end up going into foster care because the grandparents cannot cope financially, even though they want to look after the children and the children want to stay with them.
"To give financial support to foster carers but not to grandparents just isn't logical," Dr Cameron adds.
The Grandparents Action Group can be contacted on 01952 582 621
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