The High Court has ordered mirror custody and access arrangements for an Irish child habitually resident in Singapore, so the agreed arrangements can be enforced if needed when the child is in Ireland.
In a judgment delivered on 30 October 2020, Mr Justice Garrett Simons granted the parents’ consent application under section 11 of the Guardianship of Infants Act 1964. He said the child’s welfare was the first and paramount consideration and concluded that making the arrangements enforceable in Ireland was in the child’s best interests.
The application followed a May 2019 settlement between the parents, reached during proceedings concerning the child’s alleged wrongful retention in Singapore after a holiday abroad. The High Court had recorded the settlement as a rule of court in June 2019 and declared the father a guardian. In August 2020, a Singapore court made orders in almost identical terms and provided for the parties to seek mirror orders in Ireland. Both parents consented to the Irish application and to the High Court’s jurisdiction.
Justice Simons said the Irish application was not simply a matter of following a foreign order: the agreed custody and access arrangements had already been endorsed by the High Court. He also considered that Irish orders would support the parents’ plans for the child to spend extended periods in Ireland and assist enforcement during a contemplated stay in the United Kingdom. He found no risk of inconsistent orders or interference with the Singapore court’s jurisdiction.
The court appointed both parents joint custodians under Singaporean and Irish law, with care and control to the mother and access to the father. Once the father travels to Singapore for the contemplated 12-month period, exclusive parenting time is to be divided approximately 60% to the mother and 40% to the father. The stated schedule gives the father Thursday to Sunday in one week and Tuesday to Thursday in the next; the parents may change it by agreement.
The judgment’s order also records a planned two-week summer holiday in Ireland in 2020, with the father to pay the parties’ and child’s return flights. Justice Simons declined to make orders about historic arrangements from summer 2019. He invited the parents to agree the precise wording of the order and return to the registrar within 21 days; if they could not agree, the court would rule on the wording. Each parent is to bear their own legal costs.