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Parental Responsibility

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Step-Parent Parental Responsibility Agreement

This page explains how a Step-Parent may obtain Parental Responsibility (PR) for a child with the agreement of those persons already having PR for that child.

This process is for uncontested scenarios in England and Wales. There is no court hearing. There is no involvement of Social Services. This is not adoption.

There are two likely scenarios, but the process is procedurally identical:

Both biological parents alive, but divorced, and one or more of those parents has remarried. Their new spouse (the step-parent) wishes to accept Parental Responsibility for the child / children. If the other ex-spouse has PR, they must agree to this.
One of the biological parents has died, and the surviving parent has remarried. Their new spouse (the step-parent) wishes to accept Parental Responsibility for the child / children.

I believe that this also applies to co-habiting, and/or same-sex partnerships.

The process is straight forward, and it is free! All persons with PR for the child must agree to the process.

Download the form "C (PRA2)" from Her Majesty's Courts Service website, and follow the attached instructions. Basically you have to:

Fill out the form (do not sign it yet).
Take the form and required documentation to a local court to be witnessed and stamped. If one of the biological parents has died, take a copy of the death certificate along with you. You will need a full Birth Certificate for the child; a short-form one is not enough, as it does not list the child's parents on it.
Sent the form (and copies) to The Principal Registry of the Family Division, in London for registering.
Wait for the forms to be sent back. Congratulations! You now have PR for the child / children.

N.B. I am not legally qualified, and the information presented on this website is simply the distillation of information that I have found out for myself, together with the experience of going through the actual process. If you are not clear about whether this applies to you or how to go about it, please seek qualified advice. However, I believe that the information presented is correct, or at least correct enough for the vast majority of cases.

I spent a lot of time finding out whether it was practical or possible to do this. I had been told by Social Services that I do not have PR for my step-children, and as a consequence, they won't talk to me about mine. Now I do, and they must. I could have spoken directly to a solicitor I suppose, but I prefer to research things myself. I came across many council websites, usually in the area of Child Protection, and found that the information presented there to be ambiguous at best.

In the end, I found references to form "C (PRA2)" and from then on it was easy.

I believe that all Step-Parents should seriously consider accepting Parental Responsibility for their Step-Children. It can make some of the practicalities of life easier. I believe that a parent can grant PR to another person for a specific purpose, so for example I could have been asked by my wife to take my step daughter to the doctor's or dentist for treatment; but with a PR agreement, this is no longer necessary. I can now do this autonomously.

In practice I will have had all sorts of responsibilities for my step-children without the agreement, but having permanent PR makes things clearer for all concerned.
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This page was last modified: December 17 2006 18:06:48.