Amanda Melton: Custody Battle Between Three Parents

The Court of Appeal is shortly expected to give their judgment on the case concerning lesbian parents who seek to marginalise the relationship between their son and his natural father. The focus of their argument is that they wanted to bring up the child in a two parent family. In contemplation of that they sought to reach an agreement with a close male friend and former husband of one of them (albeit in what is described as a marriage of convenience). They entered into an arrangement whereby he would act as a donor but would then have no further role in the child’s life.

There perhaps lies the first problem. He was their friend. He was the former husband of one of them. He was bound to come into regular contact with a boy whom he knew to be his natural child. Was he really supposed to play no role in that child’s future but stand by and watch others make decisions in relation to his upbringing? Whilst the primary carers are...

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