Summary of Opinion — Outer House, Court of Session

Factual and Procedural Background

This opinion, delivered by Judge Braid on 12 December 2025, follows an earlier decision of 6 November 2025 in which the court determined that the children should not relocate to The State. A by-order hearing was convened for (i) the court to determine precise arrangements for the care of the children in light of that decision, (ii) to consider anonymisation of the opinion, and (iii) to decide how the court's decision should be communicated to the children. The parties are identified in the record as the Pursuer and the Defender. A curator participated and was to assist with delivery and explanation of a letter to Child A. The Pursuer and Defender had reached agreement on a number of standard term-time and holiday contact arrangements, but several matters remained in dispute and were reserved for the court’s determination.

Legal Issues Presented

1. What precise care and contact arrangements should be made for the children after the court's decision that they should not relocate to The State?
2. What anonymisation measures should be applied to the published opinion?
3. How should the court’s decision be communicated to the children?

Arguments of the Parties

Pursuer's Arguments

• The Pursuer proposed a term-time contact pattern including alternate weekend contact (with specified start and end times for different children) and the majority of school holidays (other than Christmas), together with regular video contact.
• In relation to the Defender's block of summer contact, the Pursuer sought one overnight stay during the Defender's period to avoid up to three weeks without in-person contact.
• For video contact the Pursuer sought a fixed schedule: every Wednesday at 6:00pm and every alternate Saturday at 10:00am (on Saturdays he did not have in-person contact).
• For Christmas contact the Pursuer proposed handover arrangements beginning on the day school breaks up until specified times on 27 December in alternating years (and similarly for other years), and sought a prescriptive video call on Christmas Day at 10:00am.
• The Pursuer sought that return from holiday contact occur at 4:00pm on the day before school resumes (for many long weekend returns) and proposed that term-time fortnightly contact resume on 17 January 2026 (the later date).
• The Pursuer proposed a 14-day limit for taking the children abroad on holiday and proposed the Defender retain and renew passports.

Defender's Arguments

• The Defender accepted a largely similar term-time and holiday structure but opposed the Pursuer's overnight request during her summer block on the basis that it would unreasonably restrict her holiday time with the children.
• On video contact the Defender was willing to agree to twice-weekly calls but disputed the proposed Saturday 10:00am time as inconvenient and potentially unsafe (e.g., while driving the children).
• For Christmas contact the Defender argued the alternating periods should operate to/from Boxing Day (as agreed for 2025) rather than the handovers proposed by the Pursuer which would sometimes allocate all of Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day in a single year to one parent.
• For Easter contact the Defender preferred a consistent arrangement each year (her proposal being the last ten nights of the Easter holiday) rather than an alternating arrangement.
• The Defender proposed that returns from holiday be to education (i.e., school) rather than the day before, to avoid brief periods where she would have the children for only a few hours and to minimise direct contact with the Pursuer at handovers.
• The Defender opposed a strict 14-day limit on foreign holidays, submitting that flexibility was required (for example, for trips to The State commonly referred to in the record as Australia).

Table of Precedents Cited

No precedents were cited in the provided opinion.

Court's Reasoning and Analysis

The court proceeded to address the unresolved matters by reference to the children's best interests, practicalities of implementation, and the objective of minimising direct contact and ad hoc communication between the parties given their animosity.

Collection/drop-off location — The court decided a hierarchy of handover locations aimed at avoiding direct contact and reducing the need for ad hoc agreements: (1) collection/drop-off from education (i.e., school/nursery); (2) failing that, handover at the parent-and-child car park of Company A (the supermarket identified by the parties); and (3) failing both, by prior agreement, at extra-curricular activities. The court explained that this hierarchy ensures both parties know the default handover point without needing to communicate.

Summer contact overnight request — The court rejected the Pursuer’s application for one overnight during the Defender's block. The judge found that such an order would unreasonably restrict the Defender’s holiday time, would be disruptive to the character of holiday contact (an opportunity to make memories), and would necessitate unwanted liaison and potential conflict between the parties. The existence of video contact during any three-week period without in-person contact was noted as a mitigating factor.

Video contact schedule — The court concluded that regularity and non-intrusiveness were important. It accepted weekly video contact but refused the Pursuer’s specific Saturday 10:00am proposal. Instead the court ordered video contact every Wednesday at 6:00pm and, on alternate Sundays (when the Pursuer did not have in-person contact), at 6:00pm. The same Wednesday and Sunday times were ordered during holiday periods for the non-resident parent. The court emphasised a need for flexibility over time and declined to micromanage technical issues such as occasional camera-off incidents.

Christmas arrangements — Having considered competing proposals the court preferred the Pursuer’s proposal for handover on 27 December each year, on the ground that returning children on Boxing Day would impose an unreasonable travel burden and reduce children's quality of that day; the decision was driven by practical travel and work-commitment considerations given the parties' geographic separation. The court also ordered a Christmas Day video call to commence sometime between 10:00am and 11:00am, while expressing a hope that parties might accommodate minor timing adjustments for the children’s wishes.

Easter contact — The court preferred the Defender's proposal for consistency (the last ten nights of the Easter holiday each year) over an alternating arrangement, finding no child-centred reason to alternate and valuing predictability and the likelihood that this would allow the children to spend Easter itself with each parent over time.

Return from holiday (timing and location) — The court balanced practicalities (school start days, suitcases, and parental work commitments). It ordered that where school resumes on a Monday, returns should be to education on Monday (with Child B returned at 2:00pm until August 2026); where school resumes on a day other than Monday, returns should be at 4:00pm on the day before (which will typically be to Company A car park under the agreed hierarchy). The court explained how this rule would operate in relation to Christmas, Easter and October contacts and noted specific arrangements for the start of the school year (including 2026 as Child B's first day at school).

Commencement date for fortnightly term-time contact in 2026 — The court addressed an anomaly arising from an agreed exceptional return arrangement at the end of Christmas 2025. The court ordered that fortnightly contact commence with the weekend 10–12 January 2026 and continue fortnightly thereafter, explaining the approach to avoid consecutive contact weekends for the Pursuer.

Other matters — On travel abroad, the court rejected a strict 14-day limit on holidays abroad and accepted that flexibility was appropriate; the court ordered that passports (which were held by the court) be released into the custody of the Defender and that she renew them in good time. The court declined to become involved in excessive detail about minor technical video-call issues.

Procedure and remedy — The court reviewed competing procedural pleas and conclusions and applied the orders described above to regulate care and contact insofar as necessary following the refusal to allow removal to The State.

Holding and Implications

HOLDING: The court declined to permit relocation of the children to The State (a decision reflected from the earlier opinion) and made detailed contact and care orders regulating term-time contact, holiday contact, video contact, handover locations, and return timing. The court declined the Pursuer's request for an overnight in the Defender's summer period and rejected a 14-day limit on foreign holidays. The court ordered passports (held by the court) to be released to the Defender. Procedurally, the court repelled and sustained various pleas-in-law and conclusions: it repelled the Pursuer's third to tenth pleas-in-law; sustained the Pursuer's first plea-in-law to the extent of awarding contact rather than residence; repelled the Defender's first, and third to eighth pleas-in-law; dismissed the Pursuer's third to ninth conclusions and all of the Defender's conclusions; and awarded no expenses to either party.

IMPLICATIONS: The direct effect is that contact between the Pursuer and the children is regulated by the court’s specific timetable and hierarchy of handover locations, video contact schedule, and holiday handover rules as set out above. The decision is case-specific and practical in its focus; the opinion does not purport to establish a new general precedent beyond the application of ordinary principles to these facts.

Representative and Court Personnel (Anonymised)

• Judge delivering opinion: Judge Braid
• Pursuer represented by: Attorney Shewan of Law Firm A
• Defender represented by: Attorney Allison of Law Firm B
• Minuter/court representative: Attorney Clark of Law Firm C
• Curator (participant assisting with communications to the children): Attorney MacKinlay