Adoption & The CSA

[rogerab]

Trying to help a friend of mine who has the following predicament...
In 1998, his girlfriend when 6 months pregnant went off with another guy. Father's name doesn't appear on the birth certificate. She stopped him having any access and said the new guy was going to bring the child up. CSA got involved and since then father has shelled out almost �40k in maintenance and there has been no contact since. He hasn't got a clue where they live or anything. Father is now thinking about doing something about it. He is worried that the new guy may have adopted. If the answers from the helpful people out there are "get to a solicitor fast!!" then that's fine and I'll pass that on. His questions are...
1) How do you go about finding out if the child has been adopted? Surely if adoption has taken place then the CSA will be obliged to pay back all maintenance since the day of adoption. I don't believe they would/would have needed my consent to adopt.
2) My name does not appear on the birth certificate which is a legal document required for many things. How can the CSA get away with making me pay maintenance if in the eyes of the law the father is "unknown"? Surely that's fraudulent??!!
3) Have thought about contact/access but I imagine after 8 years any court would say it's been too long.
Hope someone out there can help out my mate as it's really eating away at him. He's not interested in raking up the past and what he should have done etc. - more about what he should now.
Thanks for reading.

[lh8503]

Hiya

Don't take what I say as gospel as I'm not too sure I'm training as a social worker and have looked at Parental resposibility, as a father they would have no rights what so ever because he isn't on the birth certifcate, he wasn't married to the lady, and he hasnt adopted the child himself or made any legal agreement with the mother on access. So in the eyes of the law you don't have any parental responsibility. I can't see how the CSA can take money from him because of that but maybe because he hasn't protested and the mother said it was him they went a long with it I don't know how it works but as far as parental responsibility goes he doesnt have any which means he doesn't really have a say and would be very difficult to get access. I would definatley get a solicitor and a good one as your friend has a lot of issues that need sorting out. Hope everything works out

[alijangra]

If a women names a man as the father of the child it is taken to be the truth. If the man disputes this claim then he must partake in a paternity test. My ex went through this. Turns out he was the father and he had to pay maintainence from the day she made the claim. The child was 3 years old at this point and he had never laid eyes on it since 6 months old when his then girlfriend left him. My ex was not named on the birth certificate. His ex also had a new partner who she lived with and was 'dad' to the child.

[mycats]

If you father a child, you have to pay for it, it's as simple as that. unfortunately, just paying money does not give you automatic rights to see that child (or it would be like you were "buying" them)
The new boyfriend cannot adopt the child without your permission.
It doent matter one bit if your name is on the birth certificate or not.

[Goodsoulette]

They might have a residence order or the other guy might have a parental responsibility order for that child though. Courts like to prove its in the childs best interest to be adopted, also your ex and him have to be married and they both have to adopt your son not just him. You also have to prove beyond doubt that the fathers child is uncontactable, untraceable. They really have been steering towards parental responsibility agreements these days.

My partner wanted to adopt our son but I didnt fancy the idea of adopting him myself, so I said no.