Complicated separations
“Seeing your child two weekends a month is dramatic”
Sidney Kamerzin (the center/vs) wants to promote the alternate childcare of children. He convinced Parliament to change the law.
Separate fathers also want to spend time with their children.
Image/Westend61
A separation is always difficult, but it is even more so when there are children in the equation. You have to find a guard system suitable for everyone. In the absence of agreement, the parents go to the courts. And it is often the mother who gets custody. For Sidney Kamerzin (the center/vs), this family vision belongs to the past. Fathers want to get involved in the education of their offspring.
Valaisan has therefore filed a parliamentary intervention aimed at promoting alternate custody. And he obtained a stage victory. The text has been approved without opposition by the Legal Affairs Committee of the Council of States. His national counterpart has largely followed. A bill, with two variants, was therefore directly concocted by the administration. A rare fact that shows the transpartisan unit on the theme. The circles concerned have until October 15 to give their opinion. In the meantime, we asked Sidney Kamerzin to detail the project.
You are divorced with two children. Do you share custody with their mother?
Not on paper. We officially have a traditional guard. As we get along well, however, an alternate guard is applied.
It is your personal situation that prompted you to want to change the law?
In part. But I am also a lawyer. Many of my clients have told me dramatic stories. Fathers, and sometimes also mothers, find themselves overnight to see their children only two weekends per month. So from Friday 6 p.m. to Sunday 6 p.m. And that, when they took care of it a lot before.
How many parents are at Swiss level?
I don’t know exactly. The joint parental authority has become the rule since 2017. It applies to around 80% of separate families, according to a rapport of the Federal Statistics Office. But less than 15% of separate parents share custody of children equally.
SIDNEY KAMERZIN (LE CENTER / VS), CURRENTS NATIONAL.
PARLAMENTSDIENSTE / KEYSTONE
Two projects to revise the law are in consultation, following an initiative that you have filed. What do they want?
The goal is to promote the care of children who are as fair as possible in the event of separation or divorce. We are talking about alternating guard from 30%. The ideal would be a distribution at 50-50. Personally, I rather lean for the first version. She provides that the judge decides an alternating guard when a parent requests it and the conditions are met. The second version goes further. The alternating guard is almost systematic. I am less favorable. The most important thing for me is that parents can continue to have contact with their children despite separation. The courts tend to give custody to a single parent.
The judges do not do their job well?
I would not allow myself to say so. But it is true that there are different practices from one to the other, and from one region to another. I experienced it myself as a lawyer: some judges are more likely to grant a shared guard and others much less.
In Valais, are the judges rather progressive or traditionalist?
Like everywhere in French -speaking Switzerland, it is very variable. Some judges pronounce alternate guards or extended visit rights. Others are rather for a conservative family model. Today, the judge has a very important decision -making power. This is what we would like to change with the revision of the law. That the judge decides not according to his personal convictions, but according to the well-being of the child. Alternating custody is the best solution for him to have good relations with his two parents. And it is a child’s right, inscribed in international conventions.
An alternate guard would be almost automatic with the 2e Version put in consultation. Is there not a risk of leaving children with an abusive parent?
No. In both versions, the court still has the possibility of giving custody to a single parent or any if violence has been demonstrated. But there must be tangible evidence. And these cases are minority. Conversely, a simple conflict between parents should not prevent alternate custody. Alternate custody can also promote the settlement of the conflict and be in the interest of the child. He is no longer hostage of one or the other of the parents. There is no more emotional or financial blackmail so that it remains in one or the other.
Parents do not necessarily want to alternate. Do you want to force them?
Parents’ agreement must always take precedence. If one of the parents does not want an alternating guard or cannot provide it, he will not be forced.
The mother is much more responsible for children than the father. Is the alternate guard really just in these cases?
This family model is always less frequent. In the event that a parent wants to have an alternating guard and that he implements the measures necessary to obtain it, I find that it is really a good thing. Afterwards, he must be sincere and show that he can claim alternate custody, for example by reducing his working time. Questions for childcare and equality are intimately linked. If the father is more present, the mother can also return to work more quickly.
A parent who does not want to spend more time with his children, but who wants to pay less pensions, could push for alternate guard …
This is a secondary question. I do not decide the financial issues. What prevails is the child-parent relationship.
Rather than pushing for alternating custody after separation, shouldn’t we work for a better distribution of domestic tasks from the start?
It’s clear! And this is more and more the case when I look around. Both parents generally take care of children. With my initiative, I hope that this continues after a separation.
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