It is a sad fact that a significant number of children lose contact with their absent parent following a divorce or separation. However, new legislation has come into force this week that amends the Children Act 1989 and, according to Karen Reynolds a specialist family lawyer at Davies and Partners Solicitors, the changes will give family courts more powers when making and enforcing contact orders on parents.

The new legislation came into force on the 8 December 2008 and will enable Family Courts to be more robust and proactive in dealing with difficult family breakdowns and disputes. A Court can now require parents to undergo a "contact activity" that will help maintain or improve contact such as attending parenting information programmes or classes or undertaking a domestic violence prevention programme.

With the new legislation, if a parent has failed without reasonable excuse to comply with the contact order, the Court can now make an enforcement order which requires the parent to undertake unpaid work of between 40 and 200 hours.

The Court already had and retains the power to commit a parent to prison for failing to comply with contact orders, but it is rarely used, mainly because of the impact that would have upon the welfare of the child. It is possible that under this new provision, which is more akin to a Community Service Order, the Courts may be more likely to use it.

Before making an enforcement order, the Court will have to be satisfied that it is necessary to secure the parents compliance with a contact order and that it is relative to the seriousness of the breach of rules.

Commenting Karen said, "Following divorce or separation a significant number of children lose contact with their absent parent or are the subject of a bitter battle between the parents through the Courts over contact arrangements. It is recognised that this has emotional as well as financial costs."

She continued, "The intention of the new legislation is positive. However, it remains to be seen whether sufficient resources have been made available to allow these new rulings to operate as intended in practice. Also, it will be interesting to see if these provisions will ultimately reduce or in fact fuel, the hostility that can often be a factor in highly contested contact disputes."