C
PART II
Recognition and Enforcement of Custody Decisions
This Part gives effect in the UK to the European Convention. The European Convention is complementary to the Hague Convention; it has been ratified by France, Portugal, Switzerland, Spain and Luxembourg and is likely to be ratified by other members of the Council of Europe in due course. It deals with the recognition and enforcement of a custody order in relation to a child under the age of 16 obtained in another Contracting State. The Convention enables someone who wants an order enforced in another country to make an application to the appropriate Central Authority in the country to which the child has been abducted to take steps, or cause steps to be taken, to discover the whereabouts of the child; to secure enforcement of the foreign custody order; then to secure the delivery of the child to the applicant. The Act provides that a registered foreign custody decision will be enforced by the UK court as if it were a decision made by the court which is enforcing the decision. Articles 9 and 10 of the Convention, which are set out in Schedule 2 of the Act, contain grounds on which the court may refuse to enforce a foreign custody decision. The Act also provides that the Lord Chancellor can receive applications for all of the UK and that he will transmit those relating to Scotland to the Secretary of State for Scotland.
The Secretary of State for Scotland will in his turn transmit any applications he receives relating to England and Wales and Northern Ireland to the Lord Chancellor.
As under Part I, this part of the Act provides that on receipt of an application solicitors will be instructed to act on behalf of an applicant under the legal aid scheme. Once a foreign decision has been registered in the court the court will have power (similar to that in Part I) to give interim directions for the protection of the child. There are also similar provisions to those in Part I for obtaining reports on a child abducted to another Contracting State.
Setting up the "Central Authorities"
6. Sections 3 and 14 of the Act provide for the setting up in the UK of three "Central Authorities" who will be responsible for carrying out functions provided by the Conventions and for co-ordinating requests from overseas countries in connection with child kidnapping. The functions of the Central Authorities for England and Wales and for Northern Ireland will be discharged by the Lord Chancellor, and those for Scotland by the Secretary of State for Scotland. Steps are already being taken to
/establish