Tragic frozen 14-year-old Brit girl’s father hadn’t seen her for years – so let’s stop parents using kids in divorce battles

IN the tragic story of the 14-year-old who chose to be cryogenically frozen what caught my eye was that the grieving dad had not been able to speak to or see his daughter in NINE years due to the visceral hatred from the mother.

That is a disgrace and its time we adopted American laws and stopped what is called “parental alienation”.

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If we had such a law there is no way the father would have been excluded from his daughter’s life as he could have simply gone to the courts.
The teenager died of cancer and it has emerged the dad too was suffering from blood cancer but didn’t know they were both in the same hospital being cared for.
Outrageous. If there is a divorce you would hope that both parents would set aside their differences when it came to their children.

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Instead some use them as battering rams in their war with the other half.

Not only can the child end up not seeing mum or dad (more likely dad) but can be psychologically harmed themselves which they can carry into adulthood.

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There are many aspects to alienation. I know this from a rather good lawyer website out of Orange County in California. They include:

1) Discussing in front of the child the reasons for the divorce/separation. Allowing others — grandparents or siblings are often the vehicle — to make disparaging comments.

2) Undermining the authority of the other parent. One parent influences the child to believe the other parent’s authority is not as important and should be disregarded.

3) The alienating parent allows the child to make decisions they don’t have the maturity to make, e.g. homework or bedtime, creating an illusion the child has more freedom at one house over another.

4) By creating the impression to the child that the new man/woman in their life is to be called Mom or Dad and allowing the belief in the child they have two dads or two mums.

Under our old friend the Human Rights Act all kinds of folk are entitled to a family life.

People like the dad who hadn’t seen his daughter for almost a decade were denied that right.

This should change.

Would like to hear from affected families. Please email [email protected]

Down to Roo

HAS Jose Mourinho completely lost it?

He claims it was the FA’s responsibility to look after Wayne Rooney to stop him swimming in the falling-over lotion until 5am.
Facts: Rooney is a 31-year-old married father of two. He is both the England and Manchester United captain. He earns £300,000 a week, has been famous all his adult life and bears the scars of previous poor public actions.

The responsibility lies with one person and one alone – Wayne Rooney.

If Mourinho doesn’t understand that perhaps he needs a drink.

Watch out, Theresa - Boris is one of life's Winnies

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IN a scene from the brilliant Netflix production The Crown Winston Churchill enters Westminster Abbey to a standing ovation ahead of Elizabeth’s wedding to naval officer Philip.

One of the guests remarked that Clement Atlee, who had defeated Churchill to become PM and was already seated in the Abbey, had received no such celebration.

Churchill had something the nation loved.

I saw something on a similar scale some years back at a party thrown by Spectator magazine when David Cameron arrived in near silence but the crowd erupted into rapturous applause for Boris Johnson.

Johnson too has something the nation loves.

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Which brings me to the current mutterings around the Cabinet table. They c and is considering giving him the boot. Could I warn Mrs M that would be a grave mistake.

Her alleged irritability follows him warning the Italians that they may find flogging their prosecco more difficult in future and using the B-word to describe an argument put forward by a Czech newspaper. In the difficult times ahead we want more of Boris, not less. His job is to attract all the flak from the EU while allowing No.10 to do a deal if that is possible (it won’t be possible).

Boris is that rare beast, a popular politician who remains enormously ambitious. In the event Mrs May makes the mistake of dumping him she should remember what happened to Churchill and Atlee at the Abbey.

And she would be the Socialist, not the Churchill.

Light at the end of the tunnel

WITH owner Roland Duchâtelet doing his best to run Charlton into the ground I am pleased to report there is light at the end of the player’s tunnel.

The anti-management fanzine I read while chanting “we are going down” having just scored against Port Vale (it’s a strange old world in SE7) is marvellous.

Well-written, insightful and knowledgeable – everything that is missing from the boardroom.

How about making the editor the chief executive?

One proud wife

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I JUST loved that look of admiration on the face of Yvette Cooper as husband Ed Balls finished his astonishing Great Balls of Fire routine on Strictly Come Dancing.

She knew, we all knew, there was no way the public were going to force him out of the show. His energy is such a joy. Strictly is about entertainment not ability. When they collide, great. When they don’t, the public will put an honest trier on an Ed-estal.

I hope he wins the glitterball for all us couch potatoes cheering him on. Do keep voting for him. Only four Saturdays to go.

Update on Omran

HAVE now heard back from Omran’s father – the bewildered little boy bombed in Aleppo – and he made it clear he doesn’t want the money being raised from prints of this picture of his son painted by artist Jolyon Madden.

So all the cash raised will go to the White Helmets who pull children like Omran out of the rubble every day.
I have set up the Just Giving page justgiving.com/crowdfunding/Omran and hope to get the prints to you by next week or so. They are £35 a time.

Rash of tickets

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I HAPPENED to catch a TV shot the other day of the diminutive Commons Speaker John Bercow sitting in a great seat at the ATP tennis tournament at the O2.

Despite making £151,526 a year (and living in a £1.2million house) my bet is that he didn’t pay for that ticket as he comes out in spots when putting his hand in his pocket.

In the last three years Mr Bercow has been given more than £40,000-worth of tickets and hospitality. It doesn’t matter if its Arsenal, Wimbledon, Gleneagles, the Davis Cup, he will be there enjoying himself at somebody else’s expense.

Mr Bercow came on my radar recently as he claimed in the Commons I was a “bigoted fellow” for asking if it was appropriate for a Channel Four presenter wearing a hijab to present news about the Nice massacre by a Muslim.

As you will remember I was given the all clear by the regulator but didn’t hear anything from Mr Bercow in the way of an apology.

If he was skint I could understand him taking the tickets but by anybody’s standards £150,000 is a decent whack.

Perhaps politicians like Bercow might improve their standing among voters if they acted like them and actually paid their way.

Some hope.