School Holidays | Passports

Both parents need to authorise a passport to be issued for their children.

If you have an order for sole decision making you can ask the Australian passport office to issue a passport without the consent of the other parent.

If, however you have the following order in a parenting order, it makes it a much easier process to issue a passport for a child in circumstances where the other parent does not consent or fails to sign necessary documents.

1. 1. Pursuant to section 11(1)(b)(i) of the Australian Passports Act 2005 (Cth), the (Parent) is permitted and authorized by this Order to apply for and obtain a passport/Australian Travel Documents for the child without requiring the consent of the other parent and the passport is to issue from the Australian Passport Office notwithstanding that one of the parents have failed to sign all documents necessary to do so.
2. The passport of the child is to remain with the (Parent). The (parent) will provide the passport to the (other parent) at least 14 days prior to travel. Upon the return of the (other parent) he/she will return the passport to the( parent).
3. For the purposes of section 65Y of the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) the (Parent) is   permitted   to   take,   remove   or   send   the   child   from   the Commonwealth  of  Australia  to  travel  internationally,  for  the  purposes  of  a holiday with the (parent) or for educational purposes without the written consent of the (other parent).

This last order is a good one to have as it is an offence to travel with a child internationally without the written consent of the other parent. This order can be made a mutual order in which case it would say:

For the purposes of section 65Y of the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth each parent  is   permitted   to   take,   remove   or   send   the   child   from   the Commonwealth  of  Australia  to  travel  internationally,  for  the  purposes  of  a holiday or for educational purposes) without the written consent of the (other parent), provided such trouble is in accordance with these orders.

Good to know

If there is a dispute over who holds the passport, you can seek an order that the passport is to be held at the closest Registry of the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia. Registries discourage this practice however, as the holding of lots of passports takes up space and takes up time. Parents also need to factor in getting the passport from the registry.

An alternative to example order 2 above is:

“The passport is to remain with the parent who last travelled with the child until such time as the passport is required for travel with the other parent in which case the parent who holds the passport will ensure the other parent has the child's passport at least 14 days prior to travel. On the return of the parent from overseas travel that parent will retain the passport until it is required by the other parent.”