Can I Stop My Ex Taking My Child Abroad?

Your ex has family overseas. Lately they have started talking about a trip, maybe a holiday, maybe something longer, and now you are wondering whether they could get on a plane with your child and not come back.

Here is the straight answer. In most cases, yes, you can act to stop your child travelling overseas. You have three levers: block the passport, place your child on the Family Law Watchlist, and ask the court for an order. How much protection you already hold depends on one thing, whether a parenting order is in force.

The rest of this page walks you through each lever, how to move quickly, and what to do if your child has already been taken.

You can act to stop it if, and where it gets harder

You can act to stop it if:

• There is a real risk of removal: family or close ties overseas, a threat or a plan to leave, or a destination that is not a Hague Convention country.
• You move before the travel happens, not after.
• You can show that risk to the court with something more than a bad feeling.

It is harder, and speed matters more, if:

• There is no parenting order in force and no proceedings on foot.
• The other parent has an equal say in decisions and your child holds a valid passport.
• There is no evidence yet of a genuine removal risk.

None of these are dead ends. They just change how fast you need to act and what you will need to show.

What the law actually says

You might assume that once you separate, you get an automatic veto over any overseas trip. Not quite.

The picture changes once a parenting order is in force. From that point it is a criminal offence to take or send your child overseas without the written consent of each person the order favours, or a court order. The maximum penalty is three years imprisonment. Where parenting proceedings are on foot but not yet decided, the equivalent offences are taking the child (section 65Z) and keeping the child overseas (section 65ZAA).

The overseas-removal offence sits in section 65Y of the Family Law Act 1975 (the full Family Law Act 1975 is on the Federal Register of Legislation).

Do not just refuse the passport

The first thing most parents reach for is the passport, and it is a fair instinct. A child cannot leave the country without one. Refusing to sign the application is step one.

Here is the catch. Refusing to sign does not lock the door on its own, because a passport can still be issued in “special circumstances”. The real safeguard is lodging a Child Alert Request (the PC9 form) with the Australian Passport Office. That flags your child in the passport system for up to 12 months, or until they turn 18 if there is a court order in place.

Put your child on the Family Law Watchlist

The passport alert stops a new passport being issued. It does not stop a child leaving on a passport that already exists. That is what the Family Law Watchlist is for.

The court can order the Australian Federal Police to place your child on the Family Law Watchlist, which stops the child leaving from any Australian airport or seaport. Two things worth knowing: the watchlist prevents international travel, not domestic travel within Australia, and the AFP cannot add or remove a child without a court order. That order is what does the work.

How to apply to the court

This is the step the whole field tends to skip, so let me be concrete about it.

You are asking the court for two things: an order restraining the removal of your child from Australia, and a request that the AFP place your child on the Family Law Watchlist. If there are no current proceedings, you start with an Initiating Application. If there is already a matter on foot, you file an Application in a Proceeding within it.

What the court wants to see is evidence. That means a clear, factual, chronological affidavit setting out the real risk of removal and your child’s ties to Australia: their school, their home, their extended family, their routine here. If the matter is urgent and the courts are closed, there is an after-hours pathway to reach a judge. The court’s guidance on relocation, travel and the Hague Convention sets out how these applications run, and our child custody lawyers prepare them every week.

What to do if your child has already been taken

If your child is already gone, the tools change, and speed matters even more.

A recovery order is a court order that can authorise police to find, recover and return your child (section 67Q of the Family Law Act, recovery orders explained by the court). A location order (section 67J) requires a person or a government department to tell the court where your child is. For a removal to a country that has signed the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction, that Convention is the route to seek their return.

One point trips up a lot of parents, and it is worth stating plainly:

A lot of people are of the belief that they can go to the police station and ask the police to recover their children for them. The police are not going to act unless they’ve received an order from the court, and that applies even if you do have parenting orders in place.

So the court order is not a formality. It is the thing that lets police act at all.

Here is how fast this can move when you get in early.

We had a client, let’s call her Michelle, and Michelle had full-time care of her daughter, and the father had supervised time every second weekend, and after a visit the father didn’t return the child. He told Michelle he was going to keep her for good by way of text message, and she was completely distressed. We helped her file an urgent recovery order application, the court heard the matter within 48 hours and granted the order for her return.

That 48 hours is the whole point. The longer you wait, the harder it gets:

Act quickly. The longer you wait, the harder it becomes to get the orders. If you’ve waited months in order to get an order to return a child to another location, you have to think: the court needs to then disrupt this child’s life not one time, because they’ve moved to another location, but another time after that, and they might be hesitant or reluctant to do so.

Lawful travel: how to say yes safely

Not every overseas trip is a threat. Plenty of separated parents want their child to see family abroad or take a genuine holiday, and there is a safe way to do it.

You can give proper written consent, authenticated as required, or the parties can seek a travel order that sets conditions: the itinerary, a fixed return date, and undertakings about the child’s ties to Australia. Consent orders can lock a travel arrangement in so both parents know where they stand. If your child is already on the watchlist, their name has to be removed by court order before any approved trip can go ahead. And the up-to-three-years penalty applies to unauthorised removal, not to travel that both of you have properly agreed to.

A genuine holiday is different from a permanent move. If the real question is whether one of you can relocate overseas with a child for good, that is a separate matter with its own rules. The court’s overview of children and international travel after separation is a useful starting point.

Where to from here

If you are feeling helpless, scared or unsure of what to do next, you are not alone. This is one of the most frightening situations a separated parent can face, and it is also one where acting early genuinely changes the outcome.

We help parents apply for these orders every week, and we act fast because every hour matters. If you are worried your child could be taken, or your child is already gone, book a free discovery call with me and my team. We will tell you honestly where you stand and what your first move should be. Call 1300 614 732 or send us a message.

The clock starts ticking the moment there is a real risk. The earlier you act, the more you can protect.