Can my wife move back in and kick me out?

Found out December 2006 my wife was having an affair. She moved out March 2007 to be with boyfriend. She hasn't paid any maintenance for the four children that she abandonned with me, although that is likely to change very shortly as the CSA have been in contact. I know that she will struggle to make the payments proposed and the CSA are also talking about back-dating to last March when she moved out. She has said if it came to it, she would quit her job to make herself ineligible to pay CSA.

During the period between me finding out about her adultery and her moving out, she did threaten that she would get me moved out of the house by alleging (lies) of my unreasonable behaviour. In the end she decided to move in with boyfriend instead. Also, because I did not want to pursue divorce on grounds of adultery (mainly for lack of finances) she is divorcing me for unreasonable behaviour (more lies) and has told me she is prepared to do whatever is necessary to get what she wants "even if it means hurting the children". At one point she intimated that she would even be prepared to make child abuse allegations, if it served her purposes. I should add, all four children elected to stay with me in the family home.

So you see, I am concerned that she might be capable of anything. My worry is that if the relationship with her boyfriend didn't work out before our divorce was settled, or if she now thought it financially prudent because of the CSA situation, that she might try to seek custody of the children and move back to the family home and kick me out. Can she do this???

Given that she left the children with you and has been gone over a year, I think she would find it pretty difficult. What she can get away with alleging will depend partly on how old the children are. If she alleges child abuse there will be a social services investigation, in which the children will be interviewed alone, so you can't influence what they say. Social workers are unlikely to be convinced if the children don't say anything happened, or say categorically that nothing did.

If your wife takes you to court over residency then CAFCASS will interview the children. If they all want to stay with you then their wishes will be taken into account if they are deemed to be old enough to have understood the implications -i.e. if they are about ten or older. Even if only one child is that old you would have a pretty good chance of success as courts try to keep siblings together and anyway staying with you represents stability.

Good luck!

sadie