Boyd v Dreher is a recent Saskatchewan Court of Appeal case where the Court determined that a parenting arrangement should not be centred around one parent who works an irregular schedule. Instead, both parents should be responsible for arranging childcare, so that they both have the opportunity to spend leisure time with their children.
Facts
The parties had two children together during 14 years of cohabitation as spouses. While the oldest child remained primarily with the mother with no dispute from either party, the younger child's parenting arrangement was informally arranged by both on a roughly equal schedule. However, this arrangement followed the father's shift work schedule so that he would care for the child exclusively on his days off. The father worked 12-hour shifts that required him to be away from home for 14 hours each workday, including driving time, on days that he was working. As the relationship broke down, the mother sought an alternate arrangement, arguing that the schedule centred solely around the father's work schedule, meaning that he was only parenting on days off, while the mother's parenting time included both her workdays and days off. The mother proposed an arrangement that the child would spend time in the care of each parent during workdays and days off.
King's Bench Decision
The judge in the Court of King's Bench ordered that the parenting schedule should not favor one parent over the other, and both parents should be responsible for work, as well as enjoy the benefit of spending time with the child during their free time. The judge stated that the mother's proposal to change the parenting arrangement would still allow the child to be in a shared and equal parenting arrangement, but with the specific schedule being altered. The judge granted the mother's application and altered the parenting schedule accordingly.
The Father's Appeal
The father appealed, arguing that his 12-hour shift schedule was inflexible and demanding, making it simply unworkable to parent while working. He stated that he had to leave the child unattended in the morning before school, or wake the child at 4:30 A.M. for childcare. He claimed that it was impossible for him to make arrangements for childcare and had no option but to return the child to the mother if he was forced to parent during work days, which would reduce his parenting time. He also argued that the lower court judge made an error by altering the status quo for the child, which should not be altered without a compelling reason in line with the child's best interests.
Court of Appeal Decision
The Court of Appeal dismissed the father's appeal. The Court of Appeal stated that a mere change in the parenting schedule, which did not affect decision-making authority or the child's primary residence, was not a change to the status quo. The Court reasoned:
[32] The relevant status quo prior to the Decision was that [the parents] shared decision-making responsibility for [the] child and shared parenting time on a roughly equal basis. The Decision did not alter any of that; it merely adjusted the days and times of exchanges so that the child would have more opportunities to spend time with, and be cared for by, [the mother] on her days off. [The father's] argument on this point rests on the flawed hypothesis that his parenting time cannot be considered parenting time unless he is completely unencumbered by other responsibilities while the child is in his care. That is not the state of the law; parents are often required to make accommodations for other responsibilities and commitments that arise while children are in their care. The mere fact that the intersection of other life events prevents a parent from constantly being in the physical presence of the child during their parenting time does not mean the child is not in their care during that time.
The Court of Appeal reasoned that parents are required to make accommodations for other responsibilities and commitments that arise while children are in their care. The Court of Appeal rejected the idea that a parenting arrangement should be based solely on one parent's shift schedule, and it emphasized that both parents should share responsibility for childcare when they are both working or not working.
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