Barry Botha Breytenbach

Grandparents’ rights over their grandchildren

There can be no doubt that grandparents, more often than not, are intimately involved in their grandchildren’s lives and upbringing, and they provide care. But what happens when they are denied access to and contact with their grandchildren? Despite the generally recognised importance of the role grandparents play in the lives of many children, not […]

The legal duty of a grandparent to maintain a grandchild

By operation of law, the liability to maintain someone is based on three factors: firstly, the claimant’s inability to support himself or herself; secondly, his or her relationship to the person from whom he or she claims support; and thirdly, the latter’s ability to provide support. The common law and the Children’s Act recognise that parents are […]