I think part of this comes down to the court process itself. In our opinion, when an application is made to the court for the relocation of a child, the parent who is seeking to relocate the child should have the onus of proving why that change, which is a significant change for the child, is in the child's best interests.
In terms of the onuses that are outlined in the legislation, I think we see these more as complicating the litigation process. The vast majority of the time, the difference between substantially equal time is going to lead to situations where establishing the breakdown of the time that the child spends with each parent would become another issue within the litigation, when really the focus should be on what is in their best interests.
In our group's experience and opinions, the status quo is often in the best interests of the child. For that to be disrupted, especially when it is going to be a significant impact on the parenting time, as relocation is defined in this bill, then the person who is seeking to have a significant impact on the parenting time and disrupt the status quo of the child should have the burden of proving why this is in the child's best interests.
If the application is made by the parent who is seeking to change the status quo, it just makes it a little easier for the respondent—which is the natural litigation process—to reply as to why it's not in the child's best interests and to advocate why the status quo shouldn't change.