What factors will the court consider to vary a parent's access order?

In Pang v. Pang, 2013 ONSC 2564, Mr. Justice Price considered that the mother's repeated breaches of court orders amounted to a material change in circumstances that affected the child's interests to such a degree to justify varying the order. He identified the framework in paras. 19 and 20: 19 Past decisions of our courts have identified factors the court should consider when asked to vary an order for child custody or access. These include the pre-eminent responsibility of custodial parents to make decisions affecting a child, a child's need for stability during the turmoil that accompanies separation and divorce, and the need to manage conflict constructively between parents in order to minimize its negative impact on the child. 20 Abela, J.A. in MacGyver v. Richards, (1995), cautioned judges against allowing an access parent to interfere lightly with a custodial parent's responsibilities, to serve what is alleged to be the best interests of the child. She observed that, because what is in children's best interests may vary from child to child, and from time to time, and having regard to the difficulty of deciding, objectively, what is most likely to be conducive to a child's having the best opportunity to receive needed care and attention, it is important to minimize the prospects for stress and instability.

Price J. considered circumstances where parents were in prolonged conflict at para. 24: 24 Murray J., in Jackson v. Jackson, (1995), referred to the damage the parents in that case were doing to their children by their prolonged conflict: As with many parents in high conflict, they purport to wage war for the best interests of their children... The practical reality is that they have no apparent interest in curbing conflict to minimize the potential of harm to their children.

At para. 81, Price J. referred to the decision of Corbett J. in De Melo v. Gooding, 2010 ONSC 2271: 81 As Corbett J. noted in De Melo, the threshold requirement for a material change in circumstances is not intended to condemn the parties to a lengthy process of dispute resolution that holds no reasonable prospect of enabling them to resolve their differences: This is not to encourage interminable court attendances, or unending participation in formal dispute resolution outside the court process. There comes a point at which the frequency and intensity of conflict may warrant a change in the overall custody and access regime, in an effort to reduce that conflict. In other words, the failure of the processes established by the parties may, itself, be a material change of circumstances, just as the apparent inability of the parties to work with a specific parenting coordinator could justify changing the coordinator in Litman v. Sherman. [Emphasis added by Price J.]