Italy's highest appeals court on Tuesday ruled that separated parents who argue too much can lose custody of their children.
The Cassation Court made its decision on a case in which parents who had joint custody of two children in Liguria used their offspring as a means of getting back at their ex-partners.
The court said that in addition to ''constant arguing'', the parents tried to ''bring the children around to their side''.
The mother would behave permissively with her son - closing her eyes to unfinished homework, letting him go out often and buying him a scooter - while taking a hard line with her daughter because she wanted to see her father, the court said
It ruled that the two children ''showed signs of suffering determined by the inability of their parents to have a minimal dialogue, and the tendency to use the children as a tool to offend and get revenge''.
The Italian Association for Separated Parents (Gesef) hit out at the court's decision, saying that ''families will be destroyed rather than helped'' by losing custody of children.
''It's enough to consider the psychological repercussions of a child who is taken away from home,'' said Gesef president Vincenzo Spavoni.
''The State response to two argumentative parents should not be the removal of the children but intervention to help the adults,'' he added.
Italian Parents Association MOIGE added that wider recourse should be made to family mediators in such situations.
