A FIVE-YEAR-OLD boy from Southampton is today at the centre of a cross-Channel custody battle.

Little Tommy Donaldson's bags are packed and he must say goodbye to his mother and older siblings after a court ruled he must return to France tomorrow to live with his father.

The youngster's mother Vicky Donaldson, 38, of Manor Farm Road, Bitterne, has been ordered by the High Court to return her youngest child to the temporary custody of his father Alistair, who lives in Vendee, where the family set up home in 2002.

Now Mrs Donaldson and her other three children, Jody, 15; Lucy, 13 and Jamie, 11, will have to say goodbye to Tommy, Mr Donaldson's only child, until a French court decides which parent should have custody.

"I want people to know the pitfalls of moving abroad for any length of time and the way it affects your rights," Mrs Donaldson said.

The whole family moved to France in February 2002 to build a new life, but in the following July after the couple's marriage broke down, Mrs Donaldson moved home to Southampton with her children.

During Tommy's visit to France in August 2003, however, Mr Donaldson successfully applied for a temporary residence order for his son.

When Tommy returned to England for the summer holidays, as permitted through the court order, Mrs Donaldson discovered the order had lapsed and decided not to return him to his father in France.

Yesterday a judge at the High Court in London ruled that in keeping her young son, Mrs Donaldson had broken the Hague Convention, a law drawn up more than 20 years ago to stop or redress the unilateral removal of children between different countries.

Today Tommy is being returned to his father, who will be taking him back to France tomorrow.

"Tommy is absolutely distraught," said Mrs Donaldson.

"He has started at Bitterne Park School and he loves it. He can't bear to think about going back to France. Neither can my other children. They are all incredibly close.

"Now Tommy is going back to an isolated house in the middle of nowhere, away from his family environment."

Mrs Donaldson and her family must now wait until next year for the French courts to decide who should have custody of Tommy.

"I have been fighting this for more than a year so I have hardened up, but it is tearing my heart out," she said.

"Tommy is part of our family. I am a good mother. I don't deserve to lose my child because of some law."

Mr Donaldson, 41, who owns a cleaning business in Southampton but lives in France, told the Daily Echo: "The judge in France decided I had temporary custody of my son. A final decision has not been made.

"Vicky is not the one suffering. She abducted our son. She wanted to live in France but then decided she didn't like it so she moved back to England.

"My son was living in France. I took him back there to a home he was used to living in and put him back in a school he was used to.

"She broke a French custody order. It has now been upheld in this country and quite rightly so.

"If she has any argument she needs to go to France to argue in the French courts."