Many of the people both in parliament and private citizens have a weird idea of bringing up children, sure most children are as close to perfect as you can get, and some children - and parents - are not just a copy book example. The trouble with those making laws on such cases, many could do with Psychoanalysis themselves otherwise we end up with laws which do more harm then already exist. I don't have much - any faith in politicans, they sign a pledge to join a political party, "I promise to agree with the decisions of the majority of the party" seems to be the promise you have to make to join. I consider that that promise means that the person has no integrity, and little intelligence, and doesn't have the necessary intelligence to make intelligent decisions, and this been proved in many areas of government decisions of the economy. But certainly, genuine abuse and other harm towards children, pensioners and other elderly and the general public, should be treated very gravely.

"The Bill broadens the definition of "family violence" in tune with community perceptions and understanding to include not just actual or threatened physical or sexual assault but harassment, emotional manipulation, financial abuse, cultural, familial and friendship isolation and a range of dominating and controlling behaviours."

So anyone who has ever had a heated argument with their ex loses the right to see their kids, because of "emotional abuse". Anyone who has ever argued over money has "financially abused" their ex. Anyone who dislikes one of their ex"s friends is guilty of "friendship isolation".

No wonder there are so many allegations of abuse in family law cases. The few couples that have never done anything on the list are so perfect that they would never split up.

As YEBIGA said yesterday, seperate the question of custody from the division of assets and you will eliminate most of the bogus claims. Also lower the amount of money going to custodial parents. Many only want their kids for that reason. Money brings out the worst in people.

Fantastic if that's what really happens but from what I've seen of the output of those opposing the reforms put in place when Howard was PM what they really seem to be wanting is a return to maternal bias.

There has been no attempt to address the issues which contribute to false (or overstated) accusations - eg the winner takes it all aspect of property settlements and the lack of accountability associated with child related income. There does not seem to be any interest in reducing the adversarial nature of family law disputes with a view to reducing the reasons why parents might find it harder to work together after it's all over. There has be no talk from them of better way's of dealing with false or overstated accusations.

The current system encourages unnecessary disputes, Howards reforms may have made that process more difficult but the fundamental reasons for the disputes are still there. The changes being pushed for remove some of the roadblocks to unwanted disputes without changing the motivations for them.

R0bert

"a future free from abuse, neglect and family violence a real prospect for all Australian children"

The most likely situation where this is going to occur is if the child is living with its mother in a defacto relationship with mummy's new boyfriend.

Prior to the reforms, about 90% of children from separated parents ended up in this situation.

This is not a proposal for a return to "maternal bias". This is some sense in amongst the madness of the result of Howard's "reforms". What the proposals are aiming for is for the PRIMARY right of a child to safety over and above any parental rights. This is what should ALWAYS occur.

The current situation is resulting an children being sent to live with a parent who is clearly not capable of placing a child's needs first and act as a mature parent. I have even seen orders by the FCA that mean that children can not be taken for any medical treatment without the consent of the other parent and when that other parent has abused the child and left visible marks, then they are not going to consent to medical treatment. This is some of the frightening reality of the current FCA system and it has to change for the sake of the children.

It has to be about the children and not about the parents. That is the beginning, middle and end of the whole discussion and for those who believe that the current situation is better, then they need to go and read the reports that have lead to the proposed new changes.

Personally I do not think the changes go far enough. Much needs to be included that is currently excluded but what worries me is that people who know very little about the reality of the results of Howard's reforms will speak loudly about the unfairness of the proposals and that this ignorance will lead to this opportunity to place the safety of children as a priority being watered down and the children of this country being let down - again.

Tired,
"The current situation is resulting an children being sent to live with a parent who is clearly not capable of placing a child's needs first and act as a mature parent."

Who says?

Where did this come from, or have you just made it up?

Are you a feminist?

Interesting. Vanna, Tired clearly gives evidence for her assertion in her very next sentence of the same paragraph.

You however have chosen to quote statistics with percentages in your initial comment yet have not cited them at all. It is your argument which is not substantiated and it appears to be you making things up.

Your response is a clear example of special interest groups dodging and deliberately confusing and obscuring these very serious issues while continuing to use bullying behaviour to intimidate and upset those around them.

It is unsurprising someone such as yourself would object to the changes. You and the behaviour of those like you is the very reason we need them.

I realise that this post might seem out of place,but I am 80 years of age, and over the time have seen a lot of these problems which are happening now. As a child in the 1930's, I saw a lot of the same problems that are happening today, and by the same reason. Wives blame the husband for not being able to supply sufficient cash to provide for the family, and the husband - father also blames himself or his wife for being extravigant, or his employer. The whole cause does happen to stem from the low top tax which has been returning after 40 years, ask any person over 70 if I am right. A return to a sensible tax, top at 66.6% on $450,000, and no tax on taxable incomes below about $30,000. This would to be more successful than any other law parliamentarians would come up with, because their intelligence and integrity are in doubt - believe me. If you are in doubt about this, go on the internet and look up "Tax history of Australia" also look up "Taxhistory of the US", "Tax history of the UK" and if you look up "Taxes around the world" you will see why the economy is "globably" bad, low top taxes bring on a recession or in the case of the US, a depression, the workers suffer while politicans have a wonderful time, and some CEO's have obscene salaries.

Kerry "Tired clearly gives evidence for her assertion in her very next sentence of the same paragraph"

Are you serious? A claim to have seen order's regarding a condition in those orders without any reference to the background of that condition or a link to the orders is hardly evidence that "children being sent to live with a parent who is clearly not capable of placing a child's needs first and act as a mature parent". It's an odd restriction which I can't think of any situation where it's the best solution to a problem but it's in no way evidence of the claim.

R0bert

Kerry Davis,
Type “Child abuse + single parent families” into a search engine and you will find many studies and surveys to test your assumptions regards the wonders of single parent familes, with the mother as the single parent.

Also contrary to what the author states, the Australian Institute of Family Studies did not find shared parenting unfavourable, which is somewhat inteserting, because it is known as a feminist organization that has carried out almost no research into fathers over a 20 year period.

To Robert and Vanna,

Unfortunately section 121 of the FLA restricts the publication of identifying details of cases without the express permission of the court. If these cases had been ones that the FCA chose to release publicly as part of their select few cases that they release then I could refer you to those however this is not the case. There is one, however that I can refer you to and that is Robins & Ruddock [2010] FamCA 35. If you read this you are only left to wonder how such an order can be made.

The safety of the child or children must always be a priority.

Tired

If this issue really is about the safety of the child, you wouldn't mind changes to the amount of assets and child support that the parent with most custody gets. After all, its about children, not money, isn't it? As Robert says, people will always lie while money is involved.

The family court has to assess cases where both sides are making claims and defending themselves with all sorts of claims. It is easy to sit on the sidelines criticising. Making these judgements is somewhat harder.

Benk,

The current issue being debated has nothing to do with child support. Far too often certain vested interest groups have cried foul regarding the current child support laws. This debate is about the proposals to change the Family Law Act, not proposals to change the Child Support legislation. (oh and no I do not receive one single cent of child support in case you are interested)

Tired,
How many times have you read in the paper about a father mistreating their children at any time, or, of a father mistreating their children when they are granted permission to see their children every second weekend or half the school holidays.

Looking after children on the weekends or during the school holidays is the most difficult time (because the children are not at school), but now, there is to be a return to the presumption that fathers are not capable of looking after their children, when the children are at school.

Under a feminist system, the father has to give his children back to the mother on a Sunday afternoon, so that the mother can send them to school on Monday morning, and of course, the father has to pay the woman mnoney.

The Family Court has no interest in the child. If they did, they would be acknowledging the amount of child abuse that occurs in single parent families.

But I have never heard anyone from the Family Court even mention the child abuse occuring in those families.

benk "As Robert says, people will always lie while money is involved."

I don't think I said that. What I am saying is the the current approach places pressure on people to do the wrong thing and all to often leaves those who try to act decently in an unworkable position.

Tired my earlier comment re you post was about the claim by Kerry Davies that you had provided proof of your previous comment. I know we can't always provide proof and am Ok with that although I do get very tired of those who demand proof from others that they can't or won't provide themselves.

I do think that issues like child support and property settlements are very relevant to this discussion because they provide motivators for some to seek a level of child residency which they might not otherwise pursue. Some will lie or exaggerate concerns where there is personal gain to be made from it. Getting the bulk of the families assets (or getting to keep some of them) can be strong motivators for people to act unreasonable. A regular income stream with no strings attached can be a strong motivator for those with few employable skills.

It's crazy to try and have this debate without either looking at putting in place stronger checks to prevent abuse of the protections using false or exaggerated claims or by removing some of the incentives for false claims. I struggle to work out how to do some of that without the risk of making it more difficult to report hard to prove claims.

R0bert

What I am seeing is a broadening of “what is abuse” in this article. I’m not seeing family court, child support or shared parenting as anything more than a small side issues.

I can see govt agencies being given a plethora of reasons to remove children from their families.

It follows the not-for-profits and charities growing rapidly because we ignore the abuses that have occurred over generations in Australia via these NGO’s. Apologies later, but keep giving them children.

I thought the cherry on top was the Woods Report in NSW recommending that we privatise the care of our state wards. “How do we get even more children behind NGO doors” would obviously have been the next question.

Reworking exactly what child abuse is becomes the second cherry.

This NGO sector appears to have everything swinging its way and now even more opportunities to place children under their administration and keep them there until 18 years old.

These new definitions of abuse are about implementing more removals without looking at exactly where the children are removed to. Foster care benefits from privacy policies and laws so that once removed you have no right to information about these children.

I have never found research anywhere in the world that shows foster children do better than their peers.

Where in all that is reasonable does this have anything to do with the “best interests of a child being paramount”?

I have to agree piper.

Broadening the definition of anything is a big red flag! It sticks out like dogs balls.

Whenever someone wants to broaden definitions, it's for 2 reasons.

a) To inflate statistics for the purposes of 'raising awareness' ie funding for their cause.

b) Someone is having trouble obtaining hard evidence and wants some artificial credibility to be attached to what is mere suspicion.

What we have with broadening definitions always boils down to a witch hunt. As I said in the other article in this topic, it's actually a call for more accusations without changing the underlying level of 'abuse'.

What they should be doing is actually trying to investigate and prove abuse more effectively rather than lowering the bar as to what constitutes abuse to make it so they don't really have to thoroughly prove anything.

Even such an intuitive statement such as...

'Family violence and child abuse are unacceptable and cannot be tolerated.'

are very troublesome, especially once you 'broaden the definition'.

If you look at it realistically, there are many children better off with contact with a parent who ONCE raised their voice in an argument than being banned from seeing that parent.

With these new definitions, I would say every parent in Australia should have their kids taken from them. Ask any of your friends if their parents ever raised their voice to each other or were ever manipulative and then ask them if they think they should have been taken from their families

[Deleted for abuse.]

mog the only abuse here at the moment seems to be your comments about fathers who don't like kid's being used as pawns in the search for ever more of the asset and handout pie and runners ongoing campaign against accademics.

Just a little bit of trolling on your part I guess in the hope that you will get the response you deserve and then be able to claim to be a victim of male abuse.

R0bert

Houel:”If you look at it realistically, there are many children better off with contact with a parent who ONCE raised their voice in an argument than being banned from seeing that parent.”

I think so Houel, or smacked them or smoked a joint.

The weird thing is that children in abusive homes still do better than the foster children overall.

This I would call a reflection on foster care rather than children coping okay with chronic (chronic is my new fav word) abuse.

Identify abuse, just the basics, get that early intervention going. Get the NGO’s the hell away from fostering, give them early intervention administration where they go near no child/ren not in the custody of the parent/s.

What I find interesting is that here on this site the male female thing drones on, every thread that has anything to do with families - same old same old “boys smell”/”no girls smell more”.

But on sites where the children are in REAL trouble; the mums and dads are incredibly supportive of each other. They might spew on past partners or individuals but none of this menazi/femnazi stuff that bubbles to the top here like bath farts.

If you want to blame anyone for the lack of welfare for children look at the social engineers who have railed against the traditional family unit for the last 50 years. These include those who championed defacto relations (due to their own lack of morals,) feminist and now gay advocates. Commonsense shows that in most instances a child is much better of with a natural/father. Blaming laws changed by Howard stinks of the usual political hogwash which ignores the root problems that lead to neglected and abused children. Now many of our pollies live far from moral lives swapping partners as often as you change your shocks. If you think these guys have any answers you are fooling yourselves.

TPP

I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, I am genuinely interested in finding solutions to this mess. I know that you may well speaking from your extensive experience, but is there research that has found that children in foster care do worse than children in less than ideal homes?

Shayne Neumann,

Too often we have heard the chant “The welfare of the child is paramount” to believe you or anybody who comes up with it.

The major threat to children safety is the irresponsible politician and the hungry lawyer.

Late in 1974, a group of concerned men and women put to Senator Lionel Murphy that unless the rule of giving to one of the parents the ‘custody of the child’ changed to the natural principle of - “equal duty of both parents towards fulfilling the needs of the child”-, his new “Marriage Law” would have opened the gates to a flood of divorces and would have increased the number of suffering children.

It did open those gates and the Lawyers feasted on the disputes re: partition of chattels and ‘custody of children’.

I was among the ones that in the late 1960 formed the Divorce Law Reform Association, saw Lionel Murphy twice and proposed the “equal parental duties” principle.

Mr. Murphy was a lawyer, an indoctrinated lawyer and a terminal politician, who was resolved to make legislative history and would have succeeded if he only had been able to step out of his cult of the Law into the life of family and children.

The novel principle would have meant that if the child was to become a weapon, emotional or financial, at the mercy of a spouse, the child would have been taken away in an arranged accommodation at equal expense to both parents.

No more solicitors financially bleeding the parties.

No more children in danger.

It would have been harsh a condition of divorce, but just!

Just as the Courts of Law can never be

Pied Piper "What I find interesting is that here on this site the male female thing drones on, every thread that has anything to do with families - same old same old “boys smell”/”no girls smell more”.

But on sites where the children are in REAL trouble; the mums and dads are incredibly supportive of each other. They might spew on past partners or individuals but none of this menazi/femnazi stuff that bubbles to the top here like bath farts."

I don't think what's being discussed here is really about protecting children. The ones at real risk are mostly already known to the authorities, it's failing's of the general child protection area which should apply to all children rather than fiddling with family law where the real work needs to be done.

All I'm seeing so far is an attempt to increase the power of claims of abuse with no willingness to discuss protections against the abuse of that increased power.

I'm not familiar with Shayne Neumann so I don't know his history on this topic but Elspeth has a long history in the mothers rights groups and those supporting the changes so far have been the usual crowd wanting a return to maternal bias in family law.

As for "“boys smell”/”no girls smell more”" I think James, Antiseptic and myself are all fairly clearly of the view that on issues like this that girls smell about the same as boy's. Parents of both genders do good and do wrong, we are just really over the continued claims and implications that it's just dad's who do the wrong thing.

R0bert

Pied Piper,
It is totally to do with gender.

A father can readily get 80/20 with no questions asked.

If he wants more than 80/20, he will have to have a very deep pocket and spend years in the court system.

Why?

Because if he wants more than 80/20, it could reduce her child support payments.

Also, statistically the natural father is a very minimal risk to a child. Far greater risks are traffic acidents, suicide and accidental drownings.

I have not heard of the Labor party implimenting any programs to reduce traffic acidents, suicide or accidental drownings of children or young people.

Seems very suspicious.

My Blueprint to contain the entirely unnecessary destructive interference by legal representatives and the system to exploit the vulnerabilities and extort the financial assets of divorcing parents.

ABUSE/VIOLENCE - Exclusive domain of the criminal system and the police force. Unless convicted each party is assumed innocent for the purposes of custody/access considerations.

FAMILY ASSETS - 50/50 split in all instances unless otherwise agreed by both parties. Assets brought into the marriage to vest in a straight line over a 10 year period.

CUSTODY - default position is 50/50 split of custody except by consensual agreement or where a criminal conviction or mental competancy assessment precludes this.

MAINTENANCE - This remains a tricky issue. However there should be no maintenance considerations where custody is a 50/50 split. Parties should be encouraged to determine their own suitable arrangements.

This would isolate contention to those situations where there is a primary custodial parent and a non custodial or part-time parent.
This indeed is a most difficult area and where the parties concerned are most vulnerable.

Calculations should be based on the assumption that the custodial parent is capable of obtaining and sustaining work for atleast 20 hours a week. But the number of dependents, their ages and the living conditions all need to be taken into account. Arbitrary Schedules will be necessary but access to mediation over a 2 year establishment period is critical to ensure those schedules are fair and understood by all concerned.

You are probably right R0bert, my experience to date tells me everyone smells. I have seen the results of men, women, other children, whole departments, caseplans etc abusing a child. I don’t care who wins the stat war and takes away the child abuse crown.

What the gender droning argument does is smother everything else. It bugs me no end.

Skeptic:”The novel principle would have meant that if the child was to become a weapon, emotional or financial, at the mercy of a spouse, the child would have been taken away in an arranged accommodation at equal expense to both parents.”

Yuck and looks more like using the child as a weapon against the parents. Do attachment issues or the outright terror of the child being taken away from a parent come into that novel approach?

YEBIGA I like most of it but 50/50 custody doesn’t work unless both parents stay within usually the same school district and don’t remarry and have more children, step-children. And each is only allowed half a career? Unless throwing them at babysitters which kind of defeats the whole purpose. I really think a child is happier with one main home and visits to another.

Hey benk.. yep there is stuff from one google search, and a lot more wanted me to buy research - which I didn’t. :)

http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/186_04_190207/saw10752_fm.html

http://www.aifs.gov.au/nch/pubs/issues/issues26/issues26.html

http://www.childtrends.org/files/fosterhomesRB.pdf

http://www.law.virginia.edu/html/news/2003_fall/skadden_stocco.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2010/s2941023.htm?site=perth

http://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/cysrev/v30y2008i9p1081-1087.html

http://www.papermasters.com/problems-facing-children-foster-care.html

http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/CriticalThinkRxCites/JonesHarden2004.pdf

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3892/is_200805/ai_n27900730/

http://www.chapinhall.org/sites/default/files/publications/152.pdf

vanna "I have not heard of the Labor party implimenting any programs to reduce traffic acidents, suicide or accidental drownings of children or young people."

Much though I don't like the ALP I don't think that your comment is at all fair. I don't always agree with their solutions but they do work in all these area's. Like other parties they don't always get it right but that's a different issue.

YEBIGA, those assumtions would be a great starting place.
There will still be other legitimate considerations to deal with but as a starting place it would cover the vast bulk of situations.

One other issue which springs to mind would be a parent needing to relocate and sometimes that may be a necessity (eg just can't afford to rent/buy in reasonable proximity to where the family with one home and two incomes lived).

R0bert

Robert,
No special programs have been put into place by the Labor party to reduce what are the most serious risks to children.

Instead, they seek a return to the bad old days of "When In Doubt, Lock Him Out".

This is the system used by police if called to a domestic dispute. He automatically gets locked out and removed from the house and the children, even he was not guilty.

If there is any allogation of abuse by the father, the family court will automatically award custody to the mother, eeven if the allogations are not substainiated or not found true.

The Family Law court was installed under Labor, and has grown to be the most corrupt, unreliable, feminist and distrusted law system in Australia's history.

If

For an alleged feminist court system there is a hell of a lot of women claiming to be unhappy with it. Devious lying cows, they’re obviously up to something.

If you are a police officer and you show up at a domestic dispute where the woman is saying she was just attacked by the male… what would you do? Usher the man back into the house? What if it is the solo mummies boyfriend at solo mummies house? Shouldn’t we let him stay too cause Innocent Until Proven Guilty?

Should the police take the woman maybe? Or the children? Or kick everyone out and tell them to all walk in different directions.

You’re actually quite scary Vanna.

I saw a man a couple of months ago smacking his partner around in front of their young kids on my street, police called... several people came forward and told the police that they all saw it. You know what the police did?

Nothing!

The woman wouldn’t complain – who cares if she just got a beating and is standing there all marked up. They did mention they would tell DoCS. Why? They didn’t do anything since she shut her trap so why tell DoCS?

So yeah Vanna women do lie and sometimes it works out just dandy for the men don’t it.

TPP: "I saw a man a couple of months ago smacking his partner around in front of their young kids on my street, police called... several people came forward and told the police that they all saw it. You know what the police did?

Nothing!"

Frankly, I don't believe you. If there was an unprovoked assault reported and there were witnesses, then the complaint did not have to come from the victim and they would have acted immediately.

On the other hand, if there was a mutual argument that got out of hand, the police might well have decided that there was no real assualt committed and that the best course was not to escalate the issue.

It's very easy to jump to conclusions, which is precisely the problem with the proposed changes to the FLA.

TPP:"For an alleged feminist court system there is a hell of a lot of women claiming to be unhappy with it"

They're most often complaining that the Court gave some care of the children to their father. They're upset because the Court doesn't take their unsubstantiated word that their ex is a bastard.

It's pure sour grapes and vindictiveness. Read some of the stuff on some of the single mother's blogs if you don't believe me.

Read some of the stuff that has been posted here in the past.

Howard's misogynistic deference to Fatherhood is legendary.

His obedience to The Fatherhood Foundation, AFA, CDP, etc, enshrined homophobia and consequent childhood abuse, to alleviate this "detachment disorder/disease".

One hopes an astute humanistic and rights oriented approach will exploit this bill and the "emotional manipulation, financial abuse and physical violence" that defines strict Christian upbringing, to include psychological abuse, indoctrination, denial of cognitive development and in severe cases enforced social withdrawal. Children have no contact with the outside world, nor access to information.

Whilst cults like The Exclusive Brethren are extreme in number and power, practices such as "special" home schooling [bible vs education], teaching of supernaturalism not science, removal from socialisation and community engagement, are common in politically oriented Christian Groups.

Forcing ones gay child to be "cured", based on ones own delusional illness, is violence and abuse of towering immorality on many levels. Placing ones drug using child with faith healing groups using prayer, Jesus "music", exorcism, baptism and anti-psychotic drug cocktails - eg; anti-rights/anti-science Drug Free Australia who boast Australia's highest fatality rate - is criminal. Such practices combined with conscientious objection to vaccination, preaching of 'Zionist Conspiracies' and distrust of "hedonistic modernity" compete - on a parenting level - with paranoid psychosis, and childhood "neglect" of significant proportion.

Pied Piper I've held the view that the problems with the family law system are not particular feminist. Much of the grief revolves around the father as provider, mother as nurturer thinking. The feminist part has been solidarity with the sisters and providing skewed research to keep the perceptions of male as aggressor, female as victim going.

I think some women do have good cause to have grief with family law as well. The court as far as I can tell has moved a long way from the old maternal bias standards hence the frantic efforts of some to make changes which will make it easier to play on gender perceptions. I'm not sure that Howard got the balance right but from those who are backing the proposed changes and the issues they won't talk about I'm quite confident that they are not about actually making children safer.

The system though is still set up as adversarial and shows little interest in digging for the truth. Once the role of maternal bias is out of the way then it's the biggest scoundrel win's which will leave both men and women unhappy if they have tried to do the right thing and an ex has been successful playing nasty tactics.

There will also be people of both genders who are unhappy because the system works despite itself sometimes.

R0bert

Pied Piper,
The Family Law Counrt is a highly feminist system that also scavangers money from anyone who attends (both men and women).

It has very lttle to do with families, as most people who walk out of a Family Law Court have no family afterwards. Unless you call the feminist model a family, which is that the mother has the children while the father pays money to the mother.

We also have a highly feminist culture of divorce and separation. The so called Family Relationship Centers are just centers for separation or divorce. I count the word "separation" 10 times on the Home page of the so called Family Relationship Centers.

http://math.hws.edu/javamath/basic_applets/SeriesGrapherApplet.html

The proposed changes will do nothing to strengthen families in this country.

It has been the same cycle repeating itself whenever Labor gets into power. They plunge the country into debt, install social policies that wreck the fabric of society and are too expensive to manitain, and then after they are voted out, it takes about a decade to repair the damage done.

Dear Pied Piper
I and at many couples I know have a 50/50 arrangement. It works a charm. I wish I had done it earlier, as for the first 8 years of our separation I had only fortnightly access.

You are right, there are a number of prerequisites, proximity of living arrangements, flexibility with work and a resolutnees towards the inevitable whining from a new partner/s.

But the positives far outwiegh the inconveniences, for all parties. We as a culture entirely undervalue the critical role parenting plays in becoming a mature and rounded individual. Most people who, for whatever reason, never take on the responsibility for another remain trapped in their own shallowness; forever looking to distract and entertain themselves.

To start to correct some of the current tragic family law consequences, it is essential that we spend promotional and advertising money counteracting the shallow pop culture and promote parenting as cool, as the path to wisdom; and the single life as shallow, lonely, meaningless and depressing. What is essential is that both fathers and mothers desperately want to be parents.

And then, the rest will work itself out without the need for heavy handed litiguous intrusion.

Hey Anti, yeah I do read it and believe it and read other stories and believe them. I just see tragedy being used. When you have suffered you look for an enemy and once one is focused on people become very resistant to other information that might prove them not always right.

Was a true story Anti, I stood there saying “but we saw it”, “what about the kids”. Fully bleated really I was so upset, one of the kids was still screaming in the background. Stupid me that is when the officer said he would contact DoCS. This domestic went for ages, at one point one of them had burnt rubber down the road then the dummy came back with the kids. I was on to the police 3 separate times going “COME NOW!” No she never did anything back.

Four witnesses. Four of us saw it over like half an hour but the police officer said it would not go anywhere unless she said something and she’s standing there saying nothing happened while one little girl is literally jumping up and down and still screaming she didn’t want to be hurt. It was a Friday night or Saturday, waste of time ringing them in my area on those nights.

I don’t know what to tell you blokes, I don’t like feminists, some were mean to me because I wanted to be a housewife and not join the workforce. I held a grudge ever since but I don’t like what mens groups are saying or the way they are saying it, the children will pay.

I'm 100% behind you YEBIGA. Parenting being described as the hardest job on earth is complete rubbish, it is fun and pretty easy really. I had an awesome ex and bestest friend that turned into an idiot when a new woman was in his life for a short time, then he died… not suicide I should add.

Women can’t use the word separation vanna?

R0bert: "There will also be people of both genders who are unhappy because the system works despite itself sometimes."

Yep.

TPP

Your story may well be true, although it doesn't disprove that there have been other cases where trivial issues have been blown out of proportion. The police involved sound to me like public servants trying to make their shift as easy as possible. Lets not waste too much time over-analysing the laziness of coppers.

I've posted a series of extracts from the Fatal Assault section of the annual reports of the NSW Child Death Review Team on the "Safety first in family law is long overdue" thread. As far as practical I've tried to extract comments which might be relevant to these threads. That info was not always available and clearly fatal assault is the extreme end of child abuse.

There are also links to the CDRT reports page and a couple of reports on trends so others can read the originals for themselves.

What stands out from the material is that there was nothing in the material to suggest that shared care was a factor in any fatal assault of a child in NSW.

I do believe that it's reasonable to assume that if the amendments put in place in 2006 were as bad as some claim there would be an increase in fatal assault's by parents. I'm also of the view that it's harder to fudge the data for fatal assault than with lower level abuse. A shift in definitions or the level of proof required (acknowledged or not) can make a big difference to the stats for other forms of abuse which is less likely with fatal assault.

I didn't explore other causes of death eg, where neglect or poor supervision were contributing factors. They may be relevant but from what I've seen it would be much more difficult to put the data into context.

I do think that the proposed amendments have much more to do with politics than child protection.

R0bert

Robert

It's only a matter of time before someone expands the definition of fatal to produce data that supports their case.

Hahahaha!

That's gold benk. They will. Mark my words.

Maybe 'spiritual death', where someone feels like they have died.

benk I did say "harder" not impossible :(

There are way's the data can be fudged but I've not seen any obvious signs of it from the CDRT. One that comes to mind is in deciding which deaths to attribute to mental illness compared to other factors could skew the impressions created by the data.

Anti made a comment about single mum's who have re-partnered on the other thread. That's one I disagree with. I am an interested party though, my girlfriend has children.

I think the most dangerous thing the courts can do is leaving one parent feeling utterly ripped off. Leaving them with the sense that no matter what their actual actions they have been done over by a system that did not care about truth, fairness etc. As has been said a number of times on these threads people pushed hard enough don't tend to make their best decisions.

For those wanting to pick on single mums my impression is that the worst of it lies with those with a preference for violent men (especially those who are violent themselves).

Most single mum's and their partners don't kill children, most fathers don't kill children. A very small number do.

Overall fatal assault represented less than 2% of child deaths in NSW over the study period for the trend's reports. The maternal bias crowd are trying to create the impression that the situation is a lot worse than it is.

R0bert

R0bert:"Anti made a comment about single mum's who have re-partnered on the other thread. That's one I disagree with. I am an interested party though, my girlfriend has children. "

Well, you needn't worry too much, Robert. Although that household structure is statistically much more likely to be damaging that an intact family or a single-father household, it's still a very small chance. It's an even smaller chance if you, she or he are not Aboriginal and still further if none of you are poverty-stricken.

I do very much agree with your second point, but I think that sort of institutionalised behaviour is ultimately self-defeating.

benk, I think you've got it right. I'm sure Drs Flood and/or McInnes are working on a draft as we speak. Attorney-General McClelland and Minister Macklin will be demanding it post haste now that you've revealed its existence.

Houel:”Sure kids die, it's terrible and tragic, I get that. But there seems to be this focus on denying children flawed but still loving parents rather than helping said flawed and loving parents to be better people. As you said, some child deaths are not predictable or preventable. Lets be brave and accept we cant save them all, and have the courage to help children have THEIR OWN parents a bit more safely rather than taking the easy route of denying custody under the excuse of 'safety'.”

You ignore the rapidly expanding number of companies that will benefit from denying children flawed but loving parents? Is it my paranoid thinking that every time I turn around some new policy or proposed change to law encourages the removal of children? And there is only one industry that looks to benefit from them?

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=4124&page=1

If we do start helping parents then they have less income from foster children, which I suspect is their main income.

Woods Recommendations + Inflating abuse definitions = Secure position in the industry + Enable the removal of more children.

At a more practical level, who is going to stop them?

You’re right benk, looking at that one situation was silly, bit like looking at just one bridge jumper or child thrower.

R0berts postings made it clear that although tragic the number of child deaths by assault doesn’t appear to be a specifically male or female crime?

While the men and women decide who is to blame more children are being removed from both.

Sorry, I think I am crossing threads.

Pied Piper "And there is only one industry that looks to benefit from them?"

I think maybe you are too close to one of the industries and thankfully have missed another part of this. These amendments seem to be targetted at making shared care more difficult to obtain and relying on false perceptions of abuse of children to get back to maternal bias.

This article references the amendments which made shared care much easier to obtain and Elspeth is "Convenor of the National Council of Single Mothers and their Children". The amendments re shared care changed the system from one where maternal bias was the norm (even if not formally supported) to one where shared care was endorsed making it much easier for fathers to have a reasonable role in childrens lives.

The mothers groups have fought those changes using claims that they put's children's lives and safety at risk and the onus is on them to prove that has been what's happened. The fatal assault stats certainly don't support that claim. I suspect that they will be able to dig up some advocacy research to show examples of increased abuse but I'll be very surprised if there is material available which stands up to scrutiny..

My impression from the history of those supporting the proposed amendments and the things they won't talk about is that the amendments are not aimed at taking children away from both parents, just from the male parent.

There may be a side spin off for the NGO fostering industry but I don't think that they are the intended recipients of this.

R0bert

R0bert:” There may be a side spin off for the NGO fostering industry but I don't think that they are the intended recipients of this.”

Yep I have to admit to being too close R0bert. I should have said just the one industry I have found that appears able to benefit the most financially and I see the shared care issue as the spin off.

This shared care thing in a practical sense… well it doesn’t seem practical. Can either parent have a full career or the custody stuff has to be followed with Australia acknowledging parents need to be given the time to parent without limiting their chosen employment? I am assuming “shared” means “equal” have I got that wrong? I can't decide although this sort of says it...

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/lawreport/stories/2010/2944292.htm

Richard Chisholm: “It has some language that has led people to think that there's a presumption in favour of equal time, that is, that the children should spend equal time with both parents, unless, for example, there's violence or child abuse. Now the Act doesn't say that, but it does have some hints in that direction. And it seems to me that in that way, the Act needs to be clarified.”

Pied Piper shared care won't always work and people who want to have an real role as parents will need to make some sacrifices and look at their priorities. As far as I'm aware the act does not force shared care if neither party want's it. It's clearly going to have some difficulties with very young children or if the parents are unwilling to make the personal sacrifices required. Some of those issues don't have neat answers in an adversarial system.

When my son was younger I had to make more use of out of hours care than either of us liked but plenty of the kids in the same facilities had two parents working. I've been in one way or another across the single parent spectrum, shared almost equal care, weekends only and full time care. Thankfully I managed to avoid the no-contact think except for a few's when my ex was upping the stakes to try and force a change in residency.

I've managed to maintain employment (with a fairly supportive workplace). I've not chased promotion's as I think that would be a bigger impact than is relevant.

When I was going through the mill my ex had the expectation that the residency split should be 80/20 (or less) which pretty much maximised the flow of child support and other benefits. It did not seem to matter that I'd been a part of my son's life every day up until that point.

There will be parents who can't be bothered with their children or who just won't make the sacrifices required. They should not set the standard or expectations for the rest.

R0bert

R0bert:”There will be parents who can't be bothered with their children or who just won't make the sacrifices required. They should not set the standard or expectations for the rest.”

True that.

I think me and my ex worked it out quite well. I kept the kids and the house, he paid the mortgage and so his child support was reduced.

Four years of it the govt probably wasn’t too thrilled at paying my solo mother (aka child abuser) benefit, it was 250.00 a week and what child support he did pay went to govt, around 15 years ago now.

When I remarried I bought another house with new hubby and signed old house over to him for free.

So I got free rent and he got the house after 7 years.

It worked during that time I guess because neither of us was under any pressure to do anything else.

His work wasn’t as supportive, I don’t think if we’d attempted shared care he would have got the career he wanted, the children at toddler and baby stage and neither of us approving of daycare at all. Maybe that is parental alienation via employment.