Well done guss! That is a very perceptive analysis.

RObert sorry if I gave the impression that I think all men are violent. Like Ringtail, I was married to a violent man but I have sons and I do not hate men by any means.

It certainly is a difficult issue to know how to 'punish' the badly behaved parent without punishing the kids.

I brought up the topic of violent men because I think Timkins needs to see the other side.

My ex never paid any child support. He would only work for contractors who paid cash. I never denied him access.

He would make arrangements to come and pick up the kids and then not turn up mostly because he got too drunk or stoned.

I didn't refuse him access even after this. After the first couple of times it happened, we prepared ourselves for the eventuality that he wouldn't come and had an alternative activity planned to ammeliorate their dissapointment.

I know that he was and is simply too damaged himself to have been able to do any better.

There really are a lot of unhappy badly behaved people out there and I think (as a psychology graduate who, like Ringtail got this while on welfare bringing up 3 kids) it is all down to the quality of the parenting.

Talk

guss, part of this might be an attempt to change the perception some have of welfare away from being a "right" and have it seen as a safety net provided for those who really need it.

There are some (and I'm not going to try and guess what percentage) who see welfare (and associated bits) as a legitimate alternative to medium levels of income.

Working full time in a fairly well paying job I was not netting much more than the ex when she was working one day a week and we were doing shared care once Income tax, C$A payments, FTB (A&B), single parents pension, rent assistance etc were allowed for. She has now suceeded in reducing my time with my son by a variety of means (moving away, PAS etc) so I am guessing that some of those payments will go up. Government support is seen as a legitimate alternative to supporting herself and carrying her share of the cost of raising our son.

Somehow we need to cater for the genuinely needy (parents left with most of the care of their kids by the other parent) and at the same time ensure that those who try and milk the system miss out.

Guss,
I would agree that the government is primarily looking at the dollar, as it has rarely mentioned the growing number of single parent families in the past. From a social aspect I have some concerns regards so many children going to day care centres or coming home to an empty house (because their one and only parent is at work).

Perhaps government should also be initiating programs to reduce the number of single parent families. Eg:- reduce the amount of divorce and separation by 10% every 5 years. One can imagine how well off society would be now if such a program was initiated 20 yrs ago.

Mollydukes,
It appears that you have gone to the next stage of trying to justify the number of single parent families. First start by inferring that fathers are abusive. Should this be disproven, then try and infer that fathers do not make proper parents. There can be other inferences made also:- eg children do not need fathers, men are not interested in children etc.

At all times never regard males as being disadvantaged in any way, and never make any positive comments regards the male gender unless absolutely necessary. It is the essence of feminism, and is widely used within feminist indoctrination and propaganda.

However I cannot see how over 760,000 single parent families in Australia (most of which are welfare dependant in some way) provides for quality parenting.

RObert there are those who see welfare as their 'right' and this is not a useful way to see things, but I object to the punitive way that this goverment is going about addressing this problem and wonder if it is really a problem?

The current policy only creates fear and more unnecessary divisions between the haves and those who consider themselves to be have nots.

It seems to me that your experience is from a more 'middle class' perspective. My perspective is from the 'welfare class'. When these families split, there are no assets to divide up etc.

Some of the resulting single parents are totally incapable of organising their lives so that they can find work as well as deal with their children. If there is some provision to equip them with the knowledge and confidence to do organise their lives so that the kids get looked after, then it could be a good thing.

The fact is that some of these parents (and I don't think we need to google for statistics) have never been in a family in which anyone worked. Their parents were part of the generation when there was 11% unemployment and come from areas in which there still is 30 - 40% unemployment.

I still believe this move is more to do with providing a larger pool of workers to oil the wheels of the economy and that the attitude is that there have to be losers and they don't matter all that much in comparison to the bigger picture.

I really is so unfortunate that some parents deliberately make life difficult for their former partners. So much emotion and hurt and lack of any attmept to see the other point of view, underlies and contributes to these actions. It seems impossible to remember that once the two people loved each other.

The problem is not that single mothers don't want to go outside and work, besides bringing up their precious offspring, it's just that they have no-one to help them do so.

Answer.

Get the Grandparents more involved! Give them more incentives for helping out.

And people with no relatives or helpful friends around them, of course should not be expected to work.

Latch Key children due to no example of unity or loyalty from the home would soon turn into criminals, resulting in even greater monetary costs for the government

I think there is a problem with measuring someone's worth by whether or not the have a 'proper job'. The very reason we pay taxes is so that we can live in a civilised country, where the vulnerable can be protected from the extremes of poverty. Some may see it as a bit of an indulgence, but I think that if we can afford to keep parents at home looking after their kids, then this is a good use of tax revenue. It is a great thing that we are lucky enough to be able to do this. It is much better to spend the money in this way if we've got it, than to return it to people earning $125,000 p.a. (or more), who don't really need it.
The welfare state is a good thing - it shows that we have advanced to a level whereby we can afford to properly look after the needy and the vulnerable, and we all benefit from this. If some people become 'dependant' on it, then is that really such a bad thing? The consequences of welfare dependancy are not so great, that we need to punish entire sections of our society who genuinely need assistance.