Thank you Sunita Shaunak for drawing attention to this most absolute travesty of justice for abused children and their protective parent within the Family Court of Australia.

I am the mother of a child who is enduring court enforced abuse. Abuse that could and should have been prevented in the first place.

There is absolutely no form of redress for parents like me and I just have to be thankful my child has not been removed from me and given to the abuser.

In Australia 2008, Judges and Magistrates are, I think knowingly, forcing children to be sexually and physically abused. This horrendous, ugly secret must be exposed to the general public.

It is truly the ugliest shame in Austalia that highly paid professionals are complicit in the abuse of children.

Court enforced abuse of children is a betrayal of the people of Australia who believe the Family Court represents and cares for the safety and well being of children.

It does not, read the judgements and see how mothers who dare to fear their child is being abused get treated and face a barriage of 'psychiatric' assessments. Finally..read how the judge orders a reversal of residence because: "I find on balance it is more likely that the wife has fabricated the sexual abuse allegations" - reversal of custody - Langley and Bramble, 2008, FamCA 437

Lawyers acting for protective parents are forced to 'cover' up chidrens disclosures and talk the parent out of bringing fears to courts notice. It is counter productive to raise issues of abuse in the court without evidence that is completly overwhelming (eg for sexual abuse - DNA). It is highly unlikely she or he will achieve protection for the child, in fact the opposite can and does occur.

The current state of 'justice' in the Family Court is a complete betrayal of the human rights of children.

I look forward to the time when the court experts and all those who have assisted in children being abused for years on end are held accountable for the suffering they have created.

This article again reveals the awful truth that the family law system is unable to respond effectively to the abuse of children. The Family Law Council told the Howard government this in 2002 and it promptly intensified the culture which prioritises child division and distribution between parents ahead of their human rights to safety.
The AIFS Research report of 2007 into allegations of abuse in the family court identified that the majority of children's cases featured allegations and that the most common response of the court to such allegations was no response. The study found that there was no significant difference in decisions made in cases involving abuse and those which did not. The fashionable imagination in the family law la la land, which includes the courts and forced mediation, is that women lie about abuse, children lie about abuse on the coaching of their mothers and men's violence and abuse is either because he is being unbearably provoked by the wicked woman or he is grieving for the children she took away. The 'cure' is to give the abuser the children and make her stop trying to protect them or get them help. The family report writers normally exclude any verifiable extraneous records of abuse and injury and write the required abuse denying drivel, which they have been paid for, which the court then treats as a 'truth'. Report writers who step out of la la land don't get repeat business. The magic vanishing veil which makes domestic violence and child abuse go away is applied, and the conduct which child protection workers named before separation as so serious that they would remove the children if she didn't leave, becomes some form of mutual conflict game for which the woman is responsible, after separation. The family law la la land structurally reproduces intergenerational violence and abuse in families by making children survive childhoods of abuse, even when a protective parent tries to achieve safety. Thanks for exposing these human rights violations again.

I do not wish to distract from the terrible experience of parents and abused children at the hands of the Family Court.

However, I find the notion of "the rights of the child" to have no solid grounding in theory or practice, apart from the right we all have not to be criminally harmed.

But "the rights of a child" must include a grounded context, because of the relationship of dependency with a parent. Both child and parent have a right to be heard!

It seems to me a mistake by experts to talk of "the rights of a child" without including the notion of the dependency of the child on a parent. There are two parties involved, often three if you include both parents.

I had an experience in another jurisdiction (VCAT), which demonstrates the extent of deterioration of our judicial system. It was part of a vexatious conspiracy and divorce case, where - although no factual evidence was bought against me (only allegations), and although I was able to provide contradictory medical and psychological evidence - and so won the case, I was still ordered to pay the costs for my own defence!

In brief, anyone (if they have the money) can make another person suffer through vexatious allegations under VCAT.

Justice for kids,

Your situation seems pretty bad, but what would you say are the motives for Judges to 'knowingly, forcing children to be sexually and physically abused'?

Probably all evidence should be heard by the Judge, and it seems this is not happening if six doctors are pretty sure of abuse and one 'expert' is not. It seems (from this article) we have turned full circle from having an accusation of abuse be all that is needed to deny a child any contact with one of his/her parents, to the new situation of parents fearing all sorts of repurcussions from an accusation.

Some middle ground is needed. I wonder how you feel about all the parents who have created this situation by the false accusation tactics that brought about this new regime?

mog,

'The AIFS Research report of 2007 into allegations of abuse in the family court identified that the majority of children's cases featured allegations '

I'd say that's pretty overwhelming evidence there are false accuations flying around. If the majority feature accusations of abuse. Or do you think the majority of people with children who end up in the family court have at least one abusive parent? The male perhaps? The majority of male parents are abusive? What do you think?

'The fashionable imagination in the family law la la land, which includes the courts and forced mediation, is that women lie about abuse'
Is it so much more a stretch in imagination that some women lie about abuse, than the imagination you express above that the majority of families have an abusive parent.

'becomes some form of mutual conflict game for which the woman is responsible, after separation. '
Or perhaps the conflict is removed now that the parents aren't living in the same house? Do you not think that if the judge is confident that the situation both parents were in was the main factor in the environment of abuse, that now they are seperated, the children are not at risk and on weighing it up it's best for the children to have both parents in their lives?

Your words are very emotive and maybe for good reason based on your life experience, but I think you lack balance.

The claim "that PAS did not exist and has never existed" is either someone focussed on rhetoric or playing word games. Possibly their is some meaning where that claim is true but in terms that most understand it - one parent deliberatly sabotaging the other parents relationship with a child it is very real. It's a useful technique for someone with an eye to getting at an ex, grabbing almost everything during a property settlement, getting a basis to take a sea change, wanting exclusive control of decisions about the children or chasing the various benefits which supplement income.

How, ensure your child overhears half of a conversation which makes the other parent sound like they are being harsh. Cry a lot in front of the kids. Tell them when they are upset about anything the other parent has done how unfair that is how you are trying to protect them from that. Promise them a better life if only you can get the other parent to stop intefering and don't mention the downsides to what you are proposing. Give the child what they want with few boundaries or consequences and make sure they know that their wants are all important. Exagerate anything which might have bothered the child and turn it into fear - a raised voice becomes the other parent shouting at the child. Conspicuously have the locks changed, make sure the child knows that you live in fear of the other parent.

PAS hurts children and both mothers and fathers, whichever parent is most focussed on their childs wellbeing is at risk if the other parent is not mindfull of the consequences to their child of the damage done.

To ignore concerns raised by a parent about the behaviour of the other is dangerous, to assume that those concerns are never self serving is as dangerous. The ability to abuse children or willingness to use them for personal gain or benefit is not defined by gender.

Usual Suspect well said.

R0bert

Usual suspect please read a book called 'the batterer as parent' 2002 by l. bancroft and j. silverman published by sage. Your comments that conflict might cease once the couple separates illustrate that you are buying into the paradigm that violence and abuse occur because of the provoking behaviour of the target. Such a belief justifies abuse. The reality is that people who use abuse to get control over others in relationships continue and escalate those practices when their control is threatened - eg separation.
Yes most children's cases in the courts involve abuse allegations because 1. abuse causes separation 2.people can often reach and maintain agreements with non-abusing partners but cannot do so with people who use violence and so (futilely)seek court intervention and protection 3. abusers can use litigation abuse - eg repeated false allegations of breaches of contact orders to bring mothers to court.
Children need to be safe to grow and survive and abuse creates lifelong damage. Children who are abused often grow up to lives of mental illness, substance abuse, suicidality, poor relationships, impaired learning and earning, if they survive and aren't gassed in a car or drowned in a dam or chucked down a well. The system needs to take safety and survival seriously because currently it does not.

Well posted by all.

Having had quite a bit of exposure to the family Court as a supporting person, and during law studies, I can state that the Family Court is extremely poorly equipped to represent the children. I've yet to come across a situation where the needs of the children have actually overriden the bun fight between the parents. It NEVER happens.

As Mog pointed out. Any case that comes before the court, where the parents have not been able to come to some kind of workable arrangement between themselves re the chidren, would more likely than not entail some form of abuse by at least one of the parents, either towards the other adult, the children, or both.

It shows the ineffectiveness of the Family Court. It actually aids and abets, I like to think unknowingly, towards abuse of our children.

This is NOT a gender issue. Whoever comes up attacking with the best lawyer wins. It is as simple as that.

If anybody ever has to face the Family Court, quibling on the cost for your legal defense is the worst saving you'll ever make. My advice always is to find out who is the top in your area and make him/her yours before the other party does. You are extremely vulnerable if you believe to have right or the truth on your side and naively believe that that is all that is required.

Our court system is an adversarial system. Truth is not the issue, justice is. So you better make sure that you get the best chance at justice going your way.

Children are still seen as being 'owned' by another adult. Whoever comes up the best argument to claim ownership wins.

Because, unfortunately for the children, property and money is closely linked to them. Adults will fight ferociously for 'their' money/house/property. Children are also the 'best' weapon to get back at the other by a wronged spouse.

Firstly there will be people (male and female) who will tell the truth, secondly there will be people (male and female) who will LIE!

The difficulty will be sorting out who is telling the truth. Even lie detectors will give false positive/negatives.

There has been a noticeable world wide attempt to discredit PAS. However a piece of significant research into what is known as "maternal gate keeping" perhaps indicates that it is possible that PAS is a set of behaviours that bears more attention.

Mog wrote; "is that women lie about abuse, children lie about abuse on the coaching of their mothers and men's violence and abuse is either because he is being unbearably provoked by the wicked woman or he is grieving for the children she took"

There have been case histories where people who are now adults recant the stories that they told when they were children. The fact is that childrens stories can be influenced and distorted.

Protective mothers and fathers are having their children removed form their care when they express their concerns by the Family Court; the justice system is failing to protect children.

Convicted paedophiles are released into society "because they are too well known and will not get a fair trial" and given priority housing, assistance and police protection while their victims will suffer for the rest of their lives. The justice system has failed to protect children.

The woman across the road sends her children all through the neighbourhood begging for drugs, food, smokes, and money to pay her bills as well as beating them and not sending them to school. I cared for them, fed them and helped them, and when was away for the weekend they robbed my home. The police made application to the children's court to put the children into care; the application was rejected by the registrar as "the woman doesn't deliberately neglect the children; she doesn't know any better; they should stay with her and when her husband returns from jail and assists with their care, their family life will improve." The system failed to protect those children.

Regardless of your gender, the law in this land is failing to protect children. Barristers should not become judicial registrars, child welfare workers should.

This article is the wrong-way around.

Although PAS (Parental Alienation SYNDROME) is not yet recognised by the Psychological establishment, it doesn't take a brain-surgeon to realise that children can be BRAINWASHED by a custodial parent to hate their other parent. This is Parental Alienation and it happens all the time.

Forget the word "Syndrome". The mother doesn't have to have a "syndrome" for common sence to show that parental alienation is bad for kids.

Alienation is child abuse. These children suffer from horrendous trauma! An innocent kid who naturally loves Daddy, is punished or shamed by the alienating parent if they say that they love Daddy... Forced to lie, forced to betray the love they feel.

The problem is that many alienators really do believe the lies they tell their kids.

PROTECTIVE PARENT?
Statisitics show that the safest place for a child is with BOTH parents, even when they are seperated.

If a child is being neglected by an over-stressed single mother, or abused by 'mummies-new-boyfriend' the mother can sadly be blinded to see the abuse.

The only independent adult in the child's life is their father. The mere fact that there is another man in the picture acts as a deterent for any potential predatory abuser.

Look at the "boy in the suitcase" or any of the other horrific abuse cases... in nearly every one, the child lived with mum abd mummies-new-boyfriend'. (Not a loving step-parent, loving step-parents have my deepest respect)

If you want the statistics, children living with "Mummies-New-Boyfriend" have a risk of abuse, neglect and death that is 2,000% higher than kids who live with BOTH their Natural Parents.

We all know smoking causes cancer, well smoking increases the risk of lung cancer by only 25%.

Divorce is a 'winner-takes-all' game, that provides a financial incentive for sole custody. That's why selfish lawyers manipulate mothers into pushing hard for sole custody.

Sadly, sole-custody removes the protective effect of having TWO NATURAL parents.

So why does the divorce court Force kids into vulnerable single-parent homes in 97% of cases?

PartTimeParent@pobox.com
Citations available on request.

Yvonne, thanks that was very well put.

ChildAdvocate that is a distressing story. It must be difficult to see that happening and be able to do little about it. Not knowing any better is not sufficient excuse to abuse and neglect children. Too much is at stake.

James I suspect that PAS being discredited is a piece of semantics rather than a genuine proof that the behaviour described does not occur. I've seen it first hand both in my ex's tactics and in a former friends tactics against her ex so would have trouble believing that it does not exist.

mog, I'll watch out for the book. From my perspective the issue is more complex than just being about control. Sometimes isolation from the situation reduces the pressures which lead to abusive behaviours. Sometimes provoking behaviour does create the trigger that tips people over the edge, that does not excuse the abuse but I don't think all abuse is about trying to control another.

Sometimes it's about people not handling a particular situation or interaction well. Our partners can be the ones who best know our trigger points and we theirs. Day to day contact provides opportunity to hit those triggers which seperate lives may not. Shared finances, social calenders, responsibilities and lives create an entirely different dynamic to seperate lives.

Some post seperation abuse is the result of people trying to maintain control of others lives, I suspect a sizable proportion is a consequence of the difficulty created by our legal systems making it difficult for people to untangle their affairs from a former partner.

R0bert

If the reported remarks of Justice Bryant are correct, then it demonstrates even further how completely out of touch Australian Judges are with the realities of the lives of ordinary Australian people and that Australian Judges see themselves as some form of deity issuing edicts from above.

It also demonstrates the ignorance of Australian Judges of human rights issues and the rights of children as set out in the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child to which Australia was a signatory in 1991. Unlike in civilised countries which have also signed the Convention, Australian State and Federal governments have failed completely to embrace the rights of children and to embody those rights in legislation relating to and affecting children and in judicial decision-making. In particular Justice Bryant seems ignorant of the Right of children to have their views, wishes, and feelings made known in legal and administrative procedures and for those views,to be taken into account in any decision-making affecting their lives and welfare and their absolute right to be protected from abuse and exploitation. Virtually all legislation affecting children begin with the statement that the welfare of the child is paramount and this is strictly applied.

In Britain and most European countries, children are not seen merely as the property of the parents and their personal possessions but have the right in law to appoint and instruct their own legal counsel and to sue statutory bodies where their interests have been violated by those bodies. to be continued....

Continuation...........
Children are treated in law in those countries as separate entities and parties and it is a fundamental principle that their interests are not necessarily synonymous with the interests of either or both parents and that their best interests may be quite different, especially when parents are in dispute and are feuding.

Children have little opportunity in Australia to protest when their rights are violated and breached, especially by statutory bodies or their representatives.

However the most immediate problem in Family Courts is that Judges are badly informed by their `experts’, especially those appointed as Family Reporters. Such appointees are most usually psychologists or psychiatrists who have little if any, knowledge, skills, and experience in investigating child abuse. Furthermore they do not spend the requisite amount of time with children establishing their views and wishes and very often ignore them if they do ascertain them and merely submit what they as adults think is best for the child. This is arrogance and conceit of the worst kind and a gross violation of the child's rights.

In cases where child abuse becomes an issue, then Family Reporters should be drawn from independent members of the professions which are well-practiced in investigating child abuse and its recognition and identification. Until this is done then Justice Bryant and her `Judges’ will continue to make errors of jdugement which are leading to horrendous outcomes for more and more children whereby their bodies, minds, and rights are abused by those the Judges choose to give custody of and contact with.
Justice Bryant has in fact acknolwedged and accepted that Australia is one of the more backward nations in matters of children's rights and their protection from abuse and their right to be heard.

Robert stated in relation to the statement that there is no PAS: Possibly their is some meaning where that claim is true but in terms that most understand it - one parent deliberatly sabotaging the other parents relationship with a child it is very real.

People; there is no PAS but there is a lot of confusion over this. PAS was defined and promoted by a crackpot psychiatrist who self-published (ie no peer review or scientific scrutiny) and whose theories were first used in the USA. Then the crackpot (who wrote that he found it strange that society "overreacts" to paedophilia) was exposed by his peers and committed suicide. The syndrome he claimed to have discovered is NOT a psychiatric illness as he claimed therefore does not exist. Therefore many people were wrongly diagnosed with this mental illness (which does not exist) by "experts" who are now being discredited in turn. Rightfully so.

Parental alienation is something which exists and which occurs when one party denigrates the other in front of the child so that the child is affected. It is not gender specific ie mothers and fathers denigrate the other parent. It is NOT the same as PAS. Get this part right and you can help many children by discontinuing the cycle of spreading inflammatory misinformation around and letting parents get back to the main point; campaign to make the legal system work better for children.

Well stated Child Advocate.

PAS is a Parental Alienation SYNDROME, describing a mental illness that (typically) the custodial mother has...

Parental Alienation (without the 'Syndrome') is a behaviour - a behaviour that is a form of child abuse.

The debate about whether PAS exists or not is irrevelant. You don't need to say that the mother is mentally ill.

The fact is that brainwashing an innocent child and punishing them to make them lie and deny the love they hold for (typically) their father is child abuse.

Children SHOULD be protected from all forms of abuse, and Alienation is abuse. Forcing shared custody, or even removing custody from the alienating (brainwashing) parent is protecting the child.

This article opposes this and thus supports keeping the child with their abuser !

IF we addressed the issues that has led to hate, jealousy, abuse we would not see so many hurt children and adults. But of course we are to blinded to see that as a society that has demanded its individual rights we only have ourselves to blame. The court is put in a situation where some women lie habitually and some men abuse habitually. The judges have no answer and only do their best. This is more fruit of our secular society.

Ignoring for a moment runner's "more fruit of our secular society" jibe, I think he is onto something.

The majority of this thread has been aimed at the inability of the court system to cope with the rights and wrongs of family disputes over children. Much emphasis has been placed on the word "abuse" with some (to me) startling statistics thrown in.

I was frankly staggered to hear that there are "hundreds of thousands of reported child abuse cases" - presumably this is an annual figure - which must put a good deal of strain on an awful lot of people.

Especially the courts. Given the sheer amount of emotion that is contained in each and every case, and the impact of those emotions on what people say and do, it's a wonder that they get any decision "right".

Because for sure and certain, in cases like these, what is "right" for one party will be almost sure to be anything but "right" for the other.

Isn't it time for the courts to push back a little?

Tell these people that they are not there to play Solomon. That the individuals concerned should bear considerably more responsibility for reaching an equitable solution, instead of simply chucking it over the fence for "the law" to sort out.

It is quite interesting that amongst all the pain on display, and the vitriol it generates, no-one has proposed a single potential remedy.

Which suggests, perhaps, that it is the laws themselves that should be tightened up (whatever that might mean), so that the judges no longer need to do any more than assess the evidence, and enforce the law.

ChildAdvocate and partTimeParent thanks for the summary of the PA vs PAS issue. I'd not been thinking in terms of a mental illness rather in terms of behaviour. I have seen a comment on another thread suggesting that since PAS is discredited PA is the result of the behaviour of the aleniated parent so your explainations are appreciated.

Pericles the National Child Protection Clearinghouse is a good place to start if you want to understand the scale and makeup of child abuse and neglect issues. http://www.aifs.gov.au/nch/

The summary article at http://www.aifs.gov.au/nch/pubs/sheets/rs1/rs1.html is a good start.
They make the point that there is no clear proof of numbers. Not all abuse is reported and not all reported abuse is substantiated.

"The most recent national figures from the Australian Institute of Health Welfare indicate that in Australia, during 2006-07, there were 309,517 reports of suspected cases of child abuse and neglect made to state authorities. "

"in 2006-07, 58,563 reported cases were substantiated. "Substantiated" means that a case of suspected abuse was reported and investigated, and child protection authorities verified (on the balance of probabilities) that the allegation was true and the child was in need of protection." An inability to substantiate does not prove a false allegation if I understand this correctly.

"There were 28,441 children in out-of-home care on 30 June 2007." - If I understand it correctly thats a cumulative total not the number placed in out of home care that year which indicates that only a small proportion of substantiated abuse and neglect cases lead to out-of-home care.

One question which is relevant here is how effectively the kids who don't go to out-of-home care are protected from further abuse?

R0bert

think theme of this boils to 'PAS, which caused them to manufacture completely false allegations of sexual and other abuse against the other parent.

This was despite the parent’s - and children's - concerns, regarding the alleged abuse by the other parent being supported by six other well respected professionals.'

pas http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parental_alienation_syndrome ...not best but agree with some parts like established condition at law but psychiatric bodies still refuse to acknowledge(from allowing vested interests improperly influencing them...and we are still waiting for them to clearly categorize autism...so chronic emotionally traumatized child is not wrongly grouped and mismanaged...)

firstly, any professional 'expert' whom makes report after usual 2-hour interviewing mother, father, child...without having court extracted 'facts' from witnesses examination...is setting themselves for professional misconduct...only report they can produce 'unable to make professional assessment/finding in conflict situation'...conflict situation contravenes basic presumptions in a medical assessment...

so those 6 professional should be lined up before their respective boards if thats what they have done...include carolyn quadrio...

but this piece is full of unsupported opinions, outrageous claims, and selective use of information whose true weight is hard to assess...so difficult to reason...rather say its a rant...

Sam
editor...noticed 'gang bang postings'...on unsubstantiated opinions and claims other posts congratulating/supporting...think the hope is readers 'just' accept it a fact by sheer support for it...common feminist tactic noticed in past...usual effect is it empties the forum of reasonable people leaving just the fringes...

mog,

'you are buying into the paradigm that violence and abuse occur because of the provoking behaviour'

No, I don't buy into any paradigm. I have a more balanced view of domestic disputes. I could say you buy into the paradigm that the only abusers are people who wish to control.

I see a wide range of factors in abusive behaviour. People with anger management issues, stressed people in an unhappy relationship, as a response to emotional blackmail or other controlling behavior, depression, substance abuse, the list goes on. Some of these situations which contribute greatly to the chances of violent behaviour are lessened by the separation and resolution of the relationship. It's not about blaming the victim as you think it is, it's about having a more rounded and realistic view of relationship dynamics.

'Such a belief justifies abuse.'
No it doesn't. That's just the typical feminist tactic to hold on to the simplistic notion that the only violent relationship dynamic is male=violent controlling abuser, women=powerless victim. Sure it happens, but it's not the only dynamic that would appear at the Family Court.

It's the same as the justification for the one-sided DV adverts. To discuss women have ANY responsiblity in violent domestic disputes always brings on this old myth. To give women some responsibility for their actions does not lessen men's responsibility for their actions.

'abusers can use litigation abuse - eg repeated false allegations of breaches of contact orders to bring mothers to court.'
I'll bet there is just as many false allegations of abuse as there are false allegations of breaches of contact. How can you deny one but not the other?

Yvonne,

'Because, unfortunately for the children, property and money is closely linked to them. Adults will fight ferociously for 'their' money/house/property. Children are also the 'best' weapon to get back at the other by a wronged spouse.'

Exactly. That's why I cant understand mogs position that abuse allegations shouldn't be so thoroughly scruitinised.

If anyone is interested in an indepth analysis of how allegations (sexual abuse), denials and evidence are treated in the Family Court, Australia. Wendy Lee Foote has written a thesis based on a number of cases, her thesis is titled: Child Sexual Abuse Allegations in the Family Court.

It can be found through a general search or at the Kids In Distress site: www.kidsindistress.org.au (look in the alphabetical file listing). Wendy describes the approach taken by court experts and the findings they make and recommendations they give to the Judge.

As a personal aside: the current sceptical and punitive approach the Family Court takes to abuse is a choice amongst any number of responses it could make. For instance 'allegations' not 'fear' or 'reporting what child said'.

If an approach was taken that the protective parent 'fears abuse' then wouldn't the appropriate response be to allay those fears through a genuine child protection investigation?

A parent 'alleges' abuse therefore he/she is abusive, take children away - how can this possibly be good for children? Not so long ago the Government thought it was a jolly good idea to take aboriginal australian children away from their mother and family.

Members of the church abused power and molested children in their care. Foster children in institutional care are speaking out about their treatment and seeking compensation.

A great source of distress to the now adult survivors of abuse is the 'cover-up' by adults who should have known better.

As children they were silenced, but as angry adults now, no-one would dare say they are mentally ill or coached or having 'false memories'.

With all this history, politicians continue to brazenly allow a dysfunctional court to remove children to abusers.

The Government really should know better by now.

R0bert : “in 2006-07, 58,563 reported cases were substantiated. "Substantiated" means that a case of suspected abuse was reported and investigated, and child protection authorities verified (on the balance of probabilities) that the allegation was true and the child was in need of protection."
`Substantiated’ merely means that a child protection worker has made inquiries into the alleged abuse and has formed an (professional) opinion that s/he has reasonable belief that the abuse has occurred. This is a very low level standard of evidential proof as it is untested by due process of law i.e. the submission of factual evidence and a challenge and rebuttal before an independent third party.

It is not therefore to the legal standard of ‘Balance of Probabilities’ which is applied in Civil Court Proceedings such as Family Courts. On a `Balance of Probabilities’ means only that it is `more likely than not’ (i.e. only required to be 51% proven) that the offence has occurred. This is a considerable way from the evidential standard of proof of Criminal Court Proceedings which is of course beyond reasonable doubt.

It is very difficult to establish the levels of false positives and true negatives in child abuse reports and inquiries but can reasonably be assumed to have been made for mistaken, mischievous, malicious, and monetary reasons if they cannot even reach the base standard of substantiated.

There are many thousands of parents and carers who claim they have been falsely accused of child abuse but have been denied the opportunity to prove their innocence as the system does not allow them fairness and justice, and on the other hand there are many thousands of children who suffer abuse and it is unreported or inquiries fail to uncover evidence of the abuse and the perpetrator.

The system has an unacceptably high rate of fallibility which is presently causing anguish and devastation to children and families. This is for a wide variety of reasons but mainly individual and systemic failures as has been shown in many Public Inquiries into child protection failures. No lessons are ever learned.

Some parents find it difficult to accept that their children may not want to see them after they have left the family home, even if it is not their fault or wish that they have done so. When a parent leaves a family the children can experience a range of emotions from feelings of rejection and abandonment and absolute grief and sorrow. These feelings may cause them to resent that parent and to be angry with them and therefore refuse to see them again.

It can also come as a surprise to some parents that they are not at the centre of their children’s lives. Often their friends at school or in the neighbourhood have a greater immediate importance in their world, especially where a parent has taken little interest in the children in the past and shared their interests.

So when it comes to contact arrangements, the absent parent may not assume much importance to a child who has other activities to involve themselves in such as playing Footy or dancing classes. These can be the most important things in a child’s world and if they are denied those activities because they have to attend contact visits, then they will even further resent the absent parent and create immense difficulties for the resident parent in forcing their attendace at contact.

Naturally the parents in these circumstances are hurt and angry that they are not needed or seen as important by their children and cannot accept that this has occurred and wildly accuse the resident parent of `brainwashing’ the children or `alienating’ the children from the absent parent when nothing is further from the truth. The children are merely exercising their right to determine the important things in their lives and this should be given primary importance by Courts and due weighting in decision-making. Very rarely is it mentioned by Family Reporters who are supposedly reporting on the children’s wishes and feelings.

A very interesting discussion, thanks all. I was staggered to read the total volume of abuse claims made, but it didn't surprise me that it would be high. When a relationship breaks down, there is a massive and well-publicised support industry for mothers, especially ones who claim abuse. It s hardly surprising that a woman who has just ended her relationship might seek the extra assistance offered to her in return for her claim of abuse, true or not.

Having seen at first hand how much support is marshalled for a woman making a false claim of abuse and how contemptuous the courts and police are of the rights of the one falsely accused, I have no time at all for those who claim justification on the part of false accusers. I spent 7 months and several thousand dollars battling to even get a hearing when my ex-wife claimed violence in that I had raised my voice and sworn and the whole time I was being urged to "just accept it without admission", while my children were kept from me as "We cannot take the chance that the allegations may be proven". As well, the whole time the matter was before the Magistrate's Court, the Family Court refused to hear the custody matter - thus leading to greater expense for me and yet more time wasted for my children.

Women can and do tell lies for their own perceived gain and to hell with the kids or anyone else. I'm very pleased to see that Chief Justice Bryant has the courage to say so. No doubt there will now be moves afoot to get rid of her.

I note with some disgust that writers such as antiseptic and sam base their opinion of one half of the human species (the female half) on their personal experiences. It is uncontrolled spite, vitriole, malevolence and uneducated hysteria such as evidenced in their posts which seeks to re-focuss the debate onto fabricated gender issues (and their certainty that women are ALL like their ex) rather than focus on what might improve the situation of children living in an unhealthy situation and the plight of sincere parents (fathers AND mothers) who actually care more for their child than they do for derailing a debate in order to fulfill their personal needs for revenge on their ex and for reinforcement by similarly wounded people. It is noteworthy that in your shamefully ignorant and embarrassing rants, you do not address the legal process itself and the appalling risk factors associated with choice of lawyer and with which registrar is allocated to your case. Wake up.

After considerable reading of articles about the sorry state of child protection in this country as well as the Family Court and Childrens Courts, I can only agree with Chaz who has highlighted the shortcomings of the legal system. It is this which must be addressed in order to prompt the powers-that-be to take action which will result in safety for children.

continued...

It is insane to claim that while reporting of child abuse to state authorities, DV interventions and sexual abuse caseloads in courts (brought by adults who were abused as children and can now speak up) are increasing, all cases involving abuse allegations in the Family Court are fabricated by mothers. Please seek appropriate emotional help for yourself and/or get an education. Let us not forget that a significant volume of abuse allegations are made by fathers against mothers and that fathers are having reduced contact as a result as the court deems that their allegations are baseless.

Should allegations be properly investigated by suitable qualified workers and if child psychology specialists became registrars instead of barristers being appointed, we would see much better outcomes for mothers and fathers and children. Here is a suggested solution in black and white, for the writer who accuses participants of not proposing any solutions. Now what do you want to do, loving parents? Fling dung at the opposite sex or write to your local member about upgrading the system so that child welfare experts are appointed to the bench? Which option do you think will focus genuinely caring parents into useful action and which option will create more frustration and angst while achieving nothing towards improving the situation for our nations children? Are you being self-serving or are you thinking of the big picture? Wake up.

Child Advocate, I recounted my own experience, which is most certainly formative of my views of the process. I HAVE BEEN falsely accused, which means IT DOES HAPPEN. My conclusion is therefore entirely valid.

Let me point out that you have also recounted your experiences, and no one has chosen to tell you that your opinion is somehow invalidated as a result. Instead of being irrational and abusive, you might like to consider that little point. We are all the sum of our experiences, even those of us who don't happen to conform to the feminist ideal.

Now, if you want to have a rational discussion on the topic, I'm all for it. As it happens, I'm all in favour of more properly-qualified people being appointed as Family Report writers and as Child's Representatives. I also happen to think that there are some very good people in the role already, if my own experience was anything to go by. They were directly responsible for giving my kids their father back, despite the best advice of the girls down at Women's Legal Aid Qld to the ex.

As I said, the industry devoted to assisting women with Family Court matters is huge and pervaive and almost impossible for a woman receiving a Government benefit to avoid, even if she has no malice toward her estranged husband. They know what works and claiming abuse is always worth a go. It's almost pro-forma.

Some good posts, Robert, Chaz, ChildAdvocate, to name a few.

Antiseptic, from my experience, legal aid lawyers are NOT the best performing lawyers in any field. That's why you 'won' your case. Cut the anti feminist rant. Your lawyer was simply better than your ex's legal aid lawyer.

The courts have their place in property disputes, but not in parenting disputes. Our system is an ADVERSARIAL system. ONE party has to WIN. It is not geared towards coming to any reasoned workable arrangement for parenting responsibilities.

For all the cases that go to court there are many more that do not require the court for parenting arrangements.

Parenting issues result in disagreements between intact couples, a bitter separation only compounds that. That's a given.

If there is a case of criminal behaviour, eg physical, sexual abuse that's a criminial court matter, not a civil court matter, such as a family court.

Issues of criminality and property need to be kept seperated from parenting issues. Parenting issues do not belong in a court of law. That's the last place where they should be heard. It is so open to, at time repeated, abusive use by a parent it is not only cruel to children, it is an unacceptable cost and use of court time.

Custody denotes ownership. Tables, chairs and aunty Daphne's ring can be owned. Human beings, which children are, cannot.

Can I suggest that those who sincerely want to inform themselves research the psychiatry of child abuse including child sexual abuse and research "Parental Alienation Syndrome" or PAS, and psychiatrist Richard Gardner, who concoted it.
It has been proved to be used by the Family Court and its "experts". It is pro-paedophilic.

It might also be useful to research true "Alienation" and true "Estrangement".
Work has been conducted on this by Bruch, Johnston, Pragnell and Quadrio to name just a few.

Lawyers in other specilaities repeatedly tell me that they won't have anything to do with the Family Court becuase it is well known amongst them that it absoluetely fails in what it is supposed to do.

The repeated comments I hear are that if you can't get into any other field. go into the Family Court and practice there.
It says a lot about the true value we place on our children.

It was William Wilberforce who said, and I think it is highly relevant here.."You may choose to look the other way, but you can never again say that you were not told".

We are, I personally believe, on the pinnacle of unprecedneted exposure on this planet of the truth,in many, many areas.There is never anything wrong with the truth, it just is.It also remains the most powerful force on this plane.

It was RFK, in what I believe was his last speech before his assissination, who said .."Fear not the path of Truth for the lack of people walking on it".

I firmly believe that generations to come will be horrified by what was allowed to happen to our Children in the Family Court of Australia.Another Stolen and Broken Generation has been created by the Family Court in this country.

Gandhi said "Truth alone will endure.. all the rest will be swept away before the tide of Time".

Let us see what that old and trusted friend of ours, Time and the unstoppable forces of the truth actually expose about Child Abuse in the Family Court of Australia.
Dr. Sunita Shaunak

Yvonne:"from my experience, legal aid lawyers are NOT the best performing lawyers in any field. That's why you 'won' your case. Cut the anti feminist rant. Your lawyer was simply better than your ex's legal aid lawyer."

Erm...I self-represented, Yvonne, after sacking my lawyer about 3 months into the process when she attended a "mention" on my behalf and agreed, without my consent, with the other side's proposal to join the children to the ex's DVO application. She had been urging me to "accept without admission" and had also been urging me to "accept what their mother is asking for and move on" with respect to the ex's claim for increased custody. I might add that I had paid for that lawyer out of my own pocket, because Legal Aid entitlement is based on gross income, not what's left after paying 27% of it in CS and a further 30% in taxes. IOW, I won in spite of the best efforts of the legal profession, not because of them. The reason for my success was that both the ICR and the Family Report writer were able to see through the smokescreen of false abuse claims by the mother and I'm very grateful to them. My children are too. In the end, even the Women's Legal Aid Service (nice bit of gender discrimination, that) refused to fund her appeal.

Sunita, I'm sure you're sincere, but my experience leads me to believe you're misguided. Fathers do NOT routinely abuse their children and mothers are NOT saints who never lie. Family Courts are horrid places that exist for the simple reason that people cannot be trusted to act honestly and without malice in stressful situations. The worst aspect of the Family Law at the moment, as Yvonne has said, is the fact that it is adversarial. Without the Family Report writers and ICRs the Court has little chance of getting an honest answer. Your article is badly flawed.

ANTISEPTIC: Nowhere have I said that "Fathers routinely abuse their children and that all mothers are saints and never lie". Perhaps you could kindly direct me to my alleged statement?

I believe that it is an illuminating statement on your part.
It is not and must not continue to be a "fathers" and "mothers" contest.
It is a Children's safety and welfare concern : no more and no less.
Please focus on that and that only.

Given the alleged calibre of "experts" and lawyers etc. in the FCA at the monent,there is little hope of Child Abuse issues being properly and fully considered, let alone our Chidren being properly protected.
Refer to Quadrio / King interview, Kochs' articles, Background Briefing on PAS by Jane Shields,statements of the American judiciary and other acepted research and reports on these matters.

I have not concealed my identity on this Forum ; you have chosen to do so.
Sunita

SUNITA, Antiseptics choice to use an alias is legitimate on this forum as is your choice to reveal your own name.

Those of us using aliases have a variety of reasons for doing so. For those who comment on family law issues sometimes using our own experiences as examples we are able to do so without identifying others involved (would it be appropriate if Antiseptic was using his real name here and by default identifying his ex and kids).

We minimise the risk of our views impacting on us in the real world when dealing with orgainsations with significant discretionary powers (CSA and family court etc).

Some find it necessary to comment with an alias because of professional obligations. What should matter is the quality of an argument, not the name attached or the letters around the name.

Thats one of the joys of OLO that people can put views which may be unpopular in some quarters with relative safety from inappropriate consequences.

R0bert

R0bert, excellent defence of aliases. I might add that the Family Law Act and the Child Support Acts have clauses in relation to identification of parties to a FCA matter. To use my real name would have the potential to cause OLO to be held liable. I'm sure someone of Sunita's claimed expertise would be aware of that.

Sunita, this topic is truly a gendered one, regardless of whether you want to think so or not. I'm sure that some cases of abuse are missed, simply because of the volume of false accusations that are made. If those in the business of supporting mothers through the process of litigating in the Family Court offered a less credulous ear to abuse complaints in the first instance, I suspect we'd see a lot fewer real abusers get away with it, simply because the Court would place more credibility on the report. IOW, it's in the interest of those who wish to see abusers stopped to make sure they only present genuine cases to the Court, instead of trying to stack the deck by appointing to the Court those they consider more likely to accept the claim at face value.

On the topic of court experts: a recent published Interim Judgment - check out the court expert involvement.

It is called Robertson and Robertson (2008) FamCA 497 20/6/2008.

Difficult to summarise as it is very detailed. Child is 13 years old, little contact with 'dad' in last 5 years.

Boy says he witnessed dad download porn and masturbate in front of computer. There is a history of drug use (both parents) and violence.

Mother says in the past child would vomit and have panic attacks before contact.

There is a lot more, but the point is - the teenager Pt 82 "..repeatedly and consistently has stated he does not want to see the father or have anything to do with him"

The court experts recommend: No. 4 Mr T - "...does need to know and have a relationship with the father"

No. 75 Dr M "it is my impression that despite (the child's) reserve and detachment from his father if he were to see more of him the relationship would develope"

This 13 year old has ran away from the visits - on one occassion to the local police station.

At pt. 31 the mother is scrutinised: "...the mother has sabotagued the orders..."

There is discussion of whether to change residence to father. In the end the orders are second weekends and half holidays.

Should this 13 year old be forced to see his father because court experts say it will do him good?

What effect does it have on children and teenagers to have both their words and actions on such a crucial area of their lives totally, totally ignored. Perhaps they should be handcuffed, with a police escort and made to repeat: "I you love daddy".

In this case the child is ordered confidential conselling.

As has been pointed out earlier, these situations are not helped by being adversarial. However in dealing with the situation as it now is, the `Experts’ have erred in seeing this as an `either or’ situation. Firstly the Court should have required each parent to set out separately what they believed were this child’s primary needs and priorities, and then to have set out their individual proposals for how they would meet the child’s needs, individually and cooperatively if possible. Especially the financial support of the child. They should also have been required to set out their understanding of how they would each propose to form a `meaningful relationship’ with this child and in what ways they believed the child would benefit, or not, from such a meaningful relationship.

If this still did not satisfy the Court and the child continued to be reluctant to attend contact meetings with the father, then interim measures could have been put in place and independently monitored and assessed at each stage. E.g. Indirect Contact (telephone, letter, cards etc) and Supervised Contact (again independently monitored and assessed).

Thirdly the Court should have asked for a statement by the child concerned and for the child to give direct evidence to the Court (this would then meet Children’s Rights requirements).

Children's lives are far too important to be left to the current vagaries and idiosyncracies of Courts and their `Experts'.

If each of these stages were then evaluated at say, three monthly intervals the Court would then be able to make a far better informed decision based on the information provided from the above.

Regarding adversial systems in the Family Court, please consider informing yourselves:

http://www.familycourt.gov.au/wps/wcm/connect/FCOA/home/about/Media_Centre/Fact+sheets/FCOA_mc_Less_Adversarial_Trial

would be a good place to start.

Hamlet: Even this half-hearted measure of moving towards an inquisitorial system seems to be showing considerable benefits. It does not however address the issues of how children's views and wishes are directly presented and considered in the decision-making processes and therefore does not satisfy the spirit and intent of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and it does not seem to have addressed the issue of how allegations of abuse and exploitation can be competently and thoroughly investigated.

But at least it is a move toward a more humane system.

It might be informative to have a look at the following on the abject failures of the Family Court of Australia in Child Protection and its complicity in Child Abuse :

1.Jonanthan Humphrey's paper,presented to the former Australian Attoreny -General Philip Ruddock in November 2005 and entitled
"PAS, "Unacceptable Risk" and the culture of the Australian Family Court : How current Judicial paradigms are violating CROC and failing to protect Abused Children".

2.Courageous Kids' Network : NB: Not Australian based, but USA based.

3."PAS : A Paradigm for Child Abuse in Australian Family Law" by Dr. Elspeth McInnes.

4.Charles Pragnell on PAS.

5."Children at Risk" by Peter Ellingson, The Sunday Age :3 /10 /2004.

The Chief Justice of the Family Court, the Deputy CJ of the FC and the former CJ of the FC may choose to continue looking the other way, but thay can never again say that they were not told (Wilberforce).

Sunita, I followed your recommendations and found the references you mentioned on a site called http://www.kidsindistress.org.au/parentalalienation.php. May I be so bold as to suggest that this site is not an entirely balanced reference if you wish to convince skeptics? It is a partisan effort filled with links to various "feminist" (not my word, theirs) organisations; surely you can do better than that?

Having said all that, I did read the papers you referred to, and I have the following comments:

1. From Jonathon Humphreys's submission:"Although child abuse
cases represent only a small amount (<5%) of total cases concerning children each year, they do not resolve at comparable rates to other disputes." and

"interim orders denying contact have become much more infrequent in the wake of the reforms [to the FLA] dropping to under 5 percent of cases."
That would seem to be consistent, don't you think? If not, why not?

2.Courageous kid's network is essentially a site devoted to encouraging children to report abuse, which is well and good. It's interesting, though, that nearly all their links are either dead, lead to a site devoted to single mothers or go to a site advertising the services of a particular lawyer...

3. Elspeth McInnes - former convenor of the National Council for Singlr Mothers and their Children and a strident and vocal agitator for the primacy of maternal rights and denial of any rights to fathers. She now has a doctorate, does she? Nice to see my tax dollars at rest. I didn't really bother with Elspeth's paper. If you regard Gardner as unreliable, you're not doing yourself any favours quoting Elspeth. As always, her main focus is seeking more money.

4. Charles Pragnell's piece is long and I've not yet digested it properly. I will come back to you with my thoughts when I do

5. Peter Ellingsen's piece is a rehash of all the other stuff you cited.

(cont.)

You didn't mention Dr Brent Water's excellent piece "AMBIGUOUS CSA EVIDENCE IN FAMILY COURT MATTERS", which speaks directly to the issue of worried mothers jumping to conclusions: "The second player is a mother who is anxious about the child's contact with the other party.
Often this is a well founded anxiety, based on her experience of a relationship in which she felt that her husband dominated family life at best, or at worst abused and victimised her. The abuse may have been verbal, or physical or even sexual. There may be a subjective element to this, but there may also be a compelling objective element as well. These women are so distrustful that they worry that since the father was the way he was to them, he may go a step further and sexually abuse their child. This of course is amplified if they feel that the father has attempted to continue some exploitation of them in the course of the Family Law proceedings.
The father may deal with the accusations in a dismissive way which the mother perceives as indifference. They may even parody the mother's concerns in such a way that the mother feels that he is laughing at her powerlessness"

Note that this is all about Mum and Dad's relationship, not the kids. Why do you find his scenario so difficult to accept?

As I said Sunita, no one claims that abuse doesn't exist, merely that it does not exist to the degree that some vested interests would have us believe. Your references don't change that, in fact they reinforce my own sense that this subject is all about giving women more power in FLA proceedings and very little to do with the welfare of children. Frankly, that's a disgraceful abuse of children in its own right, especially given the fact that some abused children will be missed because of the high volume of false claims.

Hamlet, thanks for the link to LAT. It seems a worthwhile initiative.

Its regrettable and revealing that certain parties keep trying to make this a "mens" and "womens" issue, instead of focussing on our Children and the research on CSA and CA

Wrigley has ben disciplined for using PAS, the FC has used and accpeted PAS, ergo the FC'S alleged experts are not as highly qualified as the CJ wold like the public to believe that they are.It's a breathtaking statement from the CJ which doesn't bear scrutiny.
If the court in this land, which is supposed to deal with families and child protection and child abuse is incapable of setting acceptable and recognised standards for the professionals who give evidence in their courtrooms on CSA and CA.. what does it really say about the competency and accountability of that system ?

SUNITA, are you rejecting just the S in PAS or the whole thing?
Do you deny that some parents manipulate children to harm the relationship between the child and the other parent either deliberately as a strategy or by failure to reign in expressions of their own views around the children?

If it's just dropping the "S" then the focus on PAS being discredited seems like an issue of semantics, the impact on children and the other parent is not lessened by the syndrome aspect. If you are saying parents don't do that stuff then I strongly disagree. I've been on the recieving end of it and also seen a former good friend use it force a change in residency to facilitate a tree change she wanted to make. I've also known women who have struggled with the issues that flow from "good time dads".

I back Antiseptic views on Elspeth McInnes except that Antiseptic was being to kind in his comments. She has been one of the more vocal advocates of using "childrens interests" for womens benefits for years. There has been a significant abuse of gender issues in the practice of family law for a long time, it's not necessarily 'trying to make this a "mens" and "womens" issue"' to address that and to bring into the debate the problems with the status quo.

R0bert

SUNITA:"Its regrettable and revealing that certain parties keep trying to make this a "mens" and "womens" issue, instead of focussing on our Children and the research on CSA and CA"

I did you the courtesy of reading and discussing your references and this is the best you can respond with? Can I then assume that you have no disagreement with my comments? If so, why did you bother referring to those items in the first place?

I realise you've been on the FCA merry-go-round for a long time without what you would view as success and I also realise what a debilitating process that can be for all parties. You have my sympathy for that, but your continued failure to make your case doesn't mean the Court is flawed, but indicates to me that there is a realistic expectation that evidence-based claims must be presented. I applaud the Court for applying Occam's Razor to claims of abuse and taking steps to discourage the willy-nilly use of such claims in the absence of genuine evidence of occurrence.

The Family Court is one part of the Family Law system, which is a part of the divorce industry, which has grown to be a very big industry, and is basically focused on money.

Whoever gets the children also gets most of the assets, so there is a grab for the children. Claims of abuse can often be a part of the grab for the children.

It is interesting that most child protection agencies have a different set of criteria for what constitutes child abuse than the Family Law court.

Of course gender is a part of the Family Law court’s decisions. The Family Court is the least reliable and least trustworthy court in the land.

What would be a child-focused response to allegations of abuse?
Yes, a proper, timely, thorough, informed investigation by people qualified in domestic violence and child abuse, which would access health, education, child care, corrections, police records of parties, AND provide recommendations which privilege children's safety as their best interests, which decision-makers are obliged to accept.
Currently a family report writer has a one hour meeting with each parent and writes a report which often includes false or fanciful speculation and decision makers can and do dismiss allegations of abuse as they please. They can ignore AVOs and substantiated child protection reports, and they do, all the time.
It is strange to me how the men on this discussion imagine that there is any claim that all men are abusive - they must really identify with men who are accused of being abusive. Most normal (non-abusing)men I know recognise that talking about men who use violence and abuse is specifically referring to men who use violence and abuse and not all men. There is no claim that women never lie - both men and women lie - that's why investigation matters.

mog,

'It is strange to me how the men on this discussion imagine that there is any claim that all men are abusive - they must really identify with men who are accused of being abusive. '

Um, no. Nice try. The claim that has been objected to is that women never lie about abuse.

'The fashionable IMAGINATION in the family law la la land, which includes the courts and forced mediation, is that women lie about abuse.. '

Your words. My capitals.

You must really identify with women who are accused of making false accusations...

mog:"It is strange to me how the men on this discussion imagine that there is any claim that all men are abusive - they must really identify with men who are accused of being abusive."

Me, from yesterday:"As I said Sunita, no one claims that abuse doesn't exist, merely that it does not exist to the degree that some vested interests would have us believe. Your references don't change that, in fact they reinforce my own sense that this subject is all about giving women more power in FLA proceedings and very little to do with the welfare of children. Frankly, that's a disgraceful abuse of children in its own right, especially given the fact that some abused children will be missed because of the high volume of false claims."

Seems you could do with reading for comprehension, dear, instead of trying to ignore the stuff you don't like.

Is this feminist propaganda?

"There is no greater problem in family law today than the problems of adaquately addressing child protection concerns under the Family Law Act"

"Councils research and consultations on this issue indicate that the problems in the present system are very serious indeed. Reform is urgently needed"

4.7 "It is often said that allegation of abuse are easier to make than refute. Claims of parental alienation syndrome or that an abuse allegation has been made falsely in order to gain a strategic advantage are easier to make than refute. Indeed attack can be the best form of defence in response to an allegation of child abuse".

Quotes from: Family Law Council, Final Report, Family Law and Child Protection, September 2002.

Government leaftlets advise separated parents: not to critise 'ex' -it works against the critic. A child who loves her/his parents does not like it and will rebel - against the critic parent. Children think, interpret, reason and feel for themselves.

'Alienation' has been distorted, taken out of context to equate with the severity of sexual, physical and other forms of severe emotional abuse (e.g threats to kill oneself).

Using terminology to manipulate the truth, alienation has been elevated to severe abuse equal to the horror of sexual interference. PAS or just plain alienation is being used to justify the removal of children from their mother.

What damages relationships and children most is where a protective parent is court enforced to hand his/her child over to be abused.

What damages the relationship between child and other parent (non-resident) is when this parent physically, emotionally and/or sexually abuses their child.

Court experts using PAS to reinforce a false belief system and ignore cumulative, severe abuse, perpetuate abuse. This is the crime, not PAS.

I haven't seen a single comment to the effect that abuse doesn't happen, merely that it is not the widespread problem that some vested interests would have us believe.

It is also a gendered issue, because the allegations nearly always emanate from the mother and are directed at the father or his friends and family. As your reference mentioned, it is easy to make the allegation and once made, it can be hard to stop the mud sticking. Evidence-based claims are the only ones that should be taken seriously, not the possibly partisan views of a mother who feels she is being hard done by in her divorce or who wants to "get at" the father for perceived grievances arising during their marriage. She may also see it as a way of generating sympathy from those she is looking to for assistance with her matter.

As a point of interest, I understand that the greatest risk to children is posed by step-parents, usually a mother's new partner, rather than by biological parents. The worst case for a child is to have a father who is uninvolved for whatever reason and a mother with a series of boyfriends. Who does the poor kid turn to in that situation?

I've said before that it behooves those who support mothers through custody battles to make it clear that false allegations of abuse will not be tolerated, giving the genuine ones some chance of being heard.

Justice for Kids, PA is not as bad as some other forms of abuse but it is a serious abuse which should be treated with contempt rather than minimised. Parents willing to engage in that tactic should be assumed to be either incapable or unwilling to put their childs well being ahead of their own interests and depending on the severity of the behaviour it should be a factor in determining residency arrangements. PA comes in a variety of strengths, I'm refering to a clear cut attempt to damage the relationship between a child and the other parent.

A skilled manipulator will be subtle enough that a child is unlikely to latch onto what is happening - adults struggle enough with this stuff let alone children. The skilled manipulator will play up any existing discontent, create situations that make the other party look bad, pander to the childs wants without regard to the childs wellbeing and agree with the childs concerns that the other parent does not do so. It does not have to be about one parent sitting the child down and explaining why the other parent is bad.

It happens, it's real and it is a serious abuse of children and the other parent. The apparent widespread acceptance false accusations and PA is one the reasons why accusations and childrens "wishes" may get less attention than they deserve. Accusations should be appropriately investigated, abuse of mechanisms designed to protect children should be treated as a form of abuse.

R0bert

Research into the bullying techniques of school girls shows that girls use a number techniques, such as telling bad or false stories about a person as well as isolating their victim.

This behaviour is rationalized and justified as the victim deserved the treatment.

The aim of female bullies is to inflict emotional pain. Researchers also found that the female bullies adapted their techniques with the aid of modern technology.

I appreciate the fact that not all females who were bullies when they were younger will continue that type of behaviour.

I put it to the bloggers that there is a very strong vested interest in discounting PSA for the reason that if it is acknowledge as a problem then that means some women will have to examine their own behaviour which is not a particularly comfortable experience.

And it is not acceptable that maybe men do have a valid point afterall.

My daughters weres abducted a 2nd time by the mother a community health nurse well versed with working with dysfunctional families in Dec 99. I have not seen them since and was obliged to return to the UK. I read the Stephen Lunn article and the CJ comments on her "experts" who in my caee was not qualified in psychiatric medicine yet allowed to make an assessment. The SA Psychology Board condone this as "professional opinion".
Because the mother is above the law and her spouse an abuser there is nothing that has been done to protect my daughters from harm. They are afraid.
I associate Australia with dishonesty and corrupt practices. Indeed a few weeks ago ABC News published a call by an Adelaide QC for a public inquiry citing anecdotal evidence of corruption at all levels of Government. It is bad really bad.

There is an interesting development that even in lesbian relationships, when they break down the maternal mother will try and exclude the social mother using similar tactics to that used in heterosexual relationships.

This discussion has deteriorated int a “What about me?. Look what happened to me!. This is all about me!” diatribe. With odd bits of obscure literature thrown in as an attempt to bolster `me’-based arguments but which are not generally applicable. Anything that will denigrate men or women in some form.

You are largely all victims of a flawed and dysfunctional system which is in need of serious reforms. Its like watching victims of a car smash fighting among themselves as to who is most injured and which of them’s fault it was, while children still lie injured and dying under the car and the driver is grinning because he knows his vehicle was unroadworthy and had poor brakes but that he wont be blamed as long as the victims point accusing fingers at each other.

This thread has become unworthy of any further contributions.

ChazP, the discussion was always about the use of allegations of harm to children being used to bolster a parent's claim in custody matters.
The OP and her barrackers have not made their case so far. You have been vocal with platitudes about "the children", but you seem unwilling to engage seriously on the subject. There have been several posts from R0bert and myself that have gone directly to the OP's claims and she has not seen fit to debate us on those posts.

In trying to censor a thread that has not gone the way you would like it to go, you show yourself to be shallow at best and your position to be ill-founded.

There are a lot of interesting points made by a wide variety of people here. a few points that havent really been raised here so far:

1. How much of the "false" accusation is driven by concern that there is something bad happening, but that this is the only way to get concerns listened to? I'm not saying that this is justified BTW, just raising the possibility.

2. How much of PAS or PA is a "lioness" reaction? We all know that in nature most mothers are fiercely protective of their offspring - how much is it wired in? Again, no comment as to whether good or bad, but if we recognise it, it might be manageable.

3. How much of PA is simply poor communication and misunderstanding? My daughter now regularly comes home from her grandparents stating that various people dont love her. For a little while I was tempted to blame my mother-in-law for telling her directly, but once I stop being angry about it I can rationalise that its probably a case of her saying "but XXX doesnt love you as much as nanny does" and it being misunderstood (which I am still ticked off about, but its a lot different to it being malicious). Men are quite capable of it as well, including unintentional undermining -my husband's a star (picked it up from his mother). I've been guilty myself of muttering comments when fuming, but because I am aware of the damage that it can do, make the effort to sit down with the kids later and explain myself and put it in context.

Kids pick up on all sorts of things that we dont give them credit for.

This discussion was intended to be about the ways in which a system (in this case, the Family Court of Australia and its associated industry, The Magistrates Court) is once again failing to protect children in need.

My heart goes to those protective parents who have spoken up about the injustice of losing your children to the care of the parent who hurts them due to the actions of inept report writers, lawyers and judges who ignore the evidence placed before them and choose instead to parrot non evidence based dogma in order to make the protective parent into the unfriendly parent.

Within the law circles, it is known that certain report writers have simply been around too long, their views are entrenched and being human they are not able to self reflect in cross examination and instead become hostile and defensive so will not shift their views. Bad luck for the kids concerned. Lawyers see it as a matter of hoping that their client gets a good judge/report writer/psych/sep rep. The lawyer gets paid regardless of the outcome as does the judge, the report writer etc etc. The parents pay regardless of the outcome, in financial and emotional terms.

Leaving the welfare of the next generation of this nations leaders to chance and hope is ridiculous. A fair, well functioning system does not rely on hope and chance. Our kids and their parents deserve a much better system designed with the welfare of the whole family in mind, not an adversarial process designed to break the family apart even further.

Suggestions on actions which may result in a fairer system for all are welcome.

Are these flawed and perverse decisions by Courts and their officials widespread?. It does appear that the incidence of such decisions occur in certain States, certain cities and towns, certain Courts and Judges/Family Reporters. How far can they be identified?. Can the entire Family Court system be condemned for the actions of a minority?. Or does it require major changes in the Family Law and the operation of the Courts system?. It does seem that there is a high level of incompetence, including serious biases and prejudices, among Family Reporters in several States.

"Suggestions on actions which may result in a fairer system for all are welcome.'

1/ Remove as far as practical the links between child residency and finances. It gives cause to some people who don't really want involvment with their kids to see them to reduce the impacts of CSA and or property settlements and cause to parents with the residency to try and keep them away from the other to maximise CSA, FTB and property settlements. The stakes for the adults involved can be to big to rely on the childrens interests always being at the forefront.

2/ Have consequences when a reasonable case can be made that a claim was clearly false (not that a claim can't be proved).

3/ Introduce whatever truth detection technologies are available into the system, they are not perfect and apparently coaching can reduce their effectiveness but should be better than nothing.

4/ Find a balance in the way that complaints are treated, if it's too formal and too much a part of criminal law that may disuade many from lodging a genuine complaint, too lax and it's ineffective at getting to the truth. I don't know what the best balance is on this, too thorough and it will be backlogged, to much at the surface and perceptions will rule more than facts.

I don't know about the Family Report writers, my impression is that the process involving them is deeply flawed but I've not been close enough to it really tell for myself.

We are dealing with a situation where people often have strong emotional issues of their own, where the outcomes can make a massive difference to their own situation and where kids can an do get caught in the middle of conflicting loyalties and confused messages.

R0bert

It is correct that within legal circles operating on the east coast, some practitioners are viewed by their peers as "damaged" and as doing disservice to families but whistle blowing in the industry is career suicide as the sols/barristers/sep reps/writers/ psychs/judges etc behave more like an incestuous and inbred, ferral clan which protects its own and rely on each other for continued highly paid work.

Some individuals have been identified by industry insiders as dubious at best, criminally negligent at worst. If people working within the industry would not trust specific others in that industry to work on matters (for reasons of ignorance and negligence), then why should the rest of the populace have to suffer those fools? Those individuals determine the fate of thousands of families in the nation. Mothers, fathers and children have the right to be angry at the level of betrayal they have experienced by overpaid idiots who are accountable to nobody. If you are unlucky, one hour of each parents time with a social worker (with as little as 3 years uni, and a private contract with a solicitor, no peer review, no standards, no mandatory specialised training and upskilling - just the ability to sign an affidavit containing their own opinion) can determine the next 18 years of your childs life. That is NOT acceptable.

We all know the reforms which would improve the situation for children; what actions would get the message to politicians who can change the sick system?

Child Advocate - that is a very robust analysis of the people with responsibility for the functioning of the Family Court system on the East Coast, and indicates that seeking fairness and justice (if such were to exist in the Family Courts as they are merely jousting sessions between lawyers) is largely a postcode lottery.

In the UK where protests against the erratic operations of the Family Courts is reaching critical mass, there have been organised groups of parents lobbying Members of Parliament to try to force changes and they are beginning to persuade some MPs that there are serious problems in the Family Courts, not least because they are held in secret and therefore the injustices and miscarriages of justice are hidden from public scrutiny and `Expert testimony' cannot be exposed as fraudulent in many cases. The formation of such Protest Groups has been a unique phenomenon and they are growing and developing their spheres of influence as the State system becomes increasingly punitive towards parents if they fail to provide what the State consider to be a high enough standard of care for the children of the State entrusted to their care. Yes I mean all children are now seen as the State's children - fascism of the Left.

According to the transcript (08/07/2004) of the ABC interview Chief Justice Diana Bryant gave, on her swearing in as, I understand it,the first female CJ ever of a Court in Australia, she said :
"...that I will do right to all manner of people according to law without fear or favour, affection or ill will, so help me God ..".

Carbonell goes on to report that the CJ as saying :
"... I think the biggest challenge is to try and earn the respect for the court from the public.I think its really distressing to me to see that a public institution like the Family Court doesn't have the respect of the public and I think there's an educational process to be gone through and I'm very keen to see that happen.
And if at the end of my tenure I could improve the understanding of the court and have the respect of the public for the court, that would be something I would be very proud of......I really would like to see the instituition have a bit more respect and understanding"..."

With respect, I submit to the CJ and the AG, Robert McLelland, that in view of the recent diciplining of the FC's own "expert" (Dr. William Wrigley) for the reports he produced for the FC and the continuing statements made by many other child-welfare experts that they point-blank refuse to give evidence in FC courtrooms,my understanding that there are more complaints being lodged world-wide regarding the use of PAS and other non-existent psychiatry against "experts" utilised by FCs, would the CJ and AG not now please take the bull by the horns and really confront these matters, so that the legacy they leave is for the most important people of all, those whose faces and voices are rarely permitted into these courtrooms, but whose futures are the subject of the court's "highly qualified experts"... our Children of course.

CJ : I look you in the eyes and sincerely ask you to look honestly at your courtrooms so that your legacy may be a positive and healing one.

Respect must be earned is the first lesson that CJ Bryant must learn.
Secondly she should have been clear as to what kind of respect she wishes. Respect for the Court as a government institution and its powers just because it has those powers?. Thats playing the `Higher Rank' game. Or respect for its humanity and obedience to the principles of natural justice and providing such justice, and for upholding the international principles of children's rights, which many Australian Courts seem not to have heard of.
If CJ Bryant wants public respect then she must put her own house in order and have a clear out of the dross and garbage. People will not respect a judicial institution and process which does not provide fairness and justice but is merely a cash cow for lawyers and inexpert `Experts' to play games with.
But then, she may just be paying lip-service to a woolly ambition she has no intention of achieving or does not know the way of achieving.

Another part of the tragedy for children with abusing parents is that the Family Court is not the court where most children's issues involving violence and abuse are heard. Most go to the federal magistrates court where the children are summarily distributed to their timetables of parental attendance. The failings of the Family Court system need to be understood in the context that many cases never even get there. FRC practitioners see it was a 'win' to keep cases out of court, and parties need legal representation and a 'complexity certificate' to get the case into the Family Court. Domestic violence tends not to be seen as complex (indeed its ordinary old woman-bashing) and there is certainly no comprehension of the significance of exposure to violence and abuse in terms of children's brain development at any point in the system - which like this thread - attracts the tired old strident women-haters with their 'women lie and alienate' chorus when issues of abuse are discussed. classic distraction technique. Pity about the kids.

mog:"the tired old strident women-haters"

And here was I thinking the subject was supposed to be the kids. It's the man-haters such as yourself that are the ones most prone to use false allegations of abuse to advantage themselves. Thanks for making that clear. Shame about the kids indeed.

Sunita, I read your comment from Her Honour, Ms Bryant, with interest. I was very sceptical of her appointment, although it was hard to see how she could be less judicious than her predecessor, the egregious Nicholson, who was happy to disregard any evidence at all if it didn't fit with his prejudices. However, since then I'm forced to the conclusion that she's been an ornament to the bench. She's overseen a significant change of her own design from Nicholson's debased court, which was basically a factory for welfare dependency, designed to strip assets and children from fathers for the benefit of mothers and is now a much more respected institution. She's also overseen significant legislative changes and the implementation of the FMC, which has significantly changed her own Court's function.
I realise you've had a long and painful experience at the hands of the Court and I sympathise with you, but from where I sit I'd be much more confident of a fair hearing if I turned up in Ms Bryant's court than I ever was in Nicholson's.

On the subject of child abuse allegations, what do you suggest could be done differently? Do you really think that there is a vast legal conspiracy determined to hand children to abusers? If so, surely the entire Court should be abolished. Is that what you are seeking

Mogs: I think a start could be made by embedding International Children's Rights in all child-related legislation at Federal and State level as many civilised countries have already done, rather than the token references to `Best interests of the child..." (a term much beloved by autocrats and dictators to justify their actions based on personal biases and prejudices) and `paramountcy of the child's welfare' which amounts to nothing in an adversarial system where winning is all. Courts should be required to show that their decisions are measurably and demonstrably to the benefit of children, rather than as at present, who can buy the best lawyers. In the Family Courts, children are merely hostages to the vagaries and vicissitudes of entrenched adult prejudice and advocacy skills.

ChazP, the rights of the child have paramountcy in Australian Family Law, not just the "primacy" required by International obligation. IOW, those rights are accorded more weight than the UN obligation requires. How would you propose that be strengthened and what is your solution to the undoubted problem of false abuse allegations? Is it your contention that every allegation of abuse should be treated as having actually occurred until proven otherwise? If so, do you support the reversal of the burden of proof in other matters as well, such as (say) murder or serious sexual assault cases? What about fraud? Is it enough for me to say "ChazP ripped me off, because s/he did" and leave you to prove otherwise?

The fact is that the burden of proof always must rest with the one making the allegation. If that person cannot back up their allegation, then their case fails. To suggest otherwise is to condone witch hunts in which innocents are convicted simply because they are accused and can find no positive proof they DIDN'T do it. To date, I've not seen any suggestions on how to fix the problem that Sunita claims exists, other than her suggestion that the Court should be stacked with people likely to accept abuse claims. Since the role of the Court is specifically to arbitrate in matters that are complex without bias, such a suggestion is hardly constructive. If her "experts" were confident of their expertise, they'd likewise have no fear of the Court, since they could back up their expertise with evidence. If they are shying away, it speaks more to their competence than the impartiality of the Court.

mog,

Your motives on this are becomeing clearer and clearer.
"the tired old strident women-haters"

You are illustrating beautifully the point I made near the start. All a woman need do is yell 'think of the children' and the fact they are really just lobbying for a bigger slice of the pie for themselves is somehow missed. 'Classic distraction technique' indeed.

Yet a man concerned about having no protection under the law against false accusations is somehow considered by you as a 'woman-hater'.

People like you are part of the problem.

Antiseptic – “the rights of the child have paramountcy in Australian Family Law etc." They do not. Nor are child-related laws designed to specifically include children’s rights. Children have been refused the right to give personal testimony to Courts. Children have been placed in residence with fathers with records of violent criminal conduct, drug and alcohol abuse, and mental health problems and Courts are therefore failing to uphold children’s rights to be protected from abuse. I suggest you examine some of the recent cases of child murder by their fathers and the Court decisions to award those fathers custody of those children.

“How would you propose that be strengthened" etc. No but neither do I accept that allegations by children, that they are being abused by their fathers on contact occasions, are necessarily `false’, only unproven. Anyone with experience in child protection work knows it is rare for children to make false allegations and on the extremely rare occasions when they are coerced into doing so, this can be uncovered as they cannot maintain consistency in their testimonies.

The major part of this problem in failing to prove children’s allegations of abuse is that many Family Reporters/ Psychiatrists/ and Psychologists giving expert testimony to Courts when it is outside of their area of expertise.

“The fact is that the burden of proof always must rest with the one making the allegation”. I do not dispute that statement – however there is a great deal needs to be done in the way that Courts examine that proof, Excluding children from giving direct evidence, engaging professionals who are operating outside of their areas of competence and expertise, lawyers who can engage `Hired Gun’ Experts to argue their case, other lawyers who are too lazy or incompetent to present a reasonable case etc etc. Failures of DoCS to throughly and competently investigate children’s allegations of abuse. Gender-based bias in the Judiciary. These are but a few of the difficulties faced by children in having their allegations meet the standards of proof required by Courts.

On cue I have now had a full chorus of response from the 'what about me' boys brigade, each with some personal abuse. Shucks. I'd feel special if you didn't do it to all the girls. (For the record I adore my male partner, my father, my son, my brother, my grandfathers and my male friends.) But, leaving aside the play of taunting those who identify themselves as falsely accused abusers -

Back to the issue of children in the family law system - all along the call has been for a proper investigatory capacity in family law decision-making which 1. implements safety from violence and abuse as the primary value where violence or abuse is raised and is informed by the science around children's wellbeing and development 2.brings together the information on parents and children held by state police, corrections, child protection, education, health when there are allegations of violence or abuse and, based on the evidence 3. makes decisions which protect and support the safety of adults and children.
None of these things happens at present. That's the problem. If an airline ran its approach to passenger safety the way children's safety is handled in the family law system the carnage would be visible not shielded by secrecy provisions and professional privilege.

mog,

"from the 'what about me' boys brigade. "

For a start, I comment as an interested bystander. I have never been divorced or been accused of abuse. You however, cant see the forest for the trees. Why do you feel the need to alienate people who just want a proper investigation into abuse? I would have thought that was something you would agree with. But instead you decide to somehow simultaneously attack these posters and claim you are being abused.

' leaving aside the play of taunting those who identify themselves as falsely accused abusers -
'
Why didn't you do that in the first place? Why do you feel the need to play and taunt people? And then claim you are being abused?

It seems to me what you really want is for any allegation of abuse to just be believed, and anyone who doesn't like this idea is selfish ('what about me brigade'). You think nobody EVER falsely acuses anyone of abuse, and anyone who thinks this happens is in lala land, or a 'tired old strident women-hater'.

I think it's pretty obvious who the hater is on this forum. You're the one in Lala land.

thanks for agreeing that there needs to be proper investigation - hallelujah - you got it usual suspect!

mog:"I suggest you examine some of the recent cases of child murder by their fathers and the Court decisions to award those fathers custody of those children."

I suggest you read up on the far more common cases of children murdered by their mothers instead of letting your man-hating prejudices show so blatantly.

mog:"the play of taunting those who identify themselves as falsely accused abusers"

If you're referring to me, that should read "men who have been falsely accused of abuse". Glad to have cleared that up for you. Perhaps you could clear up for the rest of us why you presumably find it so much fun to taunt people who've been victims of false accusations

ChazP:"allegations by children, that they are being abused by their fathers on contact occasions, are necessarily `false’, only unproven"

Entirely right. It is up to the Court to determine whether those unproven allegations can be substantiated. That task is made harder when it is a parent making the allegation, not a child claiming to be a victim. If a child does make such an allegation, the Court has to have due consideration for the fact that children may often be easily lead, both intentionally and inadvertently. I'm sure that mistakes are made in both directions. In any case, it's a far more common scenario that a child is abused by a someone with no biological relationship, especially the de facto partners of their "single" mother. I'm not sure of your grounds for suggesting that Family Report writers and ICRs are acting outside their fields.

ChazP:"difficulties faced by children in having their allegations meet the standards of proof required by Courts."

I'm sure there are many others, as well. One of the problems is that such an allegation, if proven, may lead to criminal charges. The Family court is not the place for criminal matters. Such matters require a much higher burden of proof than a mere "balance of probabilities". If such a criminal matter is raised, it is likely that it would take precedence over pending Family Law matters, since it may significantly affect the grunds for any decision made in the Family Court. Therefore, it is important for all responsible parties to ensure that diverting a case to the criminal courts is not done lightly and that means that claims of abuse must be treated somewhat sceptically. Please note, that doesn't mean they should be disregarded, merely examined properly.

Even without all that, the possibility of advantage accruing to the one who makes the allegation is enough to mean any accusation must be greeted with caution. It's a fraught issue, buti still don't see that Sunita has made her case.

“That task is made harder when it is a parent making the allegation, not a child claiming to be a victim.” – any allegation of child abuse has to originate from the child by either physical evidence, complaint, or disclosure or a combination – all that a parent can do is to report such allegations and without distortion or embellishment – the child is the victim of the crime.

“it's a far more common scenario that a child is abused by a someone with no biological relationship,”
– No they are not. Natural fathers and grandfathers are the most common perpetrators of child abuse. Abuse by de facto partners are far less common.

..” such an allegation, if proven, may lead to criminal charges” etc.
And therein lies the rub. It is immensely difficult to prove child abuse to a civil court standard and even more so in a Criminal Court. The evidence that the child has been abused is often present and allegations are not therefore false in any sense, but requires some form of corroborative evidence which may be difficult to obtain. Even against previously convicted abusers. That is why the vast majority of instances of child abuse cannot be proven to a legal standard and are unpunished. The best that can be done is to try to protect the child against further abuse while the perp is acquitted.

“. I'm not sure of your grounds for suggesting that Family Report writers and ICRs are acting outside their fields."
Many Courts are appointing psychologists/ psychiatrists as Family Reporters. Their job is to diagnose mental disorders (and there are some who are diagnosing mental disorders which have no scientifically based research and are not generally accepted by the relevant professional community e.g. PAS/ Dissociative Disorder/ Repressed Memory Syndrome etc.) They are not educated nor trained nor experienced in investigating child abuse yet are permitted to do so by Courts. Child abuse is therefore not within their area of expertise and any of them doing so should be reported to their respective professional Disciplinary Board.

A paper on "Responding to children and young people's disclosures of abuse" http://www.aifs.gov.au/nch/pubs/brief/pb2/pb2.html

A number of other papers can be found at http://www.aifs.gov.au/nch/pubs/brief/menu.html

Plenty of other resources available from other parts of the AIFS site.

R0bert

A large part of the issue is the fact that the Family Court is an adversarial court and not an inquisitorial court. As long as it remains adversarial, the involvement of liars erm I mean lawyers will ensure that mistakes will be made and children will be subjected to abusive situations. Remove the lawyers (who are licensed to lie without consequence in order to win) and most of the problem is solved. Read on:

A Sydney barrister, Stuart Littlemore QC, stated client-based ethics
accurately when interviewed on television by Andrew Denton in October
1995.
Denton: ‘It's a classic question. If you're in a situation where you are defending someone who you yourself believe not to be innocent - can you continue to defend them?’
Littlemore: ‘Well, they're the best cases; I mean, you really feel you've done something when you get the guilty off. Anyone can get an innocent person off; I mean they shouldn't be on trial. But the guilty - that's the challenge.’
Denton: ‘Don’t you in some sense share in their guilt?’
Littlemore: ‘Not at all.

mog,

Well, read my first post. It's refreshing to see you have dropped the man hating for one post.

ChildAdvocate, spot on.

It would also help if the courts had some kind of informal review process. Someone who would do at least a basic check of concerns raised about the legality of judgements without the person raising the concern having to fund an appeal. Particularly so while the courts remain adversarial.

R0bert

Thanks for making me smile childadvocate.

In terms of improvements to a dysfunctional system.... all my friends believe that a certain kind of system already exists...where children are interviewed by kind child abuse experts, they play with dolls, say things and lo and behold are believed.

There is a belief that abused children are generally treated with care and respect and from truth comes protection. The first problem is the illusion that this state of affairs currently exists.

This sanitisation of the reality seems to be perpetuated by the spokespeople of the Family Court and the media.

It is an unbelievable shock that the standards of the general community don't exist in the Family Court when it comes to child abuse.

Second - the illusion needs to become the reality. Safety, quite sensibly to most people, should be the reality and priority. Words like 'childs best interests' should mean safety. 'Risk of abuse' should mean before it happens, not long term damage to the child has already happened.

Kind play therapists with years of experience in child abuse do exist. But in the hearts of men/women there is another game being played. I doubt I'll ever hear the kind and knowledgable judge say, "this is terrible what has happened to this child this must be stopped at once". But it should, it should be like that.

I think child abuse cases should be heard by child abuse experts or that a child abuse expert should 'sit in' with Judge and inform him/her. This expert should be able to override Judge who is an expert in legislation only.

There are many, many knowledgable people in our society with ideas to make this system work for children, they just need to be listened to.

Also ask the children ...they might know.

Child advocate your point that children know what is happening to them is a very good one. The trouble is that when children disclose abuse to family law system people such as family report writers and child protection workers in the context of family law proceedings, the usual mythology appears - that the children are saying what they have been told to say by their (alienating) parent (usually mother) because they are 'enmeshed.' Currently the risk that the children are telling the truth about thier abuse is borne by the children, in private, away from scrutiny. Another part of the problem is the belief amongst decision-makers that if a wrong decision is made it is worse to wrongly deprive a child of a relationship with a non-offending parent, than to subject a child to continuing abuse by an abusing parent. A Justice of the court is in print to this effect. Child abuse literally destroys children's lives. Separation from a loving parent is a sad loss for a child, but one that is not mourned when fathers go to war or work overseas or away from home. Relationsips recover. The toll of child abuse won't stop while the family law system forces children into the control of abusers.

mog,

' the usual mythology appears - that the children are saying what they have been told to say '
I find it very hard to believe that this is the defaut position, and no investigation is entered into.

'but one that is not mourned when fathers go to war or work overseas or away from home. '
So you're suggesting that a fathers relationship with the child isn't as important as the mother's relationship with the child?

In the end, it still seems you would like all allegations to be treated as truth, and the burden of proof on the accused? No risk to the children, where there's smoke there's fire, better to be safe than sorry sums it up for you.

That's open slather for false accusations. Whoever gets in first with the allegations of abuse gets custody, as the accused cant prove it didn't happen.

There has to be some disincentive for false accusations.

I recognise that it may be hard to believe that it is the default position to disbelieve children and blame mothers - trawl through judgements, read the transcripts and reports, talk to parents who have been through it. Those of us who have done so have repeatedly seen the evidence.
There is no proper investigation process when a family report writer interviews each parent for an hour and the benefit of the doubt never falls on the side of safety. Safety does not necessarily mean no contact, it means no opportunity for further physical or psychological injury.
Children mourn the loss of either parent. The point is that children can more readily survive separation from a parent than being physically, sexually and/or pschologically abused by a parent. The criminal justice system and mental wards and morgues are populated by people seriously abused as children by their parent. Sometimes it is their mother, but the most common context is domestic violence. In the state I live in, 85% of deaths of babies under one occur in households which child protection has identifed as domestic violence.There is no safety if they stay or if they leave in this family law system- all that awaits is a childhood of continuing abuse if they survive.

Usual suspect, "I find it very hard to believe that this is the default position and no investigation is entered into".

As I said - the truth is unbelievable, and the public and people such as yourself are living in the illusion of a 'just' society or are some people picking the knowledge of others in order to use it to advantage 'dads in distress'?

The Family Court does not investigate, the State Protection System is highly unlikely to investigate. Each expects the other to do something and each has refused to do anything about this situation for years. They have different ideologies and the two systems are incompatible.

I suspect that neither Federal or State want to fund investigation. If the State does bother to investigate and miracle of miracle substantiate abuse the Family Court often over rides this.

This is true, check kids in distress web site and read. Read the Family Law Council Report 2002.

If a genuine investigation were carried out and I mean a genuine investigation not the current shambles that exists, then an alleged abused child could be 'heard' and none of us need to be on this forum.

The claim that abuse allegations are a tactical move is nonsense and I challenge anyone to cite a single judgement where the child or protective parent have reported sexual or physical abuse and this has been taken seriously enough to result in supervision or no contact.

Usual Suspect - ` I find it very hard to believe that this is the defaut position, and no investigation is entered into.”
I can confirm that to my knowledge of a large number of cases, this is the prevailing attitude among many FRs and CP workers. It saves them the bother of having to carry out a thorough and comprehensive investigation. As has also been reported, I can also confirm decisions regarding whether or not abuse has occurred are made by some FRs solely on the basis of one hour clinical interviews with both parents. One accusing and the other denying – the default position lies with the denier.

` In the end, it still seems you would like all allegations to be treated as truth, and the burden of proof on the accused?”
- it has to be, at the intial stages of an investigation, in the same way the police accept a complaint that an offence has been committed. Only a thorough and competent investigation can determine whether or not the complaint is truthful and whether there is corroborative evidence. Rarely are thorough investigations carried out in FC Proceedings therefore the default position above, is applied.

“There has to be some disincentive for false accusations.”
– there are, it is called perjury and misleading a Court and the punishments can be severe . Only such situations are not looked at that the Court Procedures have been breached, but that the person making the false accusations is attacking the respondent and the punishment for doing that is the removal of the children from the care of that person. A Draconian measure by any standards for what is a breach of Court procedures and legal principles.

From what I can gather, the judge who will be hearing the case in Austria, of the father who allegedly locked up his daughter in a subterranean dungeon, for decades, allegedly raped her and allegedly caused her to give birth to I think, two or three of his children, is very, very highly trained in Child Sexual Abuse/ Accommodation / the process of disclosure of abuse / PTSD / the mechanims of operation of sociopaths /narcissists /paedophiles /manipulation and so on.
That judge will, I understand, be supported throughout the process by top,extremely well quailified and experienced child /psychiatrists, as will all parties.

That clearly demonstrates to me that there is a very clear understanding and acceptance in that country that all these matters are extremely well understood by the judiciary and that top experts are engaged by the court to give evidence in these matters ; not as I am repeatedly told by lawyers, judges and others, those "experts" who can't find work anywhere else,that is what I am told, I don't know if it is true.

The mere fact that so many true experts in these matters and I hear it all the time from them, absolutely refuse to give evidence in the FCA courtrooms is a factor here.

Let's all hope feverishly for the day when this country sees fit to pour those sorts of resources, time, committment, truth and love into its own Children.

There will be a time when, as they say, all good people come to the party..let's trust that it'sooner rather than later.

"In the state I live in, 85% of deaths of babies under one occur in households which child protection has identifed as domestic violence."

The NEW Child Death Review Team publishs a variety of material around child death including fatal assault.

http://www.kids.nsw.gov.au/uploads/documents/fatalassault2008.pdf
"• There was no evidence of an increase in the likelihood of the deaths of children from assault in recent years
• The deaths of children from assault are relatively rare The number of children who die from assault is small accounting for only 1.4 per cent of all the deaths of children over the ten year period 1996 to 2005.
• Nearly 60 per cent of children come from families with a child who had been the subject of a report to Department of Community Services within three years prior to the death
This means that, while the majority of families whose children die from assault come into contact with the child protection system, more than one assault death in three occurs in a family with no contact with that system.
• The greatest difference in incident rates was found for age and Aboriginality
We found that the risk of death by assault for children less than one year old is 16 times more likely than for those aged five years or older; for those children aged one year old death is six times more likely; and for those children aged two to four years old death is four times more likely. The risk of death by assault for Aboriginal children is four times greater than that of non-Aboriginal children."

From the 2006 study http://www.kids.nsw.gov.au/uploads/documents/CDRT_annual_2007.pdf

"In all nine of the incidents involving children under 15 years old, the perpetrator was known to the child. The perpetrator was the child’s biological father in three incidents, biological mother in three incidents and the mother’s partner in two incidents. The other matter remains under investigation. In the incident involving the
15-17 year old, the relationship between the young person and the perpetrator was unknown."

R0bert

Family Court of Australia
Re W and W : (Abuse allegations; Expert evidence] [2001] FamCA 216 (14 March 2001)

in summary of appeal to the Full Court:

I am of the opinion the expert has demonstrated bias and thus little, if any weight, should be attached to his opinion. He has stepped out of the role of an expert witness and assumed the role of advocate for the husband. These comments should not be interpreted as necessarily involving a personal attack upon the expert but rather as a criticism of the system of calling expert witnesses as it presently operates in this jurisdiction.
It appears likely that the husband and his advisers saw that there were a number of substantial weaknesses in his case. These included the fact that he had made damaging albeit inadmissible admissions. They also included the fact that no expert witness was able to form any conclusion as to why the child should have made unwarranted allegations of sexual abuse.
In these circumstances, the husband faced a substantial risk that the Court, even if it found that the allegations of sexual abuse had not been made out, would still find that there was an unacceptable risk to the child ....except in a supervised fashion, because of the possibility that abuse might have occurred.
The stakes were high and the obvious forensic solution lay in the selection of an appropriate forensic expert who might redress the balance in the husband’s favour. In the context of normal adversarial litigation, this is a well recognised and perhaps acceptable approach. In a jurisdiction where the best interests of the child are the paramount consideration, such an approach is less satisfactory. This (and more) “was” said in relation to a
case which involved many of the notions outlined above

I note that this subject seems to have disappeared from the "articles" section of OLO. I had to find it by checking my posts. Is there a reason for that?

The discussion seems to have come down to "I care for kids and you don't" in the minds of some contributors. The rights of parents to a fair hearing are dismissed as pandering to 'dads in distress' and the thought that some parents may tell lies and teach their children to tell lies is dismissed as somehow fanciful. Men are demonised and women sanctified in this view of the world. It's hardly surprising that a dutiful judge may not agree with this particular viewpoint.

I think that's pretty spot on antiseptic.

septic and suspect are you asserting that men always tell the truth and women always lie?

Not at all. Men and women both lie. The prmary carer will naturally have more opportunity to brainwash kids. Your constant use of 'Lala land' and 'imagination' of course shows you believe the idea that 'some parents may tell lies and teach their children to tell lies is fanciful. ' as atiseptic said.

MOG:"are you asserting that men always tell the truth and women always lie?"

Of course not. What a stupid question.

Usual Suspect and Antiseptic - you have obviously read W & W and been blown away?

My understanding from reading this case is that the mother was about to lose her three children to the abuser. Orders were made to this effect, at the eleventh hour it became known to the court that the father had admitted at relationship counselling to sexual abuse of the children.

Did the Judicial world tremble and shake at this horrendous miscarriage of justice? The court was about to send these children to a Paedophille full-time. Was there consternation and concern that other children may have suffered the same fate? Was a re-examination of a flawed system required?

Not at all, a bit of discussion about impartiality of court experts but no change. This judgement shows the kind of insanity that exists on a false belief system. The sheer complex mess that is made of this situation by liars and agendas and a self-reflecting legal system.

It's simple really, stand-up for the children. Find ways to get to the truth and help these children or step aside and let the adults who know how to fix this mess do their job.

There is a Judgment dated 1995 in which a little girl 2 1/2 years old spoke of sexual abuse. After two years of this little girl telling adults in detail, her mother lost an appeal to get the father to be supervised.

What would the consequences of supervision cost this father? what are the consequences of no supervision if this girl (heavens above) was telling the truth?

Think about that and think about all the children who suffer while people shout 'liar, liar'.

It is about valuing children. I read a quote recently which said: "if you don't stand for children, you don't stand for much".

There have long been concerns about the investigation of children's complaints of abuse by Family Courts. In recognition of the serious flaws in the system in 2002 the Family Law Council recommended a National Child Protection Service:
Recommendation 3 The objectives of the Child Protection Service should be:
1. To investigate child protection concerns and provide information arising from such investigation to courts exercising jurisdiction under the Family Law Act.
2. To ensure, in the course of its work, that children and families are not subjected to unnecessary investigation, assessment or stress.
3. To avoid unnecessary duplication of resources and effort in the investigation and determination of matters involving both family law and child welfare law issues.
4. To promote the development of a co-operative approach between State and Federal agencies in responding to concerns about child abuse and neglect.

It has been reported world-wide this week that a former student at a "top" Sydney school has made allegations of what appears to be ritual abuse at that school during his time there.

So courgeous and committed is this young man to the exposure of the truth and justice,that I understand that he actually stood outside his former school and handed out leaflets about what he says he endured.

Priest Robert Sharwood was,I beieve, finally stripped of that position this week after a long and courageous stand,by his target, both personally and in the courts.
Precedents are being set everywhere.

The time has come for the commom man to speak and to speak loudly, suucinctly and consistently.

Collusion and complicity in the process of Child Abuse through silence and denial are not acceptable, they never were, nothing in that regard has changed.

We have this week also witnessed the first ever African-American formally accept his nomonation for President of the United States, on the forty-fifth anniversary of King's "I have a Dream " speech.

The time for serious and effective change is here.

This country needs a Royal Commission into th Family Court of Australia and its allegd "experts".
Its children need it here and now.

I understand that the Family Law Council of Australia this week also called for more senior judges to be appointed to the FCA.

Diana: Will you please now act?

Sunita

Thank you for confirming for me that The Australian Family Court system is complicit in child abuse.

I am preparing a paper about my own recent attempt to regain contact with my maltreated grandchildren. The Family Report was crucial as it discredited me. I had no right of reply.

I was given no prior information about the Family Report process. Brochures obtained yesterday from the solicitor's clerk, and and from the Family Court website are not identical. Only the latter gives details of how to challenge a Family Report.

Just before the Court Hearing I was told that I should accept whatever contact could be negotiated with the other side or risk losing contact altogether. The contact granted is almost meaningless.

I was condemned by the Family Reporter/Consultant for involving the famiy GP who referred the family to Social Services. There was no attempt to discern the truth.

I now find that in order to challenge the Family Report, I (or my solicitor) would have needed to signal the intention to cross-examine the Family Reporter/Consultant at least 14 days before the Hearing.

I received my copy 13 days before, so a challenge was never possible.

I had also requested and offered to pay the cost of separate legal representation for thc children, and I understood that this would be arranged. It was not.

The worst aspect is that the more bady maltreated child was found by the Family Reporter/Consultant to be ill-behaved (not hungry) so the parents now have an official written report to back up their cruelty. I promised to help that child and because of the Australian Family Court and its practitioners I have let him down and he is at risk of further maltreatment.

Posted by Valarie 29 August 7.04 p.m.

Valarie, it is a kind of hell you will be entering, and I am afraid there is no good news for you - except we have a new government, a National Framework - child protection to be released end of this year.

None of this is any assistance to these children right now. I believe there are grandparents who do eventually get residence of badly abused children when both parents are incapable. These children are the lucky ones though. Like protective parents you will need overwhelming corroborating evidence.

The Kids in Distress site is full of terrible truth but may be of some assistance to you - www.kidsindistress.org.au. You can also contact them via e-mail and they may be able to give you some assistance.

The pain you feel at not being able to help these children never gets any better. The truth as I have learnt is there is almost nothing you can do. Try to look after yourself and work and hope for change. You may be the one that in the end makes the difference in your grandchildren's lives.

As I was told...take care, best you can.

As Valarie is discovering, the Family Court process is simply a cartel of lawyers, judges, public servants and "experts" keeping each other employed and doing very little toassist families in general and children in particular. The processes have little to do with revealing the truth ofa situation orwhat is best for children's welfare. The processes often alienate parents even further rather than building bridges.

Parents are told that nothing can be done about an "expert" opinion (based on an hour with each party and an hour with the child/ren) and that it is "gold" inthe courtroom. Lawyers and barristers are not social scientists therefore lack the training in social science which is necessary to challenge the experts flimsy and often non-evidence based opinions. In the words of a friend who is also a solicitor, very few solicitors and barristers CAN cross-examine social scientists effectively as they arn't trained in social science; some [lawyers] are terrified of the "experts" for this reason. Lawyers social science knowledge is largely gleaned from the information they have encountered during litigation, including a large amount of shameful junk science anyway. The "experts" are paid from $3000 per report for an OPINION which is often speculative and not based in fact. They don't investigate and do not seem to understand that some people lie when being interviewed. Yet when they make obvious mistakes, clients obtain a refund unlike other bad services and are simply told "bad luck".

Like valaries matter, so many parents encounter this kind of writer who simply condemns one party and labels the child as uncooperative etc, seemingly having no comprehension ofthe psychological or emotional circumstances which may lead to the behaviours exhibited. Remember, once one solicitor has contracted a social scientist to do a report, they will keep getting work andthat work is never peer reviewed. Nor are there training and mandatory updating requirements, unlike other professionals. There areno professional standards.

Diana Bryant's comments regarding her 'expert' reports are farcical. The FCA is little more than an adversarial industry, reeking of egotism and cronie-ism, and collusion to rob people of their money.

Justice for Kids, I had a look at the Kids in Distress web site.

Whilst they talk the talk

"The 'blame game' of who is the more abusive towards children is a waste of energy that could be better put to assisting parents who are at risk of harming their children." they also take the space to devote a page to attacking the mens movement yet I didn't manage to find the page discussing the failings of the mothers groups.

They found space for "It almost seems as if killing your own is becoming a viable alternative for a scattering of gutless men too willing to lay down the lives of their children as collateral in their wars against their wives.".

They also fitted in "It is noteworthy that to date we have not found any reports of the "Syndrome" being induced in children by fathers, protective of them from abusive mothers, or grandparents protective of children from unstable parents of either sex. "

And "Kids in Distress does not agree with the comments of this author. It is a convenient way of 'explaining away' in a 'kindly' way the reactions of mothers when they become aware that their children are being abused."

"So we are expecting a steep increase in fathers seeking contact and we are aware of this beginning to happen – purely based on their desire to reduce their child support liability."

There is some positive stuff as well but I was dismayed by the bias in their gender attacks. There seemed to be planty of negative portrayals of men but I didn't see a single general negative comment about women which seemed to be part of the sites editorial. The answer is not to start attacking women on their site but to get rid of the attacks on men and start recognising that both genders are capable of wrongdoing.

R0bert

ChildAdvocate: This is a major issue which Courts and lawyers urgently need to address - the `expertise' of those with an `Expert' label. The UK has just gone a trauma of `World-Renowned Experts', which tragically caused many women and men to suffer jail terms and to lose their children forever. The UK has now introduced tight controls over those who claim to be `Expert'. Opinions from a psychology perspective and based on theories with no scientifically-based research or professional peer group acceptance and do not appear in DSMIV or Mental Health Acts are given meek acceptance by lawyers and Courts here. Psychiatrists and psychologists are also often permitted to give opinions to Courts on matters completely outside of their professional domain. e.g. I know of no psychiatrist with specialist training and experience in the professional investigations of allegations of child abuse. Their opinions should be confined to their recognised area of professional activity i.e. diagnosis, and treatment of mental disorders which have scientifically-based research and peer group acceptance. All else is fanciful speculation and should be ruled as inadmissible evidence. Psychiatrists are completely unsuited in their professional backgrounds to act as Family Reporters to Courts as the assessment and evaluation of parents and children requires a far wider knowledge and experience in family functioning. There is now a graveyard of psychological theories that have run their course in the Courts e.g.PAS, MSBP/FII, Repressed Memory Syndrome which had no scientifically-based research to support them yet in the course of their use until final exposure for their fraudulence, wreaked havoc and suffering among thousands of children and families throughout the world. Lawyers might begin by looking at the Daubert Rules in the USA and the recent rules for expert testimony set in the UK, as a starting point for establishing the quality of `Expert' evidence in Australian Courts. Until then, it is children and parents who will continue to suffer the consequences of engaging inexpert `Experts'.

In my court experience I learnt that the Independent Child Lawyer is appointed by Legal Aid. This sounds fair enough, but then learnt the Independent Child Lawyer is appointed on the basis of - how much the lawyer charges. Therefore Legal Aid appoints the lowest bidder!! What a system!

Fortunately there are Lawyers and Barristers out there who do care about the children and do their utmost but are confined and restricted. I was fortunate in having high quality representation for my child by the Independent Child Lawyer and my own Solicitor. Also court expert was not a PAS supporter. This however made no difference in the scheme of things.

What is curious is the Judges discretion in the case Sunita talks about in her article. The majority of experts were presenting serious concerns about the children, yet the Judge selected the evidence from the expert who supported PAS? Why?

JfK:"The majority of experts were presenting serious concerns about the children, yet the Judge selected the evidence from the expert who supported PAS? Why?"

I can only assume the expert who demurred from the "majority" view was more credible to the judge. Courts are not democratic places in the sense that all experts are equal. A dozen junk opinions are still junk and one fact is worth more than a dozen suppositions. Can you think of any reasons for the judge to have considered the one opinion more credible than the others, consensual as they may have been? Try to avoid the one that goes "the judge determined to allow the child to be abused", since it's probably not the right one. As I don't know your case, I can't offer any more than that, I'm sorry.

The trade off for accepting low wages (but not compared to the average wage) now for doing child rep work is that it provides vastly increased networking opportunities, experience on the resume and in the long run a shot at getting oneself to the other side of the bench.

Justice for Kids

My comment disappearded so this might be a duplicate. Thank you for your encouraging comments. Could you tell me more about the National Framework please? I'd like to contribute etc.

The slight indirect contact I was granted by the Court three weeks ago is not working. The permitted birthday present is still at a PO awaiting the mother's signature. It arrived on time, by registered post. I managed to speak to the child on his mother's mobile phone on the third attempt for his birthday and I asked her to collect his package. It seems that like perjured Affidavits etc this sort of contempt for the legal process is tolerated. What can we do about it?

During the phone call there was no sign of the angry and hostile (to me) child described by the Family Consultant/Reporter. I suppose this indicates that it is worth accepting (as an interim measure at least) even the slightest contact.

Child Advocate
Your description of the Family Court process is very apt. Your item also helps to explain why my barrister (selected by my formerly trusted solicitor) backed down at the last minute, although cross examination of the Family Consultant/reporter on that day would not have been possible because of the requirement to give 14 days notice. They both seem to be in the wrong job!

For the purpose of keeping this discussion current in the forum, I have added this post.

I continue to encourage parents to write to their local MP about the corrupt adversarial system and urging a change to an investigative system. Ideally, I would like to see all barristers, judges, lawyers and report writers involved in the current system banished to the salt mines of Siberia, but I doubt Mr Rudd will entertain such a notion.

Child Advocate
Thank you. We must keep the discussion (and relevant action) going.

I am trying to have my case reopened and have lodged a formal complaint about my legal team to the relevant body on the grounds that :

1. They withheld crucial information from me concerning the Family Report. I found this later using the FMC website in the brochure headed "Family Reports".

2. I was therefore unable to give INFORMED consent to either the Family Assessment or to the Final Court Orders, which were apparently based on the Report.

3. They were working against my interests.

My (now former) solicitor has not yet (5+ weeks after the settlement/Hearing) lodged the Final Court Orders with the Family Court.

I am also preparing a complaint against the Family Consultant, with the relevant professional body, on the grounds (based on the relevant Professional Standards document):

1. That person was acting outside their field of expertise. (The clue is in the Interim Court Order).

2. I was not able to give INFORMED consent to the Family Assessment, as I had no prior knowledge of what it involved, how it would be used or the great secrecy involved.

3.The unprofessional manner in which the Assessment was conducted.

4. Extreme bias against me in the Report.

5. Failure of the Family Consultant to read the background documentation - this was obvious when the very delayed report arrived.

I used the Internet to obtain the relevant addresses, but Public Library staff could have helped if necessary.

Hi Valarie, please persist in your efforts as there is a great need to overhaul expertise and accountability of the Report Writers, legal counsel and decision makers and that won't happen without persistent complaint action at the individual level as well as publicly directed activities to expose the institutionalised child abuse which is sadly routine in the courts and many FRC's at present.
I have seen the most appalling outcome for children time and time again and the decision-makers are never around to see the children's distress, suicidality, depression, anxiety and incomprehension that even though they have told what is happening they are not protected - parents are similarly shell-shocked that the evidence of their child's abuse is breezily explained away by barrister waffle and accepted by everybody, who then agree with each other that the abuse didn't happen and parent must make the child happy to spend time with the abuser and experience ongoing harm. It is tragic and routine.

Hi mog

Thank you for your encouragement. All this is new to me and I can hardly believe that I could be so accepting of the system. I was raised in an era when we obeyed and respected the Law so this has been difficult for me.

I'll post comments on responses (if any) to my complaints. In the meantime I am going to write to my Local Member etc.

My advice to all: Do not annotate any of your documents if you can help it. Make a photocopy first and write on that. I did not do this as I did not anticipate needing clean copies later, and I had to get expensive replicas from the Family Court Registry to attach as evidence to my complaints. However, the Family Court staff member who phoned me about my requests was extremely helpful and kind.

Quote from article in Kids in Distress: "something is terribly wrong with a culture that devalues and criminalizes motherhood" (apologies to male protective parents and protective grandparents).

I am sceptical about the ability of academics, experts and individual efforts to create change. No one seems to take any notice - as demonstrated by the last thirteen years of worsening situation for children despite research papers, Law Council Report 2002 and debate.

The Judgements are there for all to see and read.

Why did my little child come and fall into this black hole of evil. Prepared and delivered by a 'civilised' system full of highly intelligent people to a paedophille?

The experts earnestly discuss 'attachment' and 'meaningful' all the while a huge elephant of abuse sits in the room. No-one apart from those who love this child see the heart wrenching consequences.

It's so peaceful and civilised in the court, far, far, far away from the cries of a child.

While the Father's Right's Groups may gag I would like to see a documentary that simply allows protective parents like me, to tell our story. In the US the film "Breaking the Silence: Children's Stories" was released in October 2005. Quote: "Chronicles the impact of domestic violence on children and the recurring failings of Family Courts across the country".

Caused a storm. PBS issued a appeasement statement in response to the outraged 'dads'. The point would be the general public would be aware of what is happening and could never again claim not to know.

I wish everyone could know what is happening to their faces... the suffering of children like my child and want, like me, for it to stop. Why don't Journalists present the truth to the Australian public?

mog "decision-makers are never around to see"

That is in my view a significant weakness in the whole system across the board. There does not seem to be any checkback mechanism to help them learn from past mistakes.

They do their thing and move on leaving everybody else with the consequences. There is no informal complaints handling mechanism, if you think a legal error has been made the response is to lodge an appeal which few could afford.

Business which operate like that don't last long if they have any competition.

R0bert

With regard to journalists publishing the truth. Perhaps we can help here by contacting newspapers and suggest investigative reports be made on for example :

What motivates legal advisers to use whatever means they can to persuade their clients to consent to a bad pre-Hearing settlement?

In my case, evidence in their own files of which I was unaware at the time, would have made me insist on proceeding to a full hearing which if properly considered should have brought about different, and perhaps the opposite, result. This avoidance of Court can't be because of money, as I was charged the full barrister's fee for two brief sessions during which I was lied to about not being able to challenge the Family Report and threatened with an even worse outcome. This was not in the presence of my solicitor, but of his young "clerk".

Is it simply to speed up the court process, or is there something else? I have not been allowed inside the Court Room.

RObert: My complaint to the State Legal Commissioner has so far been free. There are downloadable forms on the Internet, or you can send a letter, with attachments. If you do either, keep copies of everything, and send the complaint by registered post (or similar) to ensure delivery. You can then track it using the Australia Post website if necessary. The more complaints lodged, the better.

I am proceeding with my attempt to have my case re-opened. I am prepared to mortgage my house to do so, but I know that this method of financing is not an option for most contributors. There is tremendous injustice (and possibly worse) going on. This will be a test case.

EVERYONE: : Please keep your comments coming to ensure that the Forum remains open until I can get a result.

An alternative process would see applicants to FRCs/courts have an intake process which canvassed issues and assessed risks. When allegations of abuse or use of violence are made, the records held by police, corrections, health, education, child protection on the parties should be sought and an extended family assessment made focussing on children's and adults' safety from further harm. This should guide all decision-making and be constantly reviewed.
Professionals in the system need to be educated to 'zero tolerance' of abusive, controlling and violent behaviour with clear escalating, sanctions for offenders. Such behaviour is a choice - and if it is NOT a choice then the problem is apparently one of COMPULSIVE violent offending which may require additional medical containment responses. Currently men's violent displays tend to be viewed by legal professionals as 'provocation' (caused by her) and by psych types as 'grief' (caused by her), not intimidatory displays designed to elicit compliance - which works on them. Judges have been bombed and every family lawyer has a 'mad dad' experience of mayhem, stalking, threats, assaults so they comply, blame her, hand over the children and shut the door and go home. Research learning is that past conduct predicts future conduct. A history of violent/abusive conduct predicts future violent/abusive conduct without significant and sustained intervention to change the behaviour. Currently the system supports abusers, sacrifices children to them and punishes protective parents. A sick system.

Hi again mog

I agree totally. We must change the general culture and way of thinking of the professionals involved. I have been treated badly and patronized by my highly paid advisers and the Family Consultant because I have a dysfunctional family. I didn't have the funds or the courage to protect my own children from their violent father, and now one of these children is condoning abuse in their own home, excluding me from contact, and the Family Court endorses this.

The violence in our home commenced after the children were born. I did not have sufficient insight to predict it and I now realize that I would not have been believed if I had tried to involve the authorities.

Education generally and education about the causes of child abuse, do not seem to be enough to prevent it from being repeated in the next generation. Mental illness, personality disorders and over-emphasis on a harsh form of religion are often involved.

An integrated, compassionate approach towards those who are able to overcome their shame and report child abuse, is essential.

A social worker friend in UK warned me that I would not be granted contact, partly because there (in UK) it is assumed that all grandparents' reports of child abuse are malicious. I hoped that Australia was different.

If anyone has any lingering doubts about just how the Family Court (and court expert and JIRT) treats disclosures and concerns about child sexual abuse then read Stamos & Mariakis (2008) FamCA 727 and despair.

If..child enacting abuse, clearly disclosing abuse, having physical signs of abuse, showing behaviours indicative of abuse. What possible evidence is left?

Many thanks to all of you caring and sharing such strong emotions about your children. I found this forum 2 hours ago & have just finished reading everything.I believe as its the whole spectrum of bodies earning their living off the distress of families at risk that are letting us down, it may be time to bring in the United Nations. They were here earlier in the year to investigate the state of equality of women (which is parlous). As there is no bench mark of Human Rights signed by Australia, what prevents any of those PAID to protect the rights of the most vulnerable from abusers (of any sex)from abusing their own powers of authority? Noteably, in reading about the UN investigation into the Women's Inequality, NSW seemed to come off worse. NOW reading about the abuse by DOCS, the Police, Legal Aid Solicitors (see James Wood QC Enquiry to be published 30 September 2008)it appears to be the same state. Australian Bureau of Statistics website not often current., But:- it all reads like a comfortable BOYS OWN CLUB, except most of these Perpetrators are women. Where is "Parents for Justice in Australia" set up? There are only 21,000,000 people (UK has 64million)- and much nicer people making much nicer families I think. So, get the UN in, make a united stand ourselves, get known, have the courage of our convictions, and make sure the money paid to these entities is properly/honestly earned. There's not really any point in hiding our identities as the Federal and State police don't prosecute hackers. Our perpetrator regularly fishes about in my account, removing any evidence he feels necessary, and letters from the Long Arm of the Law say "So what".
The main Perpetrator is rapidly becoming that which poses as the FCA with the enablers of DOCS, COPS, AND MENTAL HEALTH TEAMS.
Enough is enough and our kids are losing their childhoods, futures, and sanity. Its our responsibility to be adult and tackle the government head on for a proper justice system for families.

It is very important to note, and pertinent,in this discussion on the alleged high calibre of,according to CJ Bryant herself,of the "Expert" evidence in her court-rooms,that another of the "experts" the FC relied on,(and the CJ confirmed that they relied on),SUSAN DE CAMPO,who also gave allegedly "expert" evidence in the matter referred to by Koch on the front page of "The Australian" article, entitled "Family Court:Putting Children Last",and then responded to by CJ Bryant herself,in a Courier-Mail article on 09 /09 /2005, by Leanne Edmistone, entitled "Court lifts lid on custody battle to answer critics" has I understand, from the Psychologist's Board, had to be formally advised as has Channel 9, that she does not hold any formal registration as a psychologist,as has been claimed for many, many months now,if not more,on Channel 9's Brisbane "Extra" programme and website(including details of deCampo's business, where she alleges,the last time I looked,to be the head of a group of "consultants" in these matters,)where deCampo, has also been giving her allegedly "expert" advice, for a sustained period,to no doubt thousands of viewers.Channel 9 state that they are "taking the matter seriously."
The recent changes in Medicare, which allow patients to access, for the first time,the services of psychologists,(real ones),on Medicare are also to be noted here.

Anyone ever heard of punctuation, or even paragraphs?

One of the many issues with the 'experts' who get the referrals from their favourite family lawyers, apart from the inherent back-scratching corruption when their common interest is cash for the 'job' and a sausage factory approach to children's circumstances, is that no human service professional undergraduate education routinely includes education about family violence and child abuse - not social work, nursing, medicine, psychology, law, education - practitioners may acquire clinical expertise, however without proper education they may recycle myths amongst each other - eg 'children lie about sex abuse because of parental coaching/child revenge/child pathology'(lawyer stories - these variations are routinely mobilised because the accused's lawyer's job is to challenge their veracity by providing an alternative possible account for the statements) in preference to the research evidence from clinicians working with child sex abuse survivors, that children's disclosures - particularly those with details and knowledge/conduct outside 'normal' child development, are ordinarily true by a 9:1 ratio. Denying child abuse is both common and possible because of the lack of education in this important aspect of human services provision.
Recall the recent reports in SA and Qld that penetrative sexual assaults on 5 year olds by other children were initially classified by each of the schools as 'normal curiousity' in preference to facing the truth that sexualised victims of CSA were acting out their experiences on smaller children, that it was serious offending and that both offending and victim children and families needed urgent support and intervention.
Offending against children thrives while society and family law are content to look away, make excuses, pretend it's not happening, blame those who tell, err on the side of private risk to the child, give offenders the benefit of the doubt - and collect their fees. There is a long way to go before children's human rights to safety are taken seriously in this country. If their safety was truly at the heart of decision-making, they would not be routinely given to offenders.

It is also to be noted that,in the case Koch and other journalists refer to, Melbourne psychologist, VINCENT PAPALEO, presented a Report to the FC, entitled "Parental Alienation Syndrome: A Summary", in support of the father.It was accepted in full and without question, by ALL FC staff, icnluidng judges and alleged ICLs and was also used and accepted by the FC's own "expert" who was later disciplined ;refer Koch's article.This is a clear demonstration of the true calibre of the "highly qualified experts" the CJ alleges she uses in her court-rooms and which Lunn refers to in his article. See above.
This case,I have not one glimmer of doubt, is just one of thousands, in which the FCoA,its staff and its mis-nomered "highly-qualified experts" have facilitated,permitted and colluded with the abuse of our Children.
I wonder how long before we also have a National Apology to the
"Abused Children of the Family Court of Australia"?
It may not be in our time, but it will be.

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Just checking it works...

I'd be quite interested to read the last handful of comments, but they just seem so daunting.

More and more it seems that child abuse cases should not be dealt with in the Family Court at all. The whole system and the people in it are not capable of confronting the abuse.

From "Background Briefing, The Mind of a Paedophile, Sunday 2 May 2004, presented by Helen Thomas"

Quotes from transcript (can be found on the Web)

Helen Thomas: Bill Glasser, ...visiting fellow at Melbourne Uni. Psychology and Criminology Depts. maintains the community simply doesn't want to investigate any of this.

Bill Glasser: I think there is a massive denial of the problem...Freud himself fully appreciated the nature and extent of child sexual abuse over 100 yrs ago, and in fact wrote about it.

The reaction to his observations which were very astute and applicable
today, was one of major outrage in professional circles - so much so that he in fact retracted these observations...He literally said...I'd better say that they're not real and in fact the victims of the child sexual abuse who I've encountered, have in fact just been fantasising about these events all along".

The cases of abuse need to be dealt by adults who are capable of accepting the reality of abuse - not well paid Judges, politicians, court experts and all.

Lama
What a brilliant idea to bring the UNITED NATIONS (UN) into this. I contacted UNICEF (the Children's part of UN) and was told to make a formal complaint to The Australian Human Rights Commission.

There are 8-page downloadable complaints forms (or hard copies can be obtained by post). The grounds for complaint are given on p.3 of the form. I think the relevant box for me to tick is the one relating to a federal government agency. (The Family Court).

The relevant UN document is entitled "The Convention on the Rights of the Child" (CRC) which was adopted by UN in 1989. It was ratified by Australia in 1990, BUT IT HAS NOT YET BEEN INCORPORATED INTO AUSTRALIAN LAW. The Australian Human Rights Commission monitors Australia's compliance with the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

This means that we need to also lobby our local members to ensure that the relevant laws are created as a matter of urgency.

The name of the Human Rights Commissioner as given on the website is Graeme Innes, AM.

I found most of this information on the website to which I was directed: Details follow:

www.humanrights.gov.au. Click on Human Rights, then look for the heading "Current Projects", then click on "Children's Rights" and keep reading. The core principles are those we hear frequently from solicitors etc including "the best interests of the child".

When this (the CRC) is enshrined in Australian law, our task will be easier.

"Usual Suspect":Please allow me to apologize for the fact that the intrinsic,detailed complexity of one of my consistently well-punctuated,high- intensity and high-information delivering posts was you felt, too daunting for you to even read, let alone respond to ; please, allow yourself for just one moment,to imagine how "daunting" it must be for all those little, betrayed Souls to be catapaulted into the hands and abodes of those whom they accuse of abusing them and further, be unequivocally told by CJ Bryant's allegedly "highly qualified experts" and FC judges who apparently are not in the least bit "quaiified", nor it seems, trained in contrast to other countries, to speak to these Childen, that they,along with the protective party, are lying and therefore, must be punished for same,by being ordered to live with the person they have accused of the abuse.

JFK: There are plenty of really eminent, highly experienced true experts,who are on the fore-front of Child Abuse and have been for decades, who were willing to give their excellent expert testimony in the FC, but now refuse to, for the very reasons Koch and Dr. David Wood and others refer to in their articles. Also kindly refer to Koch's artice "Doctors' Anger at Family Court".
Until the CJ makes drastic changes and first accepts that drastic change is needed, more and more of our Children will be abused and the FC,its staff, jurists and so-called "experts" will in my own personal opinion, have colluded with and been complicit in that abuse.
I communicate with those experts who really know their stuff on a regular basis; my comments are based on my experience.

I strongly support the two-pronged approach to bring attention and reform to these issues. i.e. 1. The self-styled `Experts' must be challenged in Courts as to their claimed `Expert' status and whether they are acting outside of their expertise (if they have one). Charlatans have existed in the role of experts to Courts for many years but in recent years they have been exposed in the U.K. Courts. They must also be reported to their respective association's Disciplinary Bodies for malpractice and unprofessional conduct.
2. These issues have been studiously ignored by the Australian Government, the Family Courts and the legal professions despite their being widely known for at least 6 years.
These human rights abuses by the Australian government and the Family Courts should be made known to the U.N. and they should be made accountable to world opinion.
No one will want to come to Australia when these widespread human rights abuses become known and the hypocrisies of the Australian government in criticising human rights abuses in other countries becomes apparent.

The Australian Human Rights Commission as suggested by Valarie is, I feel,an EXCELLENT way to help to expose what in my own personal opinion and experience is the abuse, collusion, complicity and ineptitude both in and of the FC,as well as writing to PM Rudd, AG MCLelland, CJ Bryant etc.
Public confidence in the FC has never been there, according to all reports, and is,unsurprisingingly, rapidly deteriorating.

The HC has stated, words to the effect as I understand it,that the court system must be able to justify its confidence in those experts it purports to place its confidence in and as a flow-on, then expects the public to place its confidence in; I wonder what it would make of "experts" used to date by the FC?

If enough people speak from their hearts, to those who can legislate for change,for all our Children, we will see that shift.

History proves that time and time again.

I am new to the forum, I would just like to say this : it has been my own experience that in First Avenue House Principle Registry Holborn London there is a lot of risks being taken by high up expert witnesses. We mothers have discussed our cases of abusive ex-partners getting custody of children .
The role of the EW in directing the court in PAS is central to any case.
Dr Claire Sturge has done her fair share of conferences discussing the morals of contact to an abusive parent to a child, in 2001 - 2003 .We met her in 2004 - 2005 , she was a night-mare to deal with . In her Family Centre Gayton Road Middlesex she was frightening to deal with. She stopped us discussing domestic violence problems we had experienced.She also said I encouraged my son to tell her about the incidents.
I now warn women not to say anything about DV issues as this is so used against you in closed court.
She done a few other cases and I met another mother who lost her 3 year old child to adoption he was twin tracked, whilst some abusive partner pursued a contact order to 2 other children to a previous relationship ,which resulted in her getting no contact what so ever apart from phone calls monitored by the ex who got custody.
Dr Claire Sturge does not travel she does not believe DV existed , but asked to see the CRB check as I referred to my ex-partner haveing a criminal record for well over a decade for violent offences.
I heard recently a pattern has emerged , in a school report after my son has lived there 3 years now with my ex , this child is exhibiting inappropriate behavoiur problems.
This child has peaked at losing it out side of a class room environment with his peers.
Child C is angry is totally losing it ,is out of control.
Now why does this not surprise me ?

I could not more strongly disgree.

It is through staying quiet and not challenging these "expert" that the current situation hes been reached and most importantly,been allowed to be reached.
Child Abuse,in any form, must be reported and must be formally recorded as being being reported in all its forms, to those who are mandated by Law to act on those reports.
In that way, those in authority can never again claim that "they were not told ".
Treverrow's case set prcedents,so did the Wrigley one,so did those in the UK that Sir Roy Meadow provided "expert" evidence for.
There are, as a result, now serious moves afoot in the UK to properly train and accredit those who give "expert" evidence in the FC. European courts already do this.

Whoever said "All it takes for Evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing", was dear right.

Sunita,

'consistently well-punctuated,high- intensity and high-information delivering posts '

What, a 139 word sentence to follow your earlier 179 word sentence, to follow mogs 157 word sentence! Are you guys running a competition for the longest sentence?

No matter what you write, any sentence this long is poor punctuation, and not very readable. It's a shame as you seem so desperate for people to rally to your cause of taking all abuse allegations at face value and removing children from their parent on unfounded and uninvestigated allegations.

You can yell 'think of the children' as long and as loud as you like, but no sensible person enjoys sifting through 179 word sentences or agrees with no protection against false accusations.

Don't forget the rest of the family law system. There is the family court itself, the federal magistrates court, the family relationship centres, the independent counsellors and mediators and 'expert' report writers - all of these contribute to the outcome. The system aims to steer separating parents out of the courts, if that fails, the FMC is the default option. If you get a certificate of complexity from your lawyer you can get to the Family Court. In the Family Court the Magellan project - for cases with violence and abuse,handles 4% of children's cases - despite statistical data indicating that violence/abuse is raised in 66% of cases. The designed and produced outcome is that most victims of violence make agreements at FRCs where there is no public record or scrutiny of agreements. Many targets of abuse simply get bullied behind closed doors at FRCs where the key outcome is an agreement. Protective parents fleeing abuse/violence risk being labelled 'unfriendly' or 'unco-operative' or 'enmeshed' or 'vengeful' or 'alienating' (so many pathological labels you just have to pick one) if they resist. There is no necessity for agreements to conform to children's social and emotional developmental needs and nobody making the decisions is even aware of what those are because they have never had any education in this and it is not a Key Performance Indicator of the FRC Business Model. Yet they will determine the terms of a child's life. So you get outcomes where the six week old baby is in week about share care; toddlers flying interstate every second weekend and attending two kindergartens. So many travesties for children's well-being as long as the goal is division, allocation and distribution of children with cavalier disregard of their actual circumstances, safety and development.

(dear usual suspect,good counting!)

RE: FAMILY CONSULTANTS. With regard to Susan De Campo, the Queensland counsellor who was misrepresented as being a psychologist when she is in fact a only a counsellor.

There was an apology about this on the relevant Channel 9 website. I emailed asking how they came to mistake Ms De Campo for a psychologist, and what her exact qualifications are. They reponded with her phone number.

I understand that the education and training of counsellors can be much less than that of registered psychologists.

Family Consultants (however qualified) have enormous power. The impressive-sounding qualifications of mine are buried within the Report.

I need to know how Family Consultants are accredited by the Court. Does anyone reading this have details on this? If so, please contact me through the Forum.

In my case the Family Consultant provided a Report which pleased the solicitors. If I had insisted on going into Court on the day, my persuasive barrister would have cross-examined the Family Consultant (if he/she had been there) in such a way as to further discredit me. This was implied in the solicitor's reply to my complaint to him later.

According to my solicitor's bill of costs, this Family Consultant was the fourth he approached. The others declined. A fifth prospective Family Consultant was engaged by the other side's solicitors and apparently commenced the Assessment without me. I did complain about this at the time, and it was explained away as a misunderstanding.

Apparently the Human Rights Commission will have some involvement in dealing with my complaint about the Family Consultant to the relevant Psychologists Board.

Meantime I have sent a preliminary complaint and background summary (on behalf of the children concerned) to the Human Rights Commissioner. Help in completing the forms is available from a Complaints Officer by phoning 1300 656 419 (local call charge) or (02) 9284 9600.

Mog,

Thank Bill Gates. It's a simple feature of Microsoft Word.

I was dragged through the family court for seven years by the man who raped me. I am a child abuse survivor - I was in a Pindown children's home as a child and the home had to be closed down because the people in charge were pedophiles. Never at any time had I been married to this man (he is already married) and never at any time had I lived with this man. He was a friend of my father. Yet the family court gave this man, who took advantage of my depressed state to rape me, the same rights as if we had been in a loving relationship. He also molested my daughter, who was 14 at the time.

Eventually, he did apologise to me in court, but I was more or less told that I had to forgive and forget.

We were hounded by the family court, it was a terrible ordeal. I had absolutly no rights in that courtroom, and I was told that rapists do in fact retain paternity rights, in effect this awful man can carry on using the family court to stalk me until my son comes of age. He took his wife to court with him as a Makenzie friend, and sought to persuade the judge that we had had a loving relationship WITH HIS WIFE SITTING NEXT TO HIM! These people are the wierdest nut jobs, but the law is the law and it's on his side.

We were micro analized by expert after expert during these seven years. My son was allotted a lawyer who he was never allowed to meet! It was totally ridiculous, because the way we were treated was that I had no rights, my son had no voice, but the rapist had all the rights and power. I just kept praying, and pleading with God, help us, please help us, I don't really know how but we won the case.

Brilliant, Valerie - will try and catch you up with the Human Rights and UN.
This weeks fight/investigation is:
The Child Expert - their nature

Recommended to Father Chris O'Reilly, I read his rant in Support of DoCs, Et Al on line

Reading the Forum reports from James Wood, QC Inquiry visit to Woollongong. He encourages reporting by the families.Check out his email address on Lawlink.

Chris O'Reilly (Brothers of the Little Inquisition) doesn't approve of women. It's not a gender based issue.Men have support groups, but I've not come across too many Wimmin"s ones. Such as "Despite being Primarily and Internationally Portrayed as a Sex Object, I still Provide Quality Parental Care and Love" Foundation.But our words & lives are discredited.

Chris O'Reilly, and Monday's feature in "The Daily Telegraph" (former Australian of the Year), Professor Fiona Stanley seem to feel that parents have limited capacity to parent.

Do Experts factor in changes to:
Societal evolution - 50% of marriages breakdown, leaving women often as the main carers.Historically,nothing new, but now facing increased danger from sexual/drug/alcohol related abuse.

Changes to the Child - stressors from peers, TV AND INTERNET, plus worsening of respect for mothers (and fathers). ie: the media promoting lifestyle that increases demand & disillusionment.Further creating unrest at home. Many kids are encouraged to have PROBLEMS.

I believe children rarely lie about abuse, but, until they have come to adulthood, there is a lack of awareness of consequence. So, stories abound, fuelled by interested questioning by Child Protection Experts (building careers in the CHILD ABUSE INDUSTRY).Newly qualified solicitors/DOCS workers etc, without sufficient years of handling families, cut the umbilical cords for everyone - no thought of consequence.The NGO family-support charities/counselors with mere diplomas and years dealing with families are not employed.Nursing,also,has deteriorated post-vocational era.

THERE'S A WHOLE NEW STOLEN GENERATION being made, which the families are accused of creating -NOT, the government appointed bodies.
We live in fear of our lives, my daughter and I. Police/solicitors/DOCS will not help.If I say I can't protect her, they will just take her away. WHO WINS THEN and HOW?

I wonder what you wowsers think of the recent grandmother who had her grandchildren taken away because she smacked them. These are the kind of results that are the natural progression to your mindless 'think of the children' attitude to investigations of abuse; Better to have the children seperated from each other and brought up by strangers than with a loving grandma who smacked them once. Or maybe not, as it wasn't a man involved.

Zoompad
I am glad that your Court ordeal is over. You are obviously vulnerable as I was. I think that you need now to look after yourself and your children, especially in building their self-esteem so that the cycle (or chain) of abuse stops now. It's important that your children do not see you as a continuing victim.

I suggest that if you have not already done so, you read the book "Games People Play", by Eric Berne, first published in the 1960s. It is still in print or your library might have it.

I found it very helpful in identifying those who were trying to get the better of me by playing psychological games in which I was always destined to be the loser.

The book is quite fun to read. One such game is "Blemish" when the other party criticizes something about you. Another is "Let's you and him fight" where someone sets up conflict and then watches, for fun.

Once the game is identified the solution is simply not to join in. Pleasantly change the subject and in future avoid the would-be game
player if you can. These bullies never mean well.

I have heard it said (and I believe it) that our behaviour teaches others how to behave towards us. It's is very hard to alter the meek habits of a lifetime, but it does help to appear to be self-assured, and stand up for ourselves and our children even if we are terrified inside. I can't always follow my own advice unfortunately.

Best wishes.

Valerie,you raise a good question about the list of accredited experts . I was refused to have a psychologist Dr Anderson, they say they are not properly qualified. All the parties have to agree on who can come into the court here in the UK in closed courts.
The families are very much on the same wave length now as they question why they will not let in other experts who look on paper to have all the right qualifications to match the so called not so expert witness.

Valarie is so right ; it is so very important to really inform yourself of the issues here and be well versed in them.
Valarie; I admire your tenacity.

Lyndamac

This whole question of experts needs to be clarified. I wonder if there is a list?

According to the Family Court of Australia brochure entitled "Family Reports", an Expert Witness is perhaps a psychiatrist who can provide assessments, diagnoses and information which cannot be provided by a Family Consultant.

Family Consultants are defined as qualified social workers or psychologists with expertise in working with families and children. (I don't think anyone except qualified child psychiatrists i.e. doctors with a specialist qualification, should be allowed to do this job).

The selection of the Family Consultant in my case was random as apparently no one else would do it. I had no say in it. The person chosen (whose opinion turned out to be the only one considered) made unfounded judgements (equivalent to a diagnosis) about my character and motives.

That person and later the Family Court also ignored the voluntarily sought, very favourable Report of the highly qualified Forensic Psychiatrist. Having changed solicitors, I now have a copy of his Affidavit WHICH WAS DATED A WEEK AFTER THE COURT HEARING which turned out so badly for me and for the children, through lack of information and bad legal advice.

My family was in UK when this began in 2007. My solicitor there would not let me include anything about the maltreatment in my Affidavit/statement. She said it wasn't relevant.

It was extremely relevant to me, and it was the only reason I had engaged a solicitor. If my grandchildren were being cared for properly, I would not be pursuing this. Excluding me is part of the maltreatment.

I am pleased to hear the situation in UK is improving.

In both UK and Australia I felt that the solicitors have to arrange the evidence in such a way as to get a certain result.

Valerie,
I have to agree with you the solicitors have to arrange it ..........

I had big gun lawyers in Principle registry , my ex would never have got custody of our son ,only for the amount of public funding thrown at this case.
I do not get to see my son now I have walked rather than subject him to the 1 hour a month in a contact centre.

My ex was violent I made a poor witness back then . I know better now.

Does the procedure of the Family Court and legal system alter according to who the abuser is alleged to be. For example: my daughter & I were abused by husband. Despite reports to Police, Mental Health, DOCS,Belinda Neale, school etc, and each concur that it did in fact happen - nothing more is said, done or suggested.
OK - unknown territory for me as no experience, but will keep trying.

HOWEVER - friend is violently raped in front of her daughter, moves to different refuges pursued by bail-breaking perpetrator & once in safe place the trouble starts in earnest.
Teen daughter publicly self-harming & needing help. Counselors brought in - who decide problem due to protective mother (who will not let possibly disturbed,& definitely underaged daughter go clubbing/drinking). Nothing to do with 6 hour ordeal witnessed 5 months previously.

Hospital admission + heavy sedation given to 14 yr old, after her own rape 6 months later. She responds with severe allergy. Following concerned comments by other patients, mother complains against Consultant Psychiatrist. DOCS take daughter into care, Child Court appoints Legal Aid solicitor for both, mother now struggling to get any help. Has only been allowed to meet lawyer once, no information on court dates which are postponed due to his inactivity. The original criminal case v. Perpetrator reduced as DOCS/Mental Health refused to answer DPP's requests, therefore daughter could not attend court.Daughter and mother reduced to meeting once a fortnight under strict supervision (carer stands one metre close at all times).

Who is the Abuser here, and who are the Qualified Child Consultants?At the DOCS care meeting they claim she is being treated for Post Traumatic Stress. The Consultant Psychiatrist claims she suffers with Over Protective Mother. If the former, why cant she return home from DOCS? If the latter how do we disprove this? Despite continually increasing the amount of sedatives for her, no DV or Sexual Abuse therapy has been delivered.

Lama you identify a very important piece of this puzzle. The lack of proper education of professionals in recognising and responding to traumatizing abuses is ordinary, so survivors' symptoms and behaviour are misrecognised and misunderstood and get poor unhelpful, often damaging, responses. Add to this a current (and continuing) climate of woman and mother blame amongst practitioners - the invisibility of perpetrators has a long history. This occurs in the criminal justice system (where victims are blamed for being victimised), in the family law system (where victims are held to be vengeful, pathological liars) and in the civil law system (where victims are diverted from victims of crime recognition and compensation for a piece of paper which says he shouldn't hit you). Threats and abuse also create compliant responses from professionals who don't want to be a target themselves.see judith herman's book 'trauma and recovery' for a useful text on trauma. also bancroft and silverman 'the batterer as parent' which looks at how perpetrators impact family dynamics.

MORE ON FAMILY CONSULTANTS.

According to The Federal Magistrate's Court of Australia brochure headed " Family Reports" , p 3, one can complain to the Family Court itself if not happy with the Family Consultant.

The Head office is in Melbourne.

Details of address:

Dispute Resolution Coordinator
Melbourne Family Law Courts
305 William Street
Melbourne Vic 3000

I have sent a complaint to the above, as well as to the relevant Psychologists Board.

I didn't know I could have cross-examined the Family Consultant in Court. I don't know whether this will add more weight to my written complaints.

I was advised to send a copy of the Family Report with my complaint.
I included copies of Affidavits as well as they contain information relevant to my complaint, and other attachments.

Congratulations Valarie on being so tenacious and protective.If only more protective parents were willing to continue and appeal perverse and corrupt decisions made by the FCoA.

I understand that WRIGLEY is sill giving "expert" evidence in th FC.
It absolutely defies belief and is a clear example of why the FC is totally corrupt and fails to protect our children.

Anyone who is being forced to send a child to visit an abuser please contact www.mothers-for-justice.net for support and advice

PAS was invented by a pedophile, Richard Gardner.

If anyone wishes to view a fax I have posted on my blog which is proof how expert witnesses work out how to make sure all the independent other experts agree with one another or come to the same conclusion. it is on www.Lyndamac.com
I think it is legal the child's ID is kept anon.
This EW is very confident is here position to invite the other expert to come and join here in the modern day witch hunt for a lighter label of msbp.

The history of Richard Gardener {the INVENTOR}of PAS makes for very interesting reading ; from what I understand, he was an advocate of sex between children and adults and said it was a natural process and to be encouraged; he also said that mothers who raised sexual abuse allegations against fathers were projecting their own sexual frustration onto their joint children and needed to be given vibrators to help them release this sexual frustration.
(See Jane Shields' piece on "Background Briefing on PAS IN the FC).

With regards to the comments above re. MISREPRESENTATION OF SUSAN DE CAMPO,I note that on her website for her business, of which she is CEO, she describes herself and her employees as being "THE WORLD'S LEADING CONSULTANTS " and that she has a "strong academic foundation ??."
Personally, I find it very strange that she describes herself as a "Consultant"... that is taken in true medical fields to mean someone who has a Fellowship(s) and has undertaken around a decade of study in one field.
I can't find what I would consider to be a "strong academic foundation" in DECAMPO's qualifications at all, neither can anyone else I know who is a true Expert in these matters and has a Fellowship.
DECAMPO apparently also gives "expert" evidencde in the FC AND IS ONE OF THE "EXPERTS" CJ BRYANT RELIES ON.

CHILD ABUSE. Two recent items in the AGE newspaper are encouraging:

1. CHILD PROTECTION WORKERS will be assigned to some Victorian Schools, depending on need. It seems that at present school staff are hindered in the effectiveness of their reports of child abuse, by the need for corroboration.

Provision for records to be transferred interstate will also be made in future. This follows a case where a family (with extreme child abuse) moved to South Australia to escape further intervention by the authorities.

Child protection is a State matter, which helps to explain some of our difficulties with the Federal Family Court.

I had already realized that it is difficult for these State-run child protection authorities to act on one complaint of abuse. We can therefore notify the school and GP etc, to improve the likelihood of intervention. I don't think either (schools or GPs) can respond to us, but they may take note.

See my next posting for the second item headed CHILD ABUSE

CHILD ABUSE (CONTINUED FROM MY PREVIOUS POSTING)

2. RE: A FEDERAL COMMISSIONER FOR CHILDREN - possible appointment. This idea has been around for some time but an item in the AGE newspaper 4 October 2008, p 12, indicates that it is again under consideration. This follows a recent report of the Australian Law Reform Commission that 95% of child sex-offenders escape conviction.

Federal Families Minister Jenny Macklin claims to be shocked by the latest figures. I am going to write to her urging swift action.

Her postal address is:

The Hon Jenny Macklin MP
Minister for Families, Housing, Commnunity Services and Indigenous Affairs,
The House of Representatives
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2600

(She should be addressed as Dear Minister).

Other general tips from the website www.efa.org.au/Campaigns/lobby.html about contacting politicians include

a. That letters (handwritten or typed) or personal interviews are the most effective, and emails the least so. Letters to be signed and to include the sender's name and full address. Don't use form letters etc. Some politicians prefer hand-written letters.

b. State the topic clearly on the first line. e.g. The Appointment of a Federal Commissioner for Children.

c. Start with a clear statement of purpose, such as asking for the speedy appointment of the above.

d. Focus on three important points and keep the letter as brief as is feasible.

e. Ask for concrete action to be taken - perhaps in this case, introducing a Bill.

f. Ask for a response to your letter.

g. Personalise your letter by saying how this issue affects you, your family etc.

h. Personalise any relationship you might have with the politician eg having voted for them, or other evidence of support for them.

Pas was invented by a pedophile. He worked with another pedophile at the False Memory Syndrome Foundation. PAS was invented by this appalling man to cover up pedophilia, as was FMS.

Interested parties may want to view the following on U-Tube:

"Family Court Crisis: Our Children at Risk".You can Google it.

I believe that a full-length film is following.
It would, I feel, be useful to also contact the makers of this film.

Thank you Sunita - I have just watched it. I cannot express how much I wish that Australia would also produce a film, documentary whatever....for the message to be lifted above the current inertia.

Don't our children deserve to be heard? It is so heartbreaking to experience this most wrenching, most soul destroying injustice.

Investigation of abuse allegations - Under what statute are Family Court Reporters empowered to investigate allegations of child abuse?. - that is the responsibility of State Authorities. I would contend that where they are doing so (which is fairly common practice), they are therefore in breach of State Law. They are mandatorily required under State Law to report every such allegation to the State and Police Authorities. No doubt they would claim they are mandated by the Judge but I'm not sure that a Family Court Judge has such powers to override State laws. Nor are Family Court Reporters trained and experienced in investigating allegations of child abuse - so they are acting far outside their professional expertise if they claim a child is fabricating an abuse allegation and such opinion should be ruled inadmissible in a Court.
Do children have the Right under Australian law to appoint their own representatives to give their views to a Court?. At the moment Courts are permitted to appoint Independent Children's Lawyers to represent them, but without consultation or agreement with the children. If children do not have such a right, then that could be held to be a breach of their Human Rights under the U.N. Charter. If they do and are being denied such right by Courts, then that is even more serious. Not consulting with children when making such appointments is an obvious and flagrant breach of children's rights in any case.

Actor Alec Baldwin also gave an interview of interest to Diane Sawyer which aired on Australia's Sixty Minutes last Sunday night.

ChazP you are correct that states have jurisdiction over child protection. All reports of child abuse MUST be reported to state authorities. but THEN, the state authorities apply their central intake cirteria and ordinarily exclude family law system referrals becuase they don;t meet the threshold of 'risk of immediate harm' as the children are typically in the care of the alleging parent with court hearings pending. So the family law system gets advised that there is 'No Substantiation' - they have to because there is no investigation to even try to substantiate anything. Many states authorities believe the mythology that separating couples falsely allege for revenge and advantage and they figure the family law decision makers can sort it out. Even where state authoriteis substantiate abuse and recommend cessation of contact, judges can and do ignore this. One judge argued that because the investigation and finding of risk rested on a report against an alleged perpetarator who had never faced court on the claims (because the child was too young to testify), it was a breach of natural justice and not acceptable. This little charade means that everybody in la la land tells each other that children are safe and gaily hands them to abusers for slow destruction. sigh

CHAZP

FAMILY CONSULTANTS (REPORT WRITERS) AND CHILD ABUSE.
mog's recent item is very illuminating. Thanks, mog.

I had already commenced composing the following which might add little new information.

The State and Territory Principal Acts (Laws) on Child Welfare are used in conjuction with other relevant State and Territory Acts AND WITH THE COMMONWEALTH FAMILY LAW ACT 1975. Therefore the State Laws are not being breached. (The source of this information was a website headed "Australian Child Protection Legislation").

At present Family Consultants (or Report Writers) are the link between Commonwealth and States. According to the Family Court Fact Sheet headed "Family Consultants" they are obliged to report to a Child Welfare authority any observed or suspected physical or psychological abuse. mog has said what then happens.

I found the following after searching the Web.

THERE ARE AT LEAST TWO CLASSES OF FAMILY CONSULTANTS

1. Those who are officers of the Federal Magistrate's Court, engaged under the Public Service Act 1999.

2. Those appointed under Regulations made under the Family Law Act 1975 (Paragraph 11B (b).

The Family Consultant involved in my case seems to belong to yet another class : Those engaged (and paid for) by the parties, even if a party (myself) was denied any say in the selection.

I now have an official statement that the Family Court cannot deal with a complaint concerning this Family Consultant. Neither can the Family Court deal with complaints about legal practitioners.

In the first case the relevant Psychologists Registration Board should be approached, and in the second the relevant State Legal Services Commissioner. I think I already knew that, but I still wonder why it is so.

This further emphasises the need for a Federal Children's Commissioner to be appointed in the hope that this will being some much-needed co-ordination and ultimately justice within the Family Court so-called system.

My son was forced to have a legal representative for almost two years. The family court were trying to force him to visit the man who raped me - not even a relationship, a rapist! I stress - I never lived with this man, he raped me 12 years ago - and in these dark times where PAS is the golden rule for everything connected with the secret family courts, I was seen as an abuser for my undisguised loathing of the man who raped me - apparently, I was expected to play "happy families" with this man and keep my outrage to myself! (though how I can teach my son any kind of moral code if I do so is beyond me, and the judge did not seem to have much of a clue either!) My son was not even allowed to meet his lawyer - he kept asking to, but this right was denied to him.

We won the right for my son not to have to visit a rapist praise God!

Some of us are looking at the link between the secret family courts and the Kinsey Institute - I would urge you all to look into that nest of snakes - Kinsey was a disgusting man who researched pedophile activity on children, even tiny little babies were masturbated for his disgusting data, and yet the Kinsey Institute is lauded as the Golden Temple of Knowledge! The head of the Kinsey Institute is a man called John Bancroft - who also happens to be the boss of Head Start (we Brits call it Home Start)

The American Psychological Association believes that all mental health practitioners as well as law enforcement officials and the courts must take any reports of domestic violence in divorce and child custody cases seriously. An APA 1996 Presidential Task Force on Violence and the Family noted the lack of data to support so-called “parental alienation syndrome,” and raised concern about the term’s use. www.apa.org/releases/passyndrome.html. `Violence in the Family' criticizes the misuse of PAS in domestic violence cases and that there is no scientific evidence of such a “syndrome.”
The Report states: “When children reject their abusive fathers, it is common for the batterer and others to blame the mother for alienating the children. They often do not understand the legitimate fears of the child. Although there are no data to support the phenomenon called parental alienation syndrome, in which mothers are blamed for interfering with their children’s attachment to their fathers, the term is still used by some evaluators and courts to discount children’s fears in hostile and psychologically abusive situations.”

“Family courts often do not consider the history of violence between the parents in making custody and visitation decisions. In this context, the nonviolent parent may be at a disadvantage . . . Psychological evaluators not trained in domestic violence may contribute to this process by ignoring or minimizing the violence and by giving inappropriate pathological labels to women’s responses to chronic victimization. Terms such as “parental alienation” may be used to blame the women for the children’s reasonable fear of or anger toward their violent father.”

The APA also discussed the mis-use of PAS in domestic violence cases “Issues and Dilemmas in Family Violence,” http://www.apa.org/pi/pii/issues/homepage.html “Family courts frequently minimize the harmful impact of children’s witnessing violence between their parents and sometimes are reluctant to believe mothers.... Psychological evaluators who minimize the importance of violence against the mother, or pathologize her responses to it, may accuse her of alienating the children from the father and may recommend giving the father custody in spite of his history of violence.”

Psychiatrists and professors are lobbying to normalize and decriminalize pedophilia In the late 1980s, during the two years I spent as principal investigator for a U.S. Department of Justice study on "Images of Children, Crime and Violence" in mainstream pornography, my research team encountered a stable of paid pornography agents we dubbed "Academic Pedophile Apologists."
These Academic Pedophile Apologists – college professors, psychiatrists and other mental-health professionals – have served as advisers, writers and "expert" witnesses, telling medical, academic, public school, court and government authorities that the barbaric pedophile crimes of child sexual abuse are harmless and, some said, beneficial.

The American Psychiatric Association .. actually publicly debating a proposal for "Lifting [The] Pedophilia Taboo." Several APA presenters "proposed removing … pedophilia, exhibitionism … voyeurism … from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)."

The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development is lavishing $26,000 on a Kinsey "conference on sexual arousal" to develop "guidelines for ... measurement of sexual response."
The NICHHD seems unconcerned that "measurement of sexual response" was Alfred Kinsey's exact excuse for unleashing a gang of his favorite pedophiles to "measure" orgasms on "hysterically weeping," convulsing and fainting children – who Kinsey argued, "enjoyed" the "experience."

Kinsey Institute are attempting to bury the horrifying truth about the rapes and sexual torture of 317 to possibly 2,035 infants and children by Institute founder Alfred Kinsey's sex "researchers" in the late 1940s.

Theo Sandfort, the IASR president and Scientific Program Committee chairman. Sandfort's qualifications include having been a well-known member of the editorial board of Paidika, the Journal of Paedophila.
Paidika pledged to advance "paedophile … consciousness" as "a legitimate and productive part of the totality of human experience.
" Paidika's regular graphic ads for NAMBLA clearly illustrate the sexual component of what they euphemistically call "man-boy-love."

In his 1991 book "Male Intergenerational Intimacy," Sandfort maintained that neither he nor the other book authors view "man-boy relationships as necessarily pathological."
Extracted condensed and paraphrased from:
Dr. Judith Reisman President of the Institute for Media Education and is the author of "Kinsey, Crimes & Consequences."

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=33551

"Theo Sandfort, the IASR president and Scientific Program Committee chairman. Sandfort's qualifications include having been a well-known member of the editorial board of Paidika, the Journal of Paedophila.
Paidika pledged to advance "paedophile … consciousness" as "a legitimate and productive part of the totality of human experience.
" Paidika's regular graphic ads for NAMBLA clearly illustrate the sexual component of what they euphemistically call "man-boy-love.""

THAT IS JUST DOWNRIGHT DISGUSTING!

Thank you for posting this.

If you Google "DR. WILLIAM WRIGLEY :PSYCHOLOGIST,you will see an entry for a U-Tube video made in the UK,(which in turn,leads to other sites of interest),entitled something like : "Social Workers : Malpractice".

ChazP
RE: INDEPENDENT CHILDREN'S LAWYERS. In answer to your query of 13 October, the answer is YES. A child (or his/her representative such as child welfare orgnaization or "any other person", may request this. (Source: Australian Family Law Act 1975, Reprint 7, 31 August 2006, 68L(4) on p 211).

See next posting.

INDEPENDENT CHILDREN'S LAWYERS (CONTINUED)
In my case, as a grandmother seeking restoration of contact for child protection purposes, I asked for a privately-funded ICL for the children as I knew the parents would oppose it, and that Legal Aid
would probably need their agreement.

However the Court ordered the ICL to be appointed by Legal Aid, but the wording clearly left open the possiblity of a privately funded ICL.

Legal Aid did not have funding at that time (6 months before the hearing) so I instructed my solicitor (in writing) to arrange it privately. He didn't do this. As indicated earlier I was deceived into settling for almost meaningless contact.

When, too late, I complained about this to the solicitor, he/she replied that "the other side" could have complained that the ICL was not truly independent if not appointed by Legal Aid. This was although I asked that the ICL be appointed in the interstate place where the children now live, stressing that I do not know any lawyers there.

I think this means that ICLs are becoming rare and that the Family Court would prefer to use only the Family Consultants' reports.

My complaint to the Legal Services Commissioner is still pending although I have had an acknowledgment.

Valarie, you do seem to be right about the Courts only using their approved Family Consultants. The Legal Aid system can be expensive, therefore work SHOULD be minimal.

As so many are encouraged to report "abuse" (sexual or neglect) we are glad to know that the Health Services play an integral in helping this growing epidemic. Possibly ALL children require counseling after abuse, even if those available are inadequately trained (1 term minimum Tafe) - many will be eventually prescribed medication - or drugs.Quite often parents of those in care are not informed as to the nature of the drugs and as a lot of these are quite complicated (usually SSRI's for depression seems to be the norm of doctors now),it is far better for Court appointed consultants who can be relied on.Especially, as the information on these drugs is changed frequently as new research emerges.

Kids are being prescribed Prozac (Fluoxetine) and Zoloft(Sertraline) of the SSRI family. These are NOT recommended by the TGA for those under 24. Whatever one's age these are serious tablets or DRUGS.Leaving out a dose, or skipping one manifests in agressive, depressive episodes. If a child is having supervised meeting with a parent, and it was to miss its dose, why - its behaviour would alter! The carers (or caseworkers) not being qualified, can possibly attribute this to the proximity of the parent. Perhaps, parent is an Abuser - not simply OVER ANXIOUS.

Nicola Mulcahy's success against the Prozac prescriber became hidden by "the Australian" reporting the foster parents or carers as prescribing for the children. No - they are not qualified. When kids are in care Mental Health generally suggest what is to be prescribed.

For those of you brave enough to talk about PAS on radio please book mark TalkShoe.com join on facebook also check out Tawnya Maddox type in search and listen to parents talking about supporting mothers & fathers living apart.
SpLitnTwo

To actually hear people brave enough to speak out about the courts, also to find out you are not alone helped me. At the time it was very frightening to find a pack of professionals coming after me in 2004 -2006 .The end result is I lost my case and the abuser got custody of a very sick child who had leukaemia.
To hear time & again others say they do not care about the children , I have to agree they tried this on with us as they knew it is well set in cement and stone it works out well for the courts & professionals and the poor families are left to cope with this.
They did not give a damn about taking risks with a child so ill as they knew they would be able to get away with what they have done.
Our files have probably been destroyed by now Social services won't let me have copies I have some not all.
Caffcass has destroyed the file.

www.Lyndamac.com

Lyndamac

I still feel that I am on trial for trying to restore contact with my grandchildren in order to protect them.

Since the failed hearing in August which I was not allowed to attend, a recurring commment I have heard is that I can't do anyhing because I signed the Consent Orders for minimal indirect contact just before the Hearing. I did so under threat of losing contact altogether and I was allowed no time to consider, or offered alternatives.

I mention this now as I would like to know if my experience was typical, or whether I was just unlucky or too trusting of the legal sytem.

Ordinarily there is a "cooling off" period for major transactions but I had to make an instant and irrevocable decision and did not even receive a record of what I had signed. There is no provision for a review even if my legal etc complaints are successful.

Any reasonable person reading the files would be able to detect the faulty logic, deceptions and mental illnesses of the defendants. This means either that the files were not read properly or that they were considered to be irrelevant because the parents have ownership of the children which over-rides all other considerations.

No one associated with the case AT THAT TIME was prepared to take the necessary steps to obtain justice for them.

As all reading this will know, I am trying to have the case reopened which is expensive and time-consuming. Meantime my grandchildren are still at risk.

I was allowed one of my rare phone calls yesterday for a child's birthday. Even then a parent caused a backgroubnd disturbance which interfered with our conversation. There is nothing I can do about this, as records would show only the fact that the call was received, not the quality of it.

There is now clear medical research evidence that constantly exposing children to traumatizing abuse results in neuro-developmental injury. The brain does 90% of its growth in the first 6 years and if, during that time the child is constantly responding to feelings of alarm, fear, distress and terror, their development will be attuned to survival in high stress dangerous environments - with consequences for cognition, speech, learning, health and behaviour. The effects are cumulative and exponential. Far from a history of abuse being 'in the past', it has inscribed the child's future. The family law system needs to get to grips with this. Past abuse not only predicts future abuse , but also means there are existing injuries which will be even more deeply harmed by further abuse.

Valerie, like most of us we have learnt from past experience sadly that we have all been duped into signing documents whilst being rushed through a system which is not accountable to any body.I am trying to gather as much information from people about all of the under hand tactics of solicitors& judges .
I put together a video yesterday and posted on YT it went to 50 viewed in the reporter section. It is part 1 of how to deal with the paper work.
my channel is Liverpoollou6 go to more from Liverpoollou6 and look for Help with Paperwork. I would ask you all to consider doing a video response to my vid and giving any helpful advice you have from your experience . Please keep the vid short. as people switch off. The forum is good ,however an image works wonders.
At least you get a phone call I do not get a phone call I stopped my contact I took the power away from my ex -partner. In time the children will want out of this situation and will want reasonable contact with the family.
This forum is brilliant I just wish it was on radio or better still linked up on YT .
I am sorry Valerie I do not know what to say except keep going do not give in .

Mog and Lyndamac

Thank you for your support and insight. Mog- you express it so well.
I am living proof of the effects of maternal emotional abuse, although this probably did not become very serious until I was six. Until then I think that my father protected me, but he became very ill, and later died. At the age of six I was blamed for causing a serious accident which I knew was not my fault, but no-one told me otherwise and I was afraid to stand up for myself. I saw the accident and I know that it was my mother's fault.I became extremely anxious about hurting others unintentionally, and have many physical health problems caused by this anxiety.

Fortunately I had a photographic memory which made learning easy.
Success at school led to superficial normality although my self esteem has always been very low. My mother ignored or belittled any achievements, and I was ashamed of her absence on important occasions.

As the result of the early abuse I became a "people pleaser", overly conscientious and overly studious. I was always too ready to help others, my life ruled by what others (including my mother) might think of the the way I looked, behaved and dressed. I couldn't break away from her until she died when I was 56.

Beng a "people pleaser" I was easy prey for the first male who suggested marriage. He turned out to be physically violent with our sons and his behaviour towards me after marriage was identical with my mother's. They became close.

Please see my next posting

Continued from my last posting:

I tried to be a perfect mother which upset my husband. He was jealous of and very violent towards our children, and I was unable to fully protect them. He left, remarried and went abroad and we seemed to recover but he re-entered the lives of our sons when each was 19 (the most vulnerable age for mental illness to show itself).

One son is now the defendant in my court action for contact with his children which is the only way I can hope to protect my them from their mother's abuse which includes withholding food, and severe corporal punishment. The father spends most of his time in another country, and condones the abuse by doing nothing about it, and by opposing my contact with the children.

The phone calls I am allowed probably help to keep the children safe as the authorities don't seem able to act. I have no great hope that the children will seek me out in later life. I have been disowned by everyone in my family who knows about the Court action. It is uncomfortable for them. Only one close friend knows about it and she was so critical of me for going to Court that our friendship has virtually lapsed.

Lindamac. Good work with your video. The Forum is great, but vidoes etc might reach those not yet involved with the Family Court and so help to prepare them.

Valerie, the You tube has to be the best platform to have your say and get the message out. The forums are a safe haven for the people who just want to be anon. It is good to have face to face with people as this way you really find support & true power. Through all of the forums there are now more support networks for families to be found globally .
I fell asleep due to a cold last night, however would have liked to have joined in on talkshow.com on facebook: I do like the Get off the Bench show: I was sent a link to this also SPLITNTWO by a mother who is living apart.
To think that we could support each other raise funds and really make a difference means so much .I have mentioned this forum so maybe new members will come over from Canada / US .This is a very good Forum,please let me know if any of you speak out on the talkshoe.com or any other radio link I would like to hear from you all and what you have to say is equally important.
Keep up the good work.
Thank you for viewing my video it has got to 38 viewed in 2 days.So obviously it has helped people or word is spreading fast. I hardly have any subbers on the channel and find it hard to keep up with it all.I will give it a go , and give it my best shot.

I may be incorrect but the "Split in Two" website appears to be a proponent of PAS.

There is a world of critical difference for children between PAS and true Alienation ; I believe that it is absolutely essential to recognise and understand this point.

Dr. Michael Bone appears and I strss appears to be a strong advocate of PAS.

Sunita, thank you so much for bringing this to my attention. I am sure you are right. As here in the UK women will ask me about a leading psychologist.They say he is nice , he will turn around the PAS . Then I say no do not deal with him, he told me the same thing. Women are talking now in private about their children who have been sent to private care homes to be abused/reprogrammed by him. The fathers groups are all in favour of him. Note I do not print his name.
The talkshoe.com & SPlitNTwO show I am listening to mostly what ordinary people have to say : they are the true experts. They are living this night-mare these psychs created.
What I find is a breathe of fresh air is how people are educating each other how to get back their sanity and find a way OUT of all of this madness created to fuel profit for legals & drug companies .

I am sure people will relate to something on there to gather their strength back to carry on living a normal life whilst there is a gap in being a family living apart.

Yes I heard the doctor describe the mother as PAS , this is a trap I fell into for talking about DV issues. Now it is much easier to walk mothers through the system and say ; please do not make my mistake.
The mothers who are going through the system now ,are taking on this advice as they see the alarming rate that is going on in courts of children from mothers.
Now I can reflect upon the statements my ex -partner who is thick could not read or write , however a lawyer wrote for him , who must have been well experienced in using this template to remove children from good mothers and place with abusive fathers.

MATTHEW FYNES-CLINTON wrote an article in the Queensland Courier -Mail on 14th. November 2008 titled "BLIND EYE TO ABUSE" in which he discusses the excellent and very revealing research of Dr. Cate Banks of Griffith University, Qld. with regards to the cover-up of Child Abuse and family violence in the Family Court of Australia.

In my opinion, Matt Fynes-Clinton has done an excellent job in his series of reports on the Family Court of Australia, which ran all this week ;his articles have served to expose what is known already to many and who are too scared for various reasons to speak out.
Fynes-Clinton has certainly moved the debate forward in a constructive way and the Australian AG, Robert McLelland, responded to one of his articles this week in the "Letters" section.

It will be intersting to see if the Honourable Robert McLelland AG also responds to "Blind Eye to Abuse" and if he and the CJ Diana Bryant will now act to protect Australian children in their court-rooms, or if the rhetoric and lip-service wil continue for more generations.

It may be of interest to the many followers and contributors of this Forum, including overseas ones, that Matthew Fynes-Clinton's excellent article in the Queensland Courier-Mail on 14th. November 2008, entitled "Blind Eye to Abuse" confirmed what many have been saying for a very, very long time with regards to the cover-up of Child Abuse in the Family Court.It appears that finally some lawyers at least,in this corrupt system can no longer stay silent and collude with the suffering of our Children.

In my OLO above, I refer to the disciplining of Dr. William Wrigley in a Family Court matter.

In an article also in the Courier-Mail on 8th. September 2005, by Leanne Edminstone, headlined "Court lifts lid on Custody Case to allay fears" it says "Justice Buckley relied on the evidence of clinical psychologist William Wrigley and counsellor Susan de Campo".

"Valarie" refers to the "mis-representation" of Susan de Campo above

The extent of this witch-hunt is growing and also being fuelled by certain journalists. There is a developing word association that goes:parent-neglect-abuse-sex. Single parents predominantly tend to be the mum, that's just the way it is. The neglect word is being bandied about in a variety of guises - it could be "child falling below the 85% requirement" that gives you that tag. Maybe later, non-school shoes for a term, due to finances.

Life Without Barriers childcare hostels were set up as an INVESTMENT plan by LAWYERS and business men is a fact stated by the AUSTRALIAN in the last few days. HOwever, same paper states the foster carers working in these places are the ones prescribing the drugs (atypical drugs and psychotropic ones not given to this age group unless in care it seems).
This paper is now suggesting ADOPTION would be the ideal answer to all these kids taken into care for whatever reason. Imagine going through a really bad divorce, and young kid, needing counseling, gets a little try out on character-changing drugs - well he/she will soon end up with a new family altogether. That actually is a better prospect than staying til 18 in the hostel being a guinea-pig for the CLINICAL SUPPORT TEAM which visits from nearby Mental Health Farm each week.

1984(2) or THE RETURN OF THE STOLEN GENERATION - View now in your local courts.! Don't ask why the legal eagles don't bother to read your stuff or take proper evidence.

mog: I have read a few medical articles on the effects of cortisol and sexual abuse of young children. A study I read, took cortisol levels of children who were known to have been sexually abused in the last few months and a control group of children who had not. Sexually abused children were so traumatised by the abuse that instead of the cortisol going up as it usually does for stress. In children sexually abused it was abnormally low. The children, it is postulated, 'block' the usual fear response...which I imagine leads to the long term brain development problems.

I don't know why forensic psychologists etc. do not develop this further as a means of evidence of abuse. Perhaps because outside of the court room a child's disclosures are enough? - sadly not so in court.

Also using cortisol level studies - cotton bud and saliva in mouth - for use in court as evidence of stress of children when daddy says: "they had a great time" but child showing behavioural and learning problems.

There is clear evidence of the long term outcomes of severe stress in early childhood, there is also a means of measuring this. I don't understand why this hasn't been taken up in court. The clear evidence of cortisol levels and the long term effects on the developing brain of the child could not be ignored even by conservative judges.

If anyone is interested just google: child sexual abuse and cortisol

Justice for kids:

Cortisol testing is a great idea. The problem is that The Family Court and those who work within it have no interest in child abuse.
I was told this recently on high authority and at great cost.

Valarie: yes, your statement sounds so awful but true. Everything I have read and personally experienced indicates what you are saying is correct...Are you able to say who was upfront enough to serve this cold hard fact?

Yes it sounds like the attitude of most Judges - Lord Nelson put his telescope up to his blind eye and said, "I see no ships", when they put the telescope up to their blind eye's and say. "I see no child abuse".

The problem with cortisol testing is that you may determine that a child is anxious and highly stressed BUT then WHO is TO BLAME would be the question and that's when all the same misogynist stories will be told and all the same outcomes will occur - it would become just another weapon. All the 'enmeshed' parents, 'alienating' parents, 'vengeful' parents would still be there to blame and they would still be women. The Family law system has an investment in enabling and continuing child abuse as the practices of supporting abusers have beome increasingly institutionalised and all professional participants have a stake in believing their mythologies. To refer to the fairytale of the Emporer's new clothes, it would mean suddenly recognising that the emporer had been wandering around nude for years - all the people who have forced children to abuse would be forced to face what they had done to these children. Denial and continuation of the institutionalised abuse of children is for now the only apparent way for family law in this country. Tragically.

Justice for kids : Yes, when the time is right I shall make a full and public report on this.

According to yesterday's Melbourne "Age" newspaper, Business section, p17, under "Tenders" a report into the effects of shared parenting/child abuse has been commissioned by the Attorney General. Tenders close on 19 December.

Iain Gillespie's article (also on p 17) on this tender begins: "In the tragic battleground that is the Family Court...". A prominent subheading reads : "The best intersets of children are often forgotten in custody battles". (I therefore think we have reason to hope).

I intend to make a submission to whatever person or organization gets the job. This would be the most effective means of publicizing it (and everything else I was told in what seemed to be a determined attempt to silence me). It was all very patronizing, but altogther worth it. See my next posting tomorrow.

Not one person involved in running this case has so far shown any concern for the children. They are more intersted in what it is costing me and in maintaining the various myths.

Whether I make this public before the research report is published will depend on the findings of of the panels considering my complaints against legal team and family consultant, lodged in late Sept/early Oct.

The legal profession seems to be relying on a very old precedent to prevent Family Court cases from being opened. This is Rice v. Asplund 1979.

I wonder why this is so. This precedent was set a generation ago and is no longer relevant.

I would appreciate hearing from anyone who has had experience of being blocked by the above precedent

There is evidence of red blood cells in spinal fluid I looked up in google it could be an indication of future mental health problems schizophrenia . This was around the time he was removed from me his birth mother. He was having LP for MRD in leukaemia this kept coming back in some samples. The fear of losing of helplessness in childhood can be a cause of .... I need help with the dna I am no expert . This is what google said it could be.

We have been barred using a draconian law called section 91/14 to the last post barring out of court. I am only allowed 1 comment this was to abuse and cortisol levels post.

Lyndamac - I'd like to help you but I do not understand one of the medical abbreviations you used. I know that LP = lumbar puncture, but what does the other one mean?

MDR is minimal residual disease left in spinal fluid after the chemotherapy is used as maintence in leukaemia. I am afraid I am now in need of only people with a medical back ground in this field. I have got the loads of our bundles .I have got suspicions my son was taken for randomisation UK2003 ALL trials.

www.lyndamac.com

What the Australian article details and Sunita Shaunak confirms is the wholesale ineptitude of the system.
Fathers’ organisation in Britain, in Canada and in the US would agree with her observations that it is the court “system which is complicit in the abuse of our children.”

With regard the damage inflicted ‘on our children’, look no further than Britain where an Underclass is mushrooming.
As for the Chief Justice pronouncing that judges are “not qualified” to speak directly to the children, readers might like to be aware of the actions of a family court judge in the German town of Cochem. He killed off the adversarial behaviour of the ‘experts’ and let both parents to show themselves as capable and competent enough to reach a joint ‘parenting plan’.

For some years in Britain we have doubted the value of so-called ‘experts’ (e.g. CAFCASS). When the opportunity has arisen we have questioned both judges and ‘experts’. Their responses make for good reading. Judges, it would appear, rely on ‘experts’ to make up for any shortfall in their own knowledge. They are guided not so much by the parents’ competency but by the views expressed in the expert’s report as to which parent shall win. They then rubber-stamp the experts’ views.
From the ‘experts’ point of view, they see judges as making the final decision based on all the evidence represented, of which their report is but one minor part and which in any event (as they concede) is not factual but expresses only the “opinions” of the writer.
The comment of the Chief Justice that she sees reports as an "extremely valuable tool for a judge" perfectly makes my point.
Perhaps, therefore, the Australian public should be warned that neither the experts nor the judges really know what they are doing.

I agree with Buster regarding Judges and `Experts’ but the family law per se’ is defective and flawed, mainly because it focuses on the rights of parents and not the children’s rights and needs, thereby totally negating any pretence of decisions being “in the Best Interests of the Child”. Decisions are made in the best interests of one or other of the parents because that is the law.

The system is also flawed because it is adversarial – this means that even where both parents are willing to act reasonably and responsibly they are thrown against each other as opponents and adversaries. They naturally adopt the role the system assigns to them and act out accordingly. Fortunately the vast majority of contact and custody disputes are resolved fairly reasonably but only because of the willingness of the parents to make compromises and to act reasonably. There is however a minority of parents who are unreasonable and sometimes malicious and vindictive towards their former partner and can manipulate the system to achieve their ends of causing pain and harrassment for their former partners, even if the children suffer as a consequence. It is this group and their lawyers who are able to exploit the law and the system and its defects.

The two essentials of reform are therefore to reframe the family laws to be based on children’s rights and needs and secondly to remove the adversarial elements. Then things might be able to move forward and children will be protected and given safe provisions within custody and contact arrangements.

In Courts, Judges and experts must be taught how better to recognise the parent who is acting maliciously and vindictively and deal with them accordingly. There are some glaring errors being made at the moment which are resulting in children suffering the pain for their inadequacies.

I have just uploaded a 2 minute vid a self help vid for people to understand the way the experts and the judges solicitors all play a part in the set up. I worked out who was lying by doing the paperwork they should have done. Type in Liverpoollou6 and look at more from ; Corruption in the Family courts.

See if the link opens.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=YNaPax2VPgE

BUSTER : With regards to your post of 10th. December 2008 and in particular, your last comment, I am of the personal opinion that, the professional disciplining of DR. WILLIAM WRIGLEY, psychologist and as I understand it and am informed,widely-used, Family Court alleged "expert",for his use of Parental Alienation Syndrome in the case TONY KOCH of "The Australian" newspaper has reported on,clearly demonstrates the true level of appalling and less than competent "expert" evidence widely accepted by the FCA and its judges.

TONY KOCH in his article of 29th. July 2005 ("Family Court: putting children last"),reports on the deep and validated concerns of eminent and respected child-welfare experts on the competence of the "experts" accepted and used by the FC and the functioning of the FCA.

It remains my view that the over-whelming majority of judges and lawyers in the FC choose to remain unknowledgeable about the true psychiatry of child abuse and other related issues.
See, for example, DR. CAROLINE TAYLOR'S book :"COURT FACILITATED ABUSE".

It is, in my own personal opinion, only a matter of time before the system and those who collude with it are exposed.

Buster: I totally agree with your statement: "The Australian Public should be warned that neither the experts nor Judges really know what they are doing".

It was the most helpless feeling in my life sitting in the back seat and listening as the 'court expert' and court members discussed the future of my child. With their collective IQ no doubt very high it was extremely defeating to hear what utter nonsense they spoke.

With my 'nothing special intelligence' I wept...seemingly from stress, but because my child was in these peoples hands and it was idiotic nonsense.

For instance: the family expert was talking about the subtleties of contact long distance and the terrible effect on relocation etcetera, meanwhile my child and I have been forced by the court to live in a state of homelessness...the father a hopping mad 'nut job' (as someone previously described in a posting) very keen to 'see' child not for love but to molest child further etcetera, etcetera.

While the public, media, government might wish to turn a blind eye to all of this, they pay in their taxes for the malicious and vexatious to use the court to access children to abuse. The tax payer then foots the bill for the fall out - counselling, criminal behaviour. You can bet the public and government are in for some whopping compensation claims not too far in the future and the taxpayer will pay again for the complete moral bankruptcy of the present.

Not care about children - probably. Care about money? now we're listening

MATTHEW FYNES-CLINTON in the Courier-Mail, recently reported on the serious and publicly-expressed concerns of ex-Family Court judge Tim Carmody in Australia, on the acceptabilty of "Shared Parenting Responsibility" after divorce.

SHARED PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITY has been advocated by a number of "experts" who give evidence regularly in the FCA, including, I am led to believe, psychologist PHILIP TRUDINGER,of Brisbane, who as I understand it, has delivered paper(s) on this and has been a vocal advocate of same.

I beleive that recent research by Jeni McIntosh and ex-Family court judge Richard Chisholm in Australia, has also raised serious concerns about the advisability of Shared Parental Responsibilty.

One would be excused for wondering what credible, peer-reviewed and peer-published research FC "experts" actually base their professional opinions on ?

Justice for kids I agree with you these experts need to be destroyed for want of a better word. The families that are being destroyed daily by the reports which are just junk 1 of mine was £1,300 it was inconclusive there were 3 experts for court .
This is legal child abuse to attempt to cause so much harm to children.People are talking and people are getting wise to them . Do not take part in the tests.

I have told my aunt to tell my cousin who is a psychologist: if you get offered silly money to do a report DON"T DO IT simply because you will get your reputation trashed and people will know what you are about to do before you even try it . Data -bases are going up with what expert done who for how much.
The internet is a powerful thing and this is how it is going to be a guide to who the experts really are who they work with in terms of solicitor's firms .People are naming and shaming and exposing the system for what it really is . I will do a series of 2 minutes video on YT . I will focus on the MMP1-2 soon as I can.
Together we will WIN. If the link does not open type in: Liverpoollou6 Corruption in Closed Courts
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?id=525644600&pid=1187668&cp=1360881329&cps=6abc5a6823

Justice for kids: Lawyers and Family Court experts may have a high IQ at the age of 18, when they enter universities to study for their profession, but IQ tests don't include assessment for common sense, morality, compassion, empathy or many other qualities.

Child protection and welfare are now the sole responsibility of State authotities. This was spelled out to me by that senior legal person I referred to in a recent posting.

This is because the Australian Family Law Act 1975, Section 60CC, re determining the best interests of the child, is bring ignored or deliberately contravened by the Family Court and its practitioners.

If have been correctly informed, each State now has (or will shortly have) its own Human Rights Commissioner and its own Children's Commissioner.

Why then does the Family Court exist? It could be done away with and its functions dealt with more effectively by the Supreme Courts of individual States, as was the case at least in Victoria before 1975.

There is no apparent "chain of command" in the Family Court arrangement. I hestitate to refer to it as a system.

Such a chain is necessary for effective administration, and for ensuring the accountability of those who work (very lucratively) within the Family Court arrangement.

More on this tomorrow.

THE ABSENCE OF A CHAIN OF COMMAND IN THE FAMILY COURT

One would expect the Attorney General or the Chief Justice of the Family Court to take responsibility for the actions of Family Law solicitors, barristers and Family Court appointed or approved Family Consultants.

For legal practitioners, complaints can be made only to the State Legal Services Commissioners who have no power to intervene in a Family Court decision or order a new Hearing, whatever the outcome of the investigation of the complaint.

Similarly the Family Court can't deal with complaints against its own legal practitioners.

The Family Court can (theortetically at least) deal with complaints against some BUT NOT ALL Family Consultants. For these one has to complain to the relevant State/Territory Psychologists Registration Board. These Boards have no power to intervene in a Court decision or reopen cases etc, whatever the outcome of the enquiry into the complaint.

NB. No one working within the Family Court can be sued. They have judicial immunity, which those dissatisfied with their performance do not seem to have. My most recent legal adviser pre-empted my query about this by warning me that I cannot sue the Family Consultant.

The above facts are based on personal experience.

WHY THE AUSTRALIAN HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION CANNOT HELP CHILDREN ENDURING FAMILY COURT ENDORSED CHILD ABUSE.

The Australian Human Rights Commission is an advisory body only and has no power to intervene in Family Court matters. I was wrongly advised by UNICEF to contact them on behalf of my grandchildren.

The Australian Human Rights Commission is mainly concerned with children in detention centres. This is ironical as my grandchildren are also in a form of detention with hostile, abusive, mentally ill parents, and restricted communication with the outside world etc.

This includes intercepted correspondence (including Registered Post items, with the blessing of Australia Post) and a parent listening to and disrupting the few Court ordered phone calls which I am allowed.

The Australian Human Rights Commission has no link with State Legal Service Commissioners or with the State/Territory Human Rights Commissioners or with any of the Psychologists Registration Boards.

I might have accidentally misled Forum members about this. I had a statement from a Psychogists' Registration Board that the Human Rights Commission would be represented on the panel hearing my complaint. This turned out to be the relevant State/ Territory Human Rights Commission, which at that stage I did not know existed.

It is not clear just whose rights (mine, the Family Consultant's or my grandchildren's) are being protected by the inclusion of a HRC representative on the panel. I hope that it is the latter.

It is a pity that these various Commissions do not identify themselves clearly as being the Australian Human Rights Commission or by including the name of the relevant State or Territiory.

The Australian Psychological Society cannot discipline its members although they all seem to adhere to the same code of practice. I was very strongly discouraged BY PHONE by someone at the above APS when I emailed asking for an address for my complaint. The incorrect phone number I was given might have been a genuine mistake, but I managed to trace the Psych Board using the Internet.

The above are also based on personal experience.

Details of the State etc Children's Commissions tomorrow.

It is my understanding that the HQCC and Psych. Board CAN and do discipline their members with regards to FC proceedings, it has happened and I would encourage others to hold the "experts" accountable for their actions and opinions,it happens in every other legal arena.....why not the FC?

THE AUSTRALIAN ATTORNEY-GENERAL'S FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS ADVICE LINE PHONE NUMBER 1800 050 321

The above was given on a morning TV show on Tues. I missed most of it
and don't even know which channel, but a Dr John (possible psychologist) was speaking about the problems caused by shared parenting. He also said that "Courts can't legislate relationships".

He said that counselling was available through the above number.

First three sessions free, the others possibly through some sort of Medicare rebate.

I phoned the above number to ask how it would work. Not very encouraging as it seems to be staffed by the same mediators who helped to cause the problem.

The person I spoke to said that since 2007, mediators (not the Court) had made decisions regarding shared parenting. I can hardly believe she said this, but if it is queried, I'll apologize if the taped recording I was told about before speaking, shows that I misheard/misinterpreted it.

Many reading this will be experiencing problems caused by shared parenting.

I suggest that all take advantage of the first three free sessions. It might provide valuable feedback to the Attorney General himself.

I'm not eligible as I was denied even mediation because the other parties moved frequently (even changing countries) and kept their address secret. The Family Court allowed this.

AUSTRALIAN STATE AND TERRITORY CHILDREN'S COMMISSIONERS

The Hon Jenny Macklin, MP, Minister for Families etc drew my attention to the existence of these, when I asked her to establish a National Commissioner for Children.

On the Internet there is a good summary entitled "Commissioners and Guardians for Children" : a national snapshot"

I can provide the website on request through the Forum, but I don't think that at present these Commissioners will be much help to anyone worried about Family Court endorsed child abuse in the home by another parent etc.

All emphasise (correctly, I believe) the rights of children to have a say in decisions relating to them.

However, children living with abusive parents are likely to be physically and emotionally restrained from taking the first step by phoning an advice etc, even if they are allowed to know that it exists. By the time they are able, they may be irreparably damaged, homeless, drug-addicted etc.

The above State and Territory Children's Commissioners seem to have no real power at present. Their role is to monitor, advise and research etc. Worryingly, there are three references to child deaths in the article referred to.

I wonder why governments (Federal and State) find it easier to appoint new Commissioners, and call for more reports (and in Victoria even a report on a recent report) when the law giving parents total ownership of their children needs to be changed.

Also, The Family Court (as long as it is allowed to exist) should be made accountable for the bad consequences of decisions made in its name.

Valerie,

You sound like you are struggling against the wall of Family Court prejudice.

Like many grandparents, second-wives and fathers, you will find that the family court gives preference to the mother, in almost every case.

Grandparents, fathers, friends, schools, the familiar family home, the family Dr... can be cast aside by the "Family Court" as they believe the mother is more important than all of these things put together.

Across the western world there are many groups of the "Families and fatherhood movement" that are working, un-funded, to try to fix the court and it's destructive prejudices.

Frequently, groups like ours have 30% female members - usually grandparents and 2nd wives, who stand together against the prejudices that hurt children so much and keep children away from loving family.

Want to join and see what advice and shared experiences we can share? Send a blank email to:
fathers4equality-subscribe@yahoogroups.com