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'.