Jordans tells us that James Munby, The President of the Family Division has today announced that the presumption of parental involvement will come into force on 22nd October, this year.
It will be inserted into the Children and Families Act 2014, at S.11.
The presumption in this context will not amount to an automatic right to 50/50 shared parenting, but an acknowledgement that the starting point focuses on the idea that all parents should be involved in their child’s life where possible.
This is unlikely to please father’s rights groups, but there it is. Do we think parental involvement as a notion is good? Yes. Do we think this subsection is a pointless addition to keep drafters busy and parents’ rights movements happy? Yes. But do we think a presumption in law is a good idea? Given the way the system cronks along, that would be a big no.
Odds on S.11 becomes the next contender after legal aid cuts to slow the process down even further.
You read it here first.
Researching Reform 
” This is unlikely to please fathers rights groups”” What kind of snitty remark is this?? You failed to state why fathers rights groups would not be satisfied with this language
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Hi Fred. In your anger, you’ve misread the comment and misunderstood it, too. Not a great way to introduce yourself on this site. I was referring to the fact that this will not be viewed as a strong enough presumption by fathers’ groups – a sentiment they have all vocalised themselves.
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THE WORLDWIDE SCANDAL OF THE FAMILY COURTS
http://www.leadershipcouncil.org/1/pas/carner.html
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It fundamentally fails to address the point, firstly without any changes to enforcement ie a automatic penalty this remains meaningless. It also fails to address the significant problem of false allegations and legal aid fraud that results.
Mediation is a distraction and just another way for lawyers to milk a system, not least as the failure to make the mediated outcome enforcible just kicks the children’s and parents welfare into the long grass.
The judiciary have consistently failed to protect children and ensure that the provisions of the law are upheld thinking they can hide behind the usual mantra of justice being in the eye of the beholder. The reality is the system remains based on possession, entitlement and ownership in most cases by the mother mixed with a strong dose of false allegations mostly encouraged by lawyers and the likes of Womens Aid. Its a shame judges and wider legal profession don’t have the moral decency to act.
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Hi Lip, thanks for your comment. For me, it’s more complicated. I think children deserving to be with both parents wherever possible as a notion is indisputable. Kids can only benefit from that love and awareness. I do think though that when you put a legal document, the current justice system and lots of other dangers like child abuse, presumptions of this kind (whether more or less narrow), are unhelpful. The reality is that the problems surrounding contact are not really legal ones, they are emotional ones. Until our system can offer a holding bay to deal with these issues first, the whole system is going to fail at being effective, for everyone.
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http://www.scfamilylaw.com/new-studies-confirm-benefits-of-joint-custody/
New Studies Confirm Benefits of Joint Custody
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http://www.irishtimes.com/news/social-affairs/we-promise-to-improve-care-for-children-but-we-demonstrate-that-we-don-t-really-mean-it-1.1959517
We promise to improve care for children, but we demonstrate that we don’t really mean it.
They promise to care for children in care but that does always happen either!
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It will be interesting to see how this `Shared Parenting’ is enforced. Will Orders be made ordering parents to have contact and visitation with their children?. How will the children enforce this right to have a parent involved in their life?. Will there be penalties for those parents who fail to engage in `Shared Parenting’ of their children without reasonable excuse or who contravene such Shared Parenting Orders.?. There are currently in excess of 800,000 separated parents who are failing to provide financial maintenance to their children – will those children have the right to enforce such payments?.
If it is believed that parents must be involved in their children’s lives after separation being in the children’s best interests, then it is logical that children have such rights of enforcement. Or do I have it wrong, this is not about children’s rights based on their best interests?.
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Unfortunately in the most part child maintenance is enforced in the UK. However the system is wholly unfair for example any maintenance does not reduce the benefits paid by the state to the mother. Further examples of unfairness is that the amounts charged are arbitrary percentages 15% for 1st child, Plus 5% for the second etc however these are not means tested so fathers end up having to choose between paying their rent and eating and paying maintenance. You are reminded in this that a mother with two children who is not working receives between £1600 and £1900 in benefits each month this is the equivalent of a £30,000 salary. This is often more than the father earns if he is on the average UK wage of £26,000 he’d receive a net of +/- £1500pm meaning he’d pay £250pm to his ex partner. This means that it is unlikely that the father is able to survive financially.
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“Unfortunately in the most part child maintenance is enforced in the UK.” – then why is over 1.4 Billion pounds owed in child maintenance?.
“… £1600 and £1900 in benefits each month” – even if such figures were correct, maintaining three people on such an amount is extremely difficult. Do you know the average cost of maintaining just one child in this country?. I’m sure I don’t need to list such costs, they will be well known to most parents.
Why are you attacking mothers with such venom. The financial maintenance is required for the children, or do you begrudge that fact.?.
Single mothers are the largest group of those living below the poverty line in this country, so your assumptions are way off beam.
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Richard… my assumptions? I have an issue because the system is unfair. I have not said that maintenance is not due either… what I have said is that the amounts being given to mothers are not means tested for either party and often it then leaves the father below the breadline meaning that the one person usually excluded from contact is also treated as a cash point. It is not fair to leave a father unable to function and in debt or he will never be socially mobile enough to provide for his children, Average UK wage is £26K this s what the majority function on…. So mothers with 2 kids do quite well by comparison.
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I see no reason why amounts should be means-tested. The most important criteria is the costs of maintaining a child, that is the purpose of the payment. Unless of course, you want children to live on a bare minimum of subsistence, or even be placed in a position of poverty.?.
And why should every other man who pays taxes, pay for the follies and meet the responsibilities of other men?.
Perhaps your remarks should be directed at, as yet unmarried men, so they think much more carefully about their commitments in marriage and fatherhood and to other working men who are subsidising irresponsible fathers.
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Richard this is ridiculous and you have a clear chip. No father expects the rest of society to pick up the tab however the point is the system is inequitable. You make the point that the cost should be related to the costs of upbringing and I agree. This is where the problem lies with your argument. The charge for maintenance is an arbitary % 15% for the first 5% for the second so on and so forth so you have a situation where a mother sitting at home gets benefits for and until the youngest child is 5 irrespective of any maintenance paid. So much so a father could contribute £30K plus as long as she doesn’t save the money beyond the limits, the children would receive a family income net of tax of almost £90K. This leaves a system open to abuse. Flip this the other way round a separated family has two houses two set of utilities two cars, possibly a separated father may have a new partner who may have children. Yet your argument is these children should be left in poverty. This maintenance is paid even if the mother gets a new partner with no regard for the new partners income. Lets assume he is on average income their household income rises to in excess of £100K. You have simply the most ignorant understanding of reality. I further suggest you visit the forums of mumsnet and net mums and look up FWI or coercive pregnancy. A recent study I read calculated that in excess of 50% of all pregnancies claimed to be unplanned were planned by the woman without consent of the father.
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LiP – I would ask again, that you please don’t personalise this discussion, it is after all a clear acknowledgement of losing the arguments. You also seem determined to focus your attacks on mothers and to thereby turn this into a gender argument when it is the welfare and wellbeing of children which is under consideration. I’m sure that no mother can just “sit at home” when there are children in the home and the usual daily household tasks have to be performed to keep the family functioning. I consider that your comment is highly misogynistic and derogatory.
You now claim to speak for all fathers – I think that a great many would dispute that and a great many others choose not to meet their financial responsibilities which are then placed on the rest of society, as borne out by the huge sum owed by fathers in child maintenance.
The charges are set, I am sure, to reflect the actual costs of maintaining a child and to which every child has a right if they are to function effectively in society during their childhood and later in their adulthood.
If a father has re-partnered and acquired further responsibilities, then that is his choice. He is not forced, coerced, nor required to do so and his children of a previous relationship should not be penalised for his choice and his decision to do so.
Your comments about unplanned pregnancy left me rolling in tearful laughter – when did fathers not have control of their own reproductive systems?. Is this another part of the F4J mythology and propaganda?.
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It must be the saddest situation to love your children but be denied contact. It should be the norm to share parenting. Children pick up on feelings and often say what is expected of them by a parent who is the dominant carer. It should be made clear from the off that the children will see both parents and nothing should interfere with that without a very good reason.
The same applies to children in care. Social workers often deny parents and extended family contact with them! Penalties should be enforced against local authorities when they do this. Research has stated it is beneficial for the child to see family members.. Local authorities should not be able to hide behind the ever flexible lie, ” Its in the childs best interests”
It is denying a child the love and reassurance they need when they cannot see loving family..
Its time for radical change.
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Hi D, I would hope that most rational people wouldn’t deny that as a fact, but once you get the system involved it’s no longer just about a sentiment with merit, it’s about how that system works with the sentiment. That’s my problem with presumptions that deviate from or try to conjoin with the original paramountcy principle.
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“…that the children will see both parents and nothing should interfere with that without a very good reason.”
That is largely what happens and why so few applications for contact and visitation are refused. When a senior Family Court judge has stated that even paedophiles should have contact with their own children (but would not be allowed contact with other people’s children in any formal way), then it is difficult to imagine the possible reasons for the small number of refusals.
Without knowing the judicial reasons for a father being refused contact, it is difficult to accept claims of unfairness and injustice.
The primary and paramount consideration in children’s welfare must be that they should have constancy, consistency, and stability in their daily lives, and that their emotional, psychological, physical, and social needs are met. Where children are ordered into 50/50 or even 60/40 shared parenting, they begin to feel like Ping-Pongs and their lives become constantly subject to disruption and instability. As one Australian child who was subject of such shared parenting has put it, “I live in two houses, but I don’t have a home.”
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Thank you richard. It’s been a little busy over the last few days at researching reform, but I’d like to say a thank you to all the posters, for their thought provoking comments and for taking the time to stop by share them.
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Who is this Richard Granville? It is not a minority of cases where the father is excluded, I work with over 1800 F4J have 40,000 victims they/we cannot all be mad. We have been routinely excluded by a combination of false allegations and a failed legal process. I was described as a doting loving capable father but I do not have contact why is that? I have multiple breached contact orders all unenforced? Why is that?
It must be a fair system and it must be my fault…. the fact is the system needs to change to remove the rewards available to unscrupulous lawyers and other alleged ‘professionals’ it is changing and will change so to quote an enlightened one, get one with it….
If you deny contact of your child to the other parent you are guilty of child abuse, if you help anyone do it you might as well do it yourself.
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“Who is this Richard Granville?” – So you would prefer to attack the player, rather than the ball?. I suppose you and your compatriots at F4J will also be maintaining that Caroline Nokes M.P. is making false allegations regarding the harassment.?.
I’m afraid that research on false allegations in Family Courts (Monash Uni) clearly show that false allegations are made in less than 9% of Family Law cases (fathers and mothers) so such claims are becoming more and more an unlikelihood and rather tedious.
I agree that the legal process is a completely dysfunctional failure, largely because it is an adversarial process, which immediately polarises the positions of the parties and casts them into defensive/offensive high-conflict opposition.
The future lives and welfare of children are far too important to be determined by the vagaries and vicissitudes of such a legal process where `winning’ is far more important than the best interests of children in consideration of their emotional, psychological, physical, and social needs. And it is a process which is racked with personal biases and prejudices based on outdated belief systems and the accompanying attitudes of the various participants. To sit and observe a Family Court Hearing is far more educational than any tragi/comedy that Shakespeare could ever have dreamed up.
Denying contact is rarely abusive to the child, it is far more often done to prevent abuse. That is why so many mothers are now absconding with their children to other countries or inter-state, leaving behind their homes, careers, supportive family and friends, and the other trappings of their daily lives in order to protect their children from violence and abuse when Family Courts have failed to do so, because they so determinedly uphold the rights of parents to have contact with or custody of their children, no matter what they may have done in terms of violence and abuse.
Why is it that fathers who claim false allegations and being denied contact, are more than a little reluctant to give the links to the case judgements, so everyone can examine the findings and rulings and make their own determinations of fairness?.
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Richard, I have little time for F4J so again you make an assumption.
Your views are so far from the reality and contact denial is child abuse, I suggest you read the likes of Warshak and you will find the true picture. Contact denial is done for control and is a form of domestic abuse.
Your suggestions that mothers as are absconding to prevent abuse is ridiculous, the numbers do not support your argument. Any harm to any child is terrible however there are two statistics you need to know in the 10 years to 2006 the NSPCC statistics were that 800 children died at the hands of their mother and just 29 at hands of fathers. However since 2012 15 kids have been murdered 12 by mum or by siblings in control of mum, 2 by others (both new partners of mum) and 1 by a father . Children are 27 times more likely to be killed by their mother than father. In America recent figures from their dept of health showed 95% of sexually and physically abused children were in homes where fathers were excluded. It gets worse still 93% of those were abused with the consent of the mother or by the mother.
It is a fact that children are more likely to be uneducated, imprisoned, homeless etc when not having access to a father. This is best demonstrated by our own prison population who >75% have not had an active male role model in their lives. Lastly Mexico recently outlawed contact denial and guess what…. reported child abuse has fallen by nearly 50%.
So the figures speak for themselves you can continue with your politically correct and outdated liberal ideology and no doubt tax payer funded income on legal aid. Or you can become a little more educated in the reality of the UK family courts.
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LiP – I made no assumption regarding F4J – it was you who introduced them into the debate as some kind of authority to support your arguments which they are far from being. I would also like to see some documentary proof of the number of members you claim they have, as the information I have received indicates that they hold their meetings in telephone boxes, and are never quorate.
I have read Warshak and am completely unimpressed, with either his ability at conducting research or in adherence to academic rigour. He seems quite adept however at sending round a few Round Robins which few contributors of their signatures will have read and understood, allowing him to misuse their authority.
Contrary to your assertion, contact is more frequently applied for as a means of control – or at least continuing control and the children are often mere pawns to obtain such control. This is done by vengeful fathers, deeply resentful at their rejection by their former female and partners and just as frequently by their children.
I can assure you that mothers are absconding to protect their children from abuse when Courts have failed to do so. Holly Collins was but one and her now adult daughter has spoken a great deal about the abuses they suffered and how her mother became her protective parent.
I don’t know where you and the NSPCC got your statistics but they are as usual incorrect (you may wish to check with your friends in F4J that you quoted their inaccurate and misleading statistics incorrectly). The Office for National Statistics data show that in 2011/12 there were 31 child homicides committed by biological parents and only 2 children were killed by others in their families. In 1012/13 there were 46 child homicides and 6 children were killed by other family members.
Your stats are similarly contradicted by other studies around the world such as in Australia where Elspeth McInnis has studied such occurrences in detail:
Cases of filicide in the context of separation by gender of perpetrator. By Dr. Elspeth McInnes AOM
In the 16 years from 1998-February 2014 there have been 29 events of filicide causing the deaths of 81 people. This is an average of 2.8 deaths per event. Such events have high lethality. The average number of events over the 16 years is 1.8 events per year. These events are therefore reasonably frequent.
This document identifies that from 1998-February 2014 there have been (at least) 23 events where separated fathers have killed their children. A total of 65 people have died in these events. 44 of the dead were children. All were murdered. Five women were murdered and 3 men were murdered. The remaining 13 men’s deaths were suicides by the perpetrators.
The document concludes with cases where separated mothers have killed their children. There have been at least 6 events between 1999 and January 2014 resulting in the deaths of 16 people: 12 children, 3 women and 1 man. All the dead women were perpetrators who suicided.
Separated fathers are nearly 4 times more likely to kill their children than are separated mothers.
Your claims about the development and eventual life opportunities of children living in fatherless families is similarly entirely incorrect and misleading. The study this is based on stated that children did better educationally and in their careers in intact families where fathers took an active interest in the children. This cannot be extended to situations where fathers have been rejected from families and wish only to play a part-time role in their children’s lives. (which they were probably only playing prior to separation).
Some of the world’s most successful people were brought up in single mother families, not least a quarter of American Presidents including Thomas Jefferson, Barack Obama and other successful Presidents. It would appear therefore that such research into intact families and the respective contributions of fathers may need re-assessing and re-evaluating as it clearly makes some false assumptions. (Much like Warshak I suppose).
In terms of imprisonment, it is far more likely that someone will be imprisoned if they have Anti-Social Personality Disorder (psychopathy which is a neurological disorder), are of below average intelligence, or are from particular ethnic groups, so the only effect that father would have on the lives of such children would be in passing on faulty genes.
So the figures speak for themselves – you can continue with your ill-informed and outdated patriarchal ideology and no doubt tax-payer subsidised lifestyle. Or you can become a little more educated in the reality of the UK family courts.
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Picking up on the original comment: why is it that you feel the need to even comment on father’s right’s groups, when this amendment, shallow tho it is, is designed for children? The comment on father’s rights is a nullity, as the positive outcomes for children and the aims of what you call ‘father’s rights’ groups are linked.
Perhaps, as a balance, you could have stated that it would probably upset some women’s groups too, as it is a step forwards (maybe, maybe not) that they won’t want.
Why don’t you just drop the ‘father’s rights’ discourse instead of smearing loving fathers as if they are seeking something unnatural? What on earth is wrong with 50/50 as a starting point that we move downwards from according to practicality in each case? Instead of starting from zero and, in too many cases, never getting beyond that, due to the lack of enforcement? Why don’t you concentrate on the rights of children to have a relationship with both parents as a positive and accept that any change that may act as a persuader towards that is good for children?
The failures of the system are a reason to bring in presumptions, not curtail them.
So far as child abuse is concerned, you ignore the empirical research stating that in jurisdictions where the role of separated fathers is taken seriously, there is less opportunity for child abusers. You focus on the very very tiny proportion of biological fathers who abuse their kids whilst ignoring the far greater problem of abusive boyfriends, smutty public officials, other pedos and the small percentage of single mothers with mental health problems who have easy access to children once fathers are elbowed out of the way. In Rotherham, the group of fathers who tried to deal with the situation when reporting what was going on were all arrested.
Fathers spoil the fun for abusive criminals, and anyone who promotes language claiming legal presumptions promoting paternal relationships as a default in law is a bad thing is not “protecting children” (that is either ignorant or a pretence ) but exposing them. The presumption may well bring a very small number of abuses from biological fathers who the system misses, but it is more likely to get it right – if only the cases that deserve to go to court actually do, and that is the idea behind a presumption. Whilst separated fathers are battling long or being dismissed without good reason in private law courts and being ignored by public law courts, children are being mentally damaged and physically and sexually abused.
You state contact issues as “emotional.” Talk about diluting a massive problem. When the law is interpreted and applied properly, and these cases do not get protracted for years in court, there’s less, or even no, emotion. The emotion stems partly from the lack of control and uncertainty parents have once the case hits the courts. The lack of emotional facility does not deflect from the need for presumptions and principals. It reinforces that need. The only way anyone separating can have any kind of support, emotional or material, is by making allegations. That places people in courts, causing emotional damage to children and parents. And again, you focus on the adults, not the children.
When you look at this from the perspective of the child, the aims of “father’s rights” and the message behind the presumption fall neatly into place. The only people who don’t see it like that are the ones whose positions, ideologies, fundings, incomes and perversions are threatened by any positive moves forward for children. If we limit the cases going to court, there’ll be more resources to catch and remove the very people you claim should be taken into consideration before advances like presumptions are made. Yours is a tedious and discredited argument; far more children have now been shown to have been neglected and abused in the UK than would ever have been the case if fathers were not elbowed out by socio-legals and other professionals who would not otherwise have had jobs or access to children.
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Dear L,
Thank you for your comment. No one is smearing loving fathers. Nothing in the post was intended as a criticism of them. What I find though, with fathers who are in pain, is that they tend to jump down everyone’s throat, regardless of whether or not it’s warranted. I understand you’re upset, but you might want to think before you write/speak.
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Natasha no need for the patronising ‘you might want to think before you write/speak.’ the issue most fathers have is that no one is listening, whatever they do they are harassed, ignored, treated like second class citizens, threatened, arrested, falsely imprisoned, sustain false allegations, receive state funded opposition (Legal Aid) this list goes one but losing your child this way is a feeling very similar to grief, just its worse because there is no closure, their children are dangled by the state with suggestions of access and promises of resolution…. None of this ever comes for some, even most and they go on to be systematically written out of the lives of their children.
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‘You might want to think before you speak.’ II know your hurt.’
Try focusing on the issue. Try giving reasons for the claims you make. List your reasons for opposing a presumption.
Don’t turn this into some kind of subjective argument by turning on ‘fathers’ or me as a single entity. That’s known as ‘playing the player.’ Play the ball instead. The ball is the welfare of children.
Why should a presumption be a something to be wary of? List actual, evidence based reasons, instead of vague myths.
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There’s no ball here, no game. I suggest you re-read the post. And if you’re unsure as to why I think this presumption is going to be more harmful than helpful, I suggest you read the rest of my blog, I’ve written about this extensively.
If you can’t write civilly, you won’t be able to post on this blog anymore. That’s the minimum requirement here on this forum. Most people manage it. Give it a try, or go elsewhere.
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Hi All, Can I ask why some of you seem to be attacking each other points of veiw instead of attacking the injustices found in both private and public family law? You should be aligning yourselves with each other to act as a force to be reckoned with! It’s not for nothing they say united we stand, divided we fall!
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Unfortunately this is the problem that some people particularly from the feminist guardian reading left seem to be in complete denial of the problem and want to present any father who speaks out as mad or stupid. The fact is I find people like this distasteful particularly when they start insulting world authorities on the subject and effectively accusing them of fraud. They can say what they like to me but if you support contact denial you are supporting child abuse. It is that simple…
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Firstly, LiP, in spite of your experience and the fact that our emotions are exposed at times like this you have shown remarkable restraint and patience in the face of some nasty taunting and goading.
Losing a child to alienation is not merely, “similar” to grief and bereavement. It is, without doubt, the worst form of loss I have ever experienced.
I am no stranger to loss: I have had more than my fair share having suffered the bereavement of colleagues, partners, siblings, parents and close friends etc: sometimes under truly dreadful circumstances. The experience of alienation, even though the lost are still alive, was every bit as horrible as any bereavement I have suffered. In fact it was worse because of the huge uncertainty, lack of closure, fleeting glimpses and knowledge that the most precious and valuable thing in my life was being persistently and systematically emotionally abused in order to fuel and promote my hurt. I imagined my daughter crying herself to sleep, hurt and isolated. I now know that my worst fears were justified.
The knowledge that another human being harbored such abject hatred that they were prepared to harm their own offspring to hurt me is something that I still fail to rationalize and I struggle to comprehend. In this regard some of the posts here are illuminating with their empathy for emotional abuse. Their splenetic jeremiads ooze hatred and bile. They make Victor Meldrew sound like Milly-Molly-Mandy.
The feelings of utter helplessness, wretchedness and frustration, when faced with the loss of ones children and a rotten system, were an entirely new experience. And, I reacted in ways behaviors that would usually be completely alien to me. The feelings evoked are deeply emotional and all consuming. They cut to the very core of ones being and they touch every aspect of ones existence.
With hindsight I know that it took a long time for me to separate the wood from the trees. Anyone that is traumatised in this way will inevitably experience difficulty in separating facts from their feelings. At these times our instincts and core emotions are exposed and near the surface. We are damaged, broken and raw. We feel threatened and at our most vulnerable. Some people are treated for PTSD as a consequence.
Most people posting here, regardless of their gender politics, have a modicum of emotional intelligence and understand the grief that accompanies losing your children. That goes for, mums, dads, grandparents, siblings, friends, professionals, indeed, virtually everyone.
Most people would never dream of treating human beings that are grieving with anything other than empathy and compassion.
Most people would not kick others when they are down for their own entertainment, to score cheap points or merely promote their dogma.
Most people would class such dismal behaviour as falling well outside well-tested, established and acceptable social norms.
Most people have more respect for themselves and others.
Most people would not think you discourteous LiP, if you refused to dignify such vile and scurrilous haranguing with a response or even an acknowledgement.
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Lord Justice Wall speaking in the Court of Appeal stated that he was “hoping that they (the government) would `dispel the myth that there is a gender bias against fathers within the Family Justice system”. He went on to say, that he would be regarded as `biased and time serving’ by one of the fathers whose case he had thrown out, so he took the unusual step of delivering a lengthy, written judgement.
The judge concluded that the father, David Bradford, had “completely lost sight of the principal focus of the case – the welfare of his son – and had become wholly preoccupied with what he regards as an ongoing battle with the mother of the child.
But the reason this father was not seeing his son was nothing to do with what the boy’s mother had done or because of any failure by Judge Hunt, who had heard the case. The reason was simply `Mr Bradford’s behaviour”.
In the case of Shaun O’Çonnell, the case was transferred to a different judge, Justice Coleridge but,
“Instead of persuading Mr Justice Coleridge that he had a case which had been misunderstood by the original judge Milligan, Judge Coleridge found that Mr. O’Çonnell had clearly demonstrated that everything Judge Milligan had said about him was correct. The children’s hostility to their father, the judge found, related directly to his behaviour towards them. “They had not been alienated by the mother”.
It is understandable that individual fathers and organisations such as F4J would want to keep the myth alive, by telling sob stories and arguing against the facts but they are in more than a little difficulty in proving three Family Court judges to be wrong.
It is always noticeable that they never disclose why they have been denied contact except to blame the mothers, and never provide the evidence from the findings and judgements in their cases.
All three judges also confirmed the existence of self-alienation of their children by fathers which so many fathers seem to have difficulty in accepting, yet occurs so often. Research has shown that the vast majority of mothers want their children to have continuing contact with their fathers, even when they have been violent and abusive, as in the case of Luke Batty in Australia where the father finally killed his son after the mother permitted continuing contact.
So it is long overdue that fathers in such circumstances abandoned the mythology and addressed the realities, as factually described by learned judges and by mothers.
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You seriously trust the narrative fabrications of these judges? Wall, a proven and serial abuser of human rights, Coleridge, who sat on divorce cases whilst harboring fundamental Christian beliefs on marriage. Coleridge, who denied enforcement to Mark Harris’s daughters, using the same spin as you have lauded above, only for those girls to run to live with him at their first chance. These stories of separation pain are ubiquitous and reflected in empirical research. You seem to have to journey far and wide, using rare anecdotes to support your views. Might also interest you to know that the ’31 homicides’ story was investigated and criticized by none other than Wall.
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And you appear to have contemptuous disregard for anyone’s evidence or opinion which does not fit your own narrow and biased views of the Family Court system, coupled with an ability to distort and contort any other evidence to support your position.
The testimony and opinions of three judges of the Family Court are hardly `far and wide’ and if you consider Warshak et al to have engaged in “empirical research” then you know little of research methodology or ethics and its validation.
Whatever you may assert regarding the characters of three learned judges, does not begin to compare to the actions and activities of the Father’s Rights Movement which has variously murdered judges and their families, menaced and threatened the children of a Prime Minister, several lawyers, and CAFCASS workers and generally created mayhem when they have been unable to prosecute what they believe to be their right to torment, torture, and abuse and kill their children and former partners.
Sadly, many Courts in the UK, USA, and Australia have succumbed to such bullying and threats and still order children into the contact with and even the custody of such dangerous and vengeful fathers, as testified by a group of Californian lawyers who have recently protested and demonstrated against such actions by Courts.
It is surely unprecedented for lawyers to protest in such a manner regarding the determinations of Courts, which indicates the gravity of the situation as it is affecting thousands of children.
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thank you Stevie …
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LAW SCHOOL PROFESSOR TO LEAD RESEARCH ON CUSTODY DECISIONS IN FAMILY COURTS
`A GW Law School professor will spend a $500,000 grant over the next three years gathering evidence of how family courts respond to cases of abuse.
Joan Meier, a law professor who runs GW’s Domestic Violence Project, earned a grant this fall from the National Institute of Justice to try to show that courts across the country have fallen into a trend of awarding custody to an abusive parent, even after the other parent warns the judge about the possibility of abuse.
The grant is one of the first that the University’s law school has been awarded by the National Institute of Justice, and is one of the first projects nationally to study domestic abuse and custody cases.
The project will analyze the findings of more than 1,000 court cases from the past 15 years. The researchers hope to debunk “junk science” that mothers make false accusations of abuse to alienate fathers from their sons or daughters, a misconception that Meier said has put many children in danger. ‘
http://www.gwhatchet.com/2014/10/30/with-500000-grant-law-professor-to-lead-research-on-domestic-violence/
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Lonsb65 and Stevie there is little point in the continuation of this discussion and I would prefer the stop it now so as to not give such abhorrent, offensive, biased and twisted views as that of Richard Grenville. Best we leave this page for the wider net to draw its own conclusions as to the motivations and which ‘narrative’ it supports.
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When vengeful, violent, and vindictive fathers are given contact with their children……….
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/rosie-batty-named-victorian-of-the-year-recognition-for-a-mother-who-gives-victims-a-voice-20141028-11da4m.html
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Sorry I was going to leave this but given the latest offensive comments http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-surrey-29848060 in summary a mother loses custody for coaching her child to hate her father, whilst this is an isolated case where a judge finally acted (all credit to LJ Parker) this is not an isolated incident. This is the definition of vengeful and vindictive to the point violence is irrelevant.
The shame is also at the door of those judges before LJ Parker and CAFCASS who routinely ignore this.
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“She would kick and scream and cry, ‘Mommy, I don’t want to go.’ Being a mother it obviously broke my heart but I had to follow what a court order said.”
Children mostly have very good reasons for not wanting contact with non-residential parents yet they are forced to do so by Court Orders.
http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2014/10/mother_of_6-year-old_girl_killed_in_carbon_monoxide_poisoning_had_fought_with_fa.html
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http://sharedparesearch.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/lawrie-moloney-phd-2008-violence.html
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