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I have just penned an article in response to the article written
by Adele Horin at http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/parents-kept-from-children-get-new-hope/2008/05/29/1211654221557.html
Kind Regards
Peter Van de Voorde
<dotafeedback@...>
Parents kept from children get new
hope
Adele Horin
May 30, 2008
PARENTS illegally kept away from their children by aggrieved
former partners would have a new government agency to turn to for help
under recommendations by the Family Law Council.
The council, the Federal Government's advisory body on family law
matters, has called for the establishment of a Child Orders
Enforcement Agency, along similar lines to the Child Support
Agency.
The agency would respond to complaints from aggrieved parents
denied court-ordered access to their children, determine whether the
other parent had shown "serious disregard" for the court
orders, and help institute legal action in the Family Court to ensure
compliance.
The council's report, "Improving Post-Parenting Order
Processes", was prepared in response to a reference from the
former attorney-general, Philip Ruddock, but is now under
consideration by the Labor Attorney-General, Robert McClelland. A
committee of eminent judges, magistrates and legal academics wrote the
report under Patrick Parkinson, professor of law at the University of
Sydney, whose term as council chairman has since expired.
Breaches of court orders for contact between separated parents
and their children - and the family law system's response to them -
have been a source of complaint for many years, the report says.
Non-resident parents have complained about their former partners
openly refusing to comply with a court order, moving residence to make
contact difficult or impossible, and being absent when they call for
their children.
Resident parents also report problems, including the failure of
the other parent to collect or return the child on time, and failure
to show up for visits.
About 2500 formal contravention applications - or complaints
about breaches of parenting orders - are lodged annually with the
Family Court and Federal Magistrates Court, but the report says this
is an underrepresentation.
The council said litigants, who were frequently self-represented,
were often left to "run the gauntlet of repeated applications"
to the Family Court, and the cases took up a great deal of the court's
time. "Experience has been that many litigants will drop out,
which results in the particular children losing the benefit of the
original orders and the recalcitrant party winning out in a war of
attrition," the report says.
Serious and wilful disregard of parenting orders was a matter of
public interest, it said. The child's best interest was at stake when
a parent breached an order that a court had deemed beneficial to the
child. As well, such breaches brought the court into disrepute.
The council said a "small, independent [enforcement] agency
with offices in each capital city" would be the best way to
respond to serious breaches. It would encourage parents to resolve
disputes without litigation. But if this was not possible litigation
would be instituted in the Family Court with the aggrieved parent able
to instruct a lawyer provided by the agency.
Acknowledging the new agency would be expensive to set up, the
council proposed providing extra funding to legal aid commissions to
help parents fund enforcement matters before the family courts.
More false hope for parents kept from their
children
Peter van de Voorde
<dotafeedback@...>
June 2008
The Family Law Council, which is the Australian Federal
Government's advisory body on family law matters, has called for the
establishment of a Child Orders Enforcement Agency, along similar
lines to the Child Support Agency.
Aggrieved non custodial parents who have been denied
court-ordered access to their children since the inception of a
Draconian Family Law Industry some 35 years ago, and who have been
calling for such measures to be taken for more than three decades, do
not hold their breath. They have long ago lost faith in a system in
which the scales of justice are tilted firmly in favour of custodial
parents. Any suggested changes to what has been shown to be such a
gross travesty of justice for so long, are viewed with great
skepticism.
Alarm bells ring immediately when it is noted the council's
report, "Improving Post Parenting Order Processes", was
prepared by a committee of eminent judges, magistrates and legal
academics who wrote the report under Patrick Parkinson, professor of
law at the University of Sydney, whose term as council chairman has
since expired.
Hundreds of thousands of the nation's victims of the Family Law
Industry, both parents and children, have witnessed at first hand how
the odds are stacked against them from the moment a parent becomes a
Non Custodial Parent.
Where have the above judges, magistrates and legal academics been
for the past 35 years? Why has there been such a deafening silence all
these years from the above committee members? Were they not aware of
what was going on or were they too busy plundering the family wealth
from separating families? Did the eminent members of the bench not
hear the cries of anguish from the non custodial parents and their
children all these years, when they turned a blind eye to the forcible
removal of children from non custodial parents by vindictive, and in
many cases disordered and dysfunctional Custodial parents. Why for the
past 35 years, have members of the bench refused to use the punitive
measures at their disposal, in order to ensure that non custodial
parents and their children remain connected following parental
separation. Their failure to do so is a crime against humanity and an
abuse of the rights of our Nation's children.
For the past 35 years we have witnessed the mockery of a Family
Justice System pretending to uphold the principle of equality and
impartiality in what can only be described as a mal- administration of
Family Law matters. Millions of the nation's parents and children, who
have had the misfortune to become victims of this Industry, have for
the past 35 years protested against the way the scales of justice in
Family Law are tipped heavily one way, in order to help maintain the
frenzy of the Law profession and their mercenaries, in the pursuit of
plundering the family wealth from unsuspecting separating
parents.
The Laws governing Family law matters were drafted by Lawyers,
with the main beneficiaries being the law profession and associated
mercenaries, who have now joined in a growing melee to capture a share
of these ill-gotten spoils. The law profession's success depends on
how much conflict and animosity is present or can be created, for them
to mount an economically successful case. The sole custodial parent
model following separation has provided them with a guaranteed high
level of ongoing conflict, and by definition it has provided them with
a lucrative economic outcome.
Family Laws which were drafted in the early seventies were
supposedly designed to help solve the problems associated with the
highly emotive issues of parental separation, especially the issue of
child custody and the right and need, to ensure ongoing contact of non
custodial parents with their children, unless it was unsafe for them
to do so.
However whether by accident or by intent THE RELEVANT SOLE PARENT
CUSTODY LAWS WERE ADOPTED, SO AS TO GUARANTEE FAILURE, with the
resulting horrendous ramifications for all those who incorrectly
believed that justice would prevail, and that by using the family
justice system, at least enduring contact with their children would be
ensured.
This effectively means that any Court Orders you may have
obtained, mostly at great expense, have a totally different meaning
depending on whether you have been made a custodial parent or a non
custodial or contact parent. So there are two totally different
outcomes for one set of Court Orders.
1. From the moment you are made a custodial parent, you have
effectively been given absolute power and control over every aspect of
your children's life, can ignore the Court Orders with impunity, and
can eliminate the other parent and extended family members out of the
children's life with ease. The methods used have been well documented
for decades.
2. From the moment you are made a non custodial or contact parent
you no longer have any say in any aspects of what happens in your
children's life. You are no longer able to protect them, love, support
and care for them and you can be totally eliminated from your
children's life with frightening speed and ease. To add insult to
injury, you can then be accused of abandoning your children and
subsequently labeled a deadbeat parent.
The adverse impact of such injustices are further highlighted by
the fact that if a non-custodial parent contravenes articles of the
Court Order, such as not returning the children on time from a contact
visit, the CUSTODIAL PARENT simply picks up the phone, calls the
police and the offending parent is immediately labeled a kidnapper,
hostage taker or child abductor, and set upon by various federal and
local police agencies. The only cost incurred to the Custodial Parent
is the cost of the phone call.
By sharp contrast if the CUSTODIAL parent decides to ignore and
contravene the same set of Court Orders, and refuse to let a child
have anything further to do with their non custodial parent even if
they live in the same street, the non custodial parent's only recourse
is to take the matter back to the very Court which failed them so
miserably in the first place. No simple phone call for them, but
rather further expensive legal proceedings which ultimately lead to
nothing, if a recalcitrant Custodial parent decides to ignore the
directions of the Court. In their twisted logic the Industry reasons
that to upset the Custodial parent would be detrimental to the
"Best Interest of the Child". This is what the Family
Justice Industry sees as an equitable outcome.
Following 35 years of silence, these eminent members of the
Family Law Council committee, have now recommended that a "small,
independent (enforcement) agency with offices in each capital city"
would be the best way to respond to serious breaches of contact
orders. They have suddenly decided that serious and willful disregard
of parenting orders was a matter of public interest and that a child's
best interest was at stake when a parent breached an order that a
court had deemed beneficial to the child.. They also belatedly
consider that such breaches brought the Family Court into
disrepute.
With their collective tongues firmly planted in their cheeks,
they suggest these enforcement agencies would encourage parents to
resolve disputes without litigation. But then true to form and making
sure to protect the lucrative status quo of their Industry and in
order to maintain the standard of living of their fellow members of
the Law fraternity, they recommend litigation should be instituted
against the offending parent in the Family Court with the aggrieved
parent able to instruct a Lawyer provided by the agency.
The committee acknowledges their recommendations would be an
expensive exercise, and therefore propose that extra funding be made
available to legal aid commissions in order to help parents fund
enforcement matters before the Family Courts.
To all those who have been a victim of this badly flawed system,
it would appear to be nothing more than an attempt to create a growth
in public funded ineffectual pursuits of enforcement of contravention
orders in the Family Court. Perhaps there is a downturn in the numbers
of aggrieved parents seeking justice from this farcical
institution.
You don't have to be a brain surgeon to recognize that a court
which refuses to punish habitual offenders for contravention of their
own orders, is going to do anything different just because the
aggrieved parents are represented by legal aid Lawyers.
The eminent members of the Family Law Council Committee suggest
that such legal actions in the Family Court as they recommend would
ensure compliance. With all due respect eminent members, could you
please explain how you see your recommendations ensuring
compliance?????
This is all smoke and mirrors gobbledygook, designed to make it
look as if they are a caring Court with "The Best Interest of the
Children" at heart. However all the available evidence would
suggest otherwise.
If this committee was even remotely serious at trying to resolve
the ongoing flagrant contraventions of Court ordered Contact Orders,
it would have been better to consider the proposal by Mr Simon Hunt of
a "CONTACT RECOVERY ORDER" or (CRO)
Unfortunately all the available evidence shows that when
practical commonsense suggestions are made to resolve this travesty of
justice against non custodial parents and their children, it is either
ignored or ridiculed by all those engaged in maintaining the status
quo for their own self interests.
The following is an explanation of the CROs by Mr Hunt. I believe
this would also be a practical and effective low cost mechanism to
enforce Court Ordered Contact Orders
The Recovery of Contact Order (RCO) mechanism is a simple way of protecting children facing the separation of their parents and will prevent most custody cases from even starting (because there is no aggrieved party to initiate litigation).
Immediately enforceable Recovery of Contact Order (RCO)
POLICY Protecting children from having of their parents removed by the other upon separation.
THE MECHANISM That any parent denied equal parenting time of their child or children can apply for immediate relief by way of a Recovery of Contact Order (RCO) protecting the child's relationship with both its parents. The excluded parent would obtain the RCO from the police or the magistrate or district court clerks office. Like an AVO or Intervention Order the Recovery of Contact Order (RCO) would be effective immediately and immediately enforceable by the police. It would provide the applicant up to a maximum of seven days of contact with their child per fortnight (or less by agreement).
Like an AVO or Intervention Order the application would go to court within days so that the respondent party, the parent withholding the child or children, has the opportunity to oppose the order.
If the RCO is not opposed it stays in force.
If the RCO is opposed, the arguments and evidence of the respondent parent will be assessed by the court and a decision made to either;
i) dismiss the respondent's case,
ii) refer the matter to the Family Court or Federal Magistrates Court whilst making an interim order for the contact requested by the Applicant Parent up to 50% ie: 7 days a fortnight (or less as agreed), or partial or complete exclusion of the applicant parent. The court may also order that allegations of child abuse or neglect are investigated by an appropriates child protection agency.
Prior to hearing the RCO would be effective immediately and immediately enforceable by the police unless the withholding parent lays criminal charges of abuse or serious neglect with the police, in which case the matter would be heard by the Magistrate or District Court before restoration of contact (50% or less by agreement) can be enforced.
VERY YOUNG CHILDREN RCOs would not be effective immediately or immediately enforceable when the child is less that one years old or is being breast fed but would none the less be promptly adjudicated by the Magistrates court.
FAMILY VIOLENCE Allegations of violence, be they genuine or contrived, would not be grounds to exclude one the child's parents when third party change over arrangements can be made.
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