Families need fathers all over the news today

[Sheila]

Bloody Louis de Bernieres also on R4 sounding off about his rights. It all seems so remote - I just wish XP was interested enough to demand contact with DS - usullay it's me naggaing him becuase he sees so little of his son. :(

I thought you were going to say that, Truck.

Okay, I think we need to make some changes because neither household is getting child benefits, yet only one parent has RP status. If no one is using CB and no one is getting maintenance, can you think of any other reason why just one parent in a 50/50 situation should be listed as the official RP?

Ah yes, this mountain of women who make up allegations about DV spoiling it for the tiny number of genuine DV cases.

Sounds very like the shit people talk about rape, doesn't it? The mountain of false rape allegations, versus the tiny number of genuine victims being let down by the false allege-ers (is that a word?).

Except it's not true. The number of women who falsely allege rape, is 2-4%. The number of women who experience rape, is 1 in 9 of us - so a massive number of women, most of whom never report.

Similarly, the number of women who experience DV, is 25%. Most women do not report it and of those who do, the average woman is attacked a minimum of 20 times before she does and so quite often it is only at the stage of relationship break up, where it comes to light. Lundy Bancroft estimates that half of divorces in the USA involve DV and given that you'd expect people who have had violent relationships to be over-represented in relationship breakups, that sounds plausible.

"Most women make it up" just sounds like yet another misogynist myth. Where's the evidence for that?

thebestisyettocome, my argument is that children should have rights, not parents. But that if you're going to give parents rights, then they have to come attached to responsibilities and both parents have to have rights, not just one. Which this legislation is not proposing. I thought I'd been fairly clear about that.

Given that these cases of rape and DV are not reported how do we know they are are true?

Fact is IMO children deserve to have a relationship with both parents and I for one am glad that this government is doing something about it. In the case of my DP he pays well beyond what the CSA expect in maintenance, he calls his children every day, he is a good and dedicated father. When it comes to contact all he can legally expect is 'fair and reasonable contact'. The mother of his children persistently uses contact as a bargaining tool. I don't think it's that unusual - my mother did it, my DPs ex does it, I have 3 friends who are divorced with kids and they do it. That's just my experience.

Tremendous amount of 'not understanding' going on.
And a lot of claims of 'false allegations make it worse for genuine cases'. Kind of like all those faking disability scroungers?
No. The problem isn't people faking disability or dv, it's the misplaced emphasis and credibility given to stories about people faking it. 20% of women are subjected to dv. Fact. 0.5% claims for DLA are fraudulent. Fact. The rest of us face even more stress and other problems because people choose to believe the Daily Mail instead of us.

Tories are thick and make it up a they go along. Fact.

Families don't need fathers, they need good fathers. Fact.

origmairose - from police estimates and the british crime survey.

The Government accept these figures.

They're hardly cheerleaders for DV and rape victims, are they, Ken Clarke doesn't believe rape is rape unless it's by a stranger in a dark alley and the govt. are closing down refuges at a rate of knots.

So it's reasonable to suppose, that if these figures are believed by the govt, they're good enough for the rest of us. But if you choose not to believe them, that's your choice.

All children should have several godparents, chosen at birth, to decide over access disputes. Opinion.

Putting a 6 month time limit on contact disputes will put children at risk. Probable fact.

The law is an Ass. Fact.

Do people believe that if a child contact case goes to court the father has likely to have committed domestic abuse?

Basil - I take it back - I should've googled before I spat my dummy. For those interested the data comes from council of europe (so looks at European member states) and says:

...figures for prevalence of violence against women suggests that one-fifth to one-quarter of all women have experienced physical violence at least once during their adult lives, and more than one-tenth have suffered sexual violence involving the use of force. Secondary data analysis supports an estimate that about 12% to 15% of all women have been in a relationship of domestic abuse after the age of 16...

There are loads of data sources origamirose.

The usual one used for the 1 in 4 figure, is the British Crime Survey.

The one for council of europe I think refers to women across europe doesn't it, rather than UK women?

None of these figures are comparable because they define DV, sexual assault etc. differently. So one country might have a higher level of DV than another, but that's only because the way they define DV and report it, is different from that of another country. Don't know enough aobut the ins and outs to know how it impacts on the data.

But basically, whichever data source you use, the story is, DV is incredibly common and if you have had a relationship break-up, you are more likely to have experienced it than the average. Which isn't surprising really IMO.

Do people believe that if a child contact case goes to court the father has likely to have committed domestic abuse?

Nope. Not sure anyone has actually suggested that. Only that those who allege it aren't guaranteed to have made it all up, as has been suggested. See latemates comments.

basil I agree with your points. Very well put. I have an ex who flits in and out every 6/8/10 weeks, depending on his mood. I no longer live my life waiting for him to appear, but will try and accomodate him where possible i.e. no plans or plans that are easily changed/altered. There isn't a court in the land that would help me enforce regular, structured contact for my DD despite her wish to see more of her dad. But, her right to a relationship with her dad doesn't matter does it?

I think it would be safe to say that where a mother actually does deny contact with the father (excluding the weird and wonderful world of Jeremy Kyle) there is a genuine reason and it is in order to make the life of the child safer and more comfortable.

In the w & w world of Jeremy Kyle however you will quickly find that the mothers that deny custody to fathers out of 'pure spite' are those with controlling extended families and friends, taking advantage of what is usually a vulnerable son or daughter.

Basil - do not misquote me

I am well aware it is not a mountain of false alegations to a few real ones. But do you realise the damge false alegation do to inocent victims??

Do you realise for every false alegation that is proven it make courts more wary of getting it wrong and real victims more worried about not being believed.
Do you realise that women are advised by some sites to report a ex for DV to stop the ex and child from having a relationship.

Facts and figures do not show the true impact of false alegations.

'But basically, whichever data source you use, the story is, DV is incredibly common and if you have had a relationship break-up, you are more likely to have experienced it than the average. Which isn't surprising really IMO.'
That is utter rubish - relationships deteriate for many different reasons and contray to poular belief on here it is not always the fault of the male

'I think it would be safe to say that where a mother actually does deny contact with the father (excluding the weird and wonderful world of Jeremy Kyle) there is a genuine reason and it is in order to make the life of the child safer and more comfortable.'

You really do not have a clue do you? there are as many mothers who are spiteful and do just that as there are freckless fathers who are not responsible.

Actually Latemates, what you said was that most women who use DV as a reason that their child should not have contact with their father have made it up in order to deny the other parent contact. that is a horrendous assumption for you to jump to.

I agree with pretty much everything Basil has said. This legislation in isolation is pretty worthless imo.

I think it would be safe to say that where a mother actually does deny contact with the father (excluding the weird and wonderful world of Jeremy Kyle) there is a genuine reason and it is in order to make the life of the child safer and more comfortable

What a stupid ignorant thing to say.

It is NOT "utter rubbish" that women who have had relationship breakdowns, are more likely to have experienced Domestic Violence, than the average.

It is a fact.

And I don't know why you're so surprised/ offended by that. Surely it's obvious that people who are in violent relationships, are more likely to eventually have those relationships break down, than those who are in non-violent relationships? This is a clear case of statistics backing common sense, IMO. I don't know what's so surprising about that - surely all of us are more likely to carry on living with someone who doesn't beat us up, than someone who does?

Basil. It is children who currently have the 'rights' not the parents. I think the Childrens' Act is pretty clear about that. And feckless fathers will always be feckless fathers whaever the law states. Why then penalsise NRPs who are being wrongfully denied access?

There is, as far as I can see absolutely no statistical evidence to back up the claim that 'there are as many mothers who are spiteful and do just that as there are feckless fathers who are not responsible'

In my personal experience it is women bending over backwards to facilitate their childrens relationships with non resident parents - but because there is no evidence other than our personal experiences, I'm not daft enough to tar all non resident parents with my personal experience brush.

I broadly agree with a policy that allows and enforces a childs contact with a non resident parent - but that is for the childs benefit rather than the 'rights' of an absent parent that seem to be whipped out whenever it is convienient without mention of responsibility.

Quite, Snapespeare.

Exactly so.

I don't think NRP's are being unduly penalised though, thebest, any more than RP's by NRP's who financially abuse their children by not paying maintenance or who emotionally abuse them by refusing to facilitate their children's right to ahve a relationship with them.

As Snapespeare points out, none of us know how the exact figures fall and which group is statistically more hard done by. What we do know, is that the group with the loudest voice, is the one which has more men in it, and is the richer one; five years after divorce, the majority of men are financially better off than they were when they were married while the majority of women are poorer. We also know, that this woman-hating government is more likely to listen to the group with more men in it and to tailor legislation to what they want, rather than what is in the best interests of the child.

The issue of NRP's being hard done by, could largely be addressed by hastening the court procedures and by ensuring that it is cheap and easy to use the courts - it's not the law that's at fault, it's the court procedures.

The issue of RP's being hard done by, needs to be addressed by education and legislation to make it as difficult to evade maintenance payments, as it is to evade tax. That could easily be done if the govt. wanted to do it. It doesn't want to do it. I invite you to speculate on why.

And i invite you to speculate why the govt considers the one issue so urgent that against its own expert advice, it wants to go ahead with this legislation, while the other issue is so trivial, that it hasn't even mentioned it - and on the contrary, is intent on ensuring that NRP's who financially abuse their children, are even more likely to get away with it because for a RP to use the CSA, will no longer be a worthwhile investment. (Did I mention that in ten years, the CSA has managed to get me about forty or fifty quid's worth of maintenance, even though my xp has been in the same address for all that time? That wouldn't be a very good investment would it?)

What does that tell us about this government's attitude to lone parents and to children?

MrGin it is exactly that ignorance that creates the motivation behind FNF - all the while there are people who believe that a RP is always motivated by 'the child's best interests' there will never be justice for all children