Australia is well-known to be backtracking on its equally-shared parenting legislation.  It's only been three years since the Howard Government enacted the presumption of shared parenting and, according to studies I've reported on before, few courts have actually established equal parenting arrangements in divorce cases.  Still, that's been too much for the forces who are bound and determined to keep children apart from their fathers. 

The main thrust of the anti-dad crowd is that, allowing children time with their fathers increases the likelihood of child abuse.  The fact that a welter of data show the opposite to be true - that mothers are more likely to harm children than are fathers and that boyfriends are far more likely to do so - matters not a whit to equal parenting opponents.  They've got their story and they're stickin' to it.

Now, reading between the lines of this article, there may be another front in the attack on father-child relationships - move- aways (The Australian, 10/29/09).  The piece reports on a mother, who's separated from her husband, and who wants to move from Sydney to Queensland to be with her boyfriend whom she met online.  Her estranged husband has a close relationship with their three-year-old daughter though, and a court has refused the mother permission to move the child away from her father.

Federal magistrate Janet Terry found the child had a "meaningful relationship" with both parents in Sydney, where she was able to "see her father regularly". If the mother was allowed to move, that contact would "inevitably diminish".

It would make the father a "holiday parent" who couldn't have any involvement with his daughter on school days. Ms Terry said: "The father is a good parent who is keen to be involved with (the child) on a regular basis. It would be a significant loss for (her) if she moved."

The court said there was no guarantee the new relationship would work out. The woman has never lived with the man, and has visited him only once.

"In my view, the child's interests will be best served by dismissing the mother's application to relocate from Sydney, to enable the girl to spend regular time with her father in Sydney," Ms Terry said.

In short, the court upheld the child's and father's rights to a relationship at the expense of the mother's ability to relocate and maintain primary custody.  The article makes a definite connection between this win for fathers' rights, the new laws and the idea that changing those laws will allow custodial mothers greater freedom to relocate and deprive their exes of contact with their children. 

The decision is a win for fathers who say that old custody laws too often enabled mothers to relocate after divorce, rupturing relationships between children and their dads. Two academic studies have shown that relocation has become more difficult under the shared parenting laws introduced by the Howard government in 2006.

Those laws are now under review.

It goes on to say that, prior to the presumption of equally-shared parenting, a mother's desire to relocate was given "great weight" by courts.  The obvious answer to the argument that equally-shared parenting laws conflict with women's right to travel is that they do no such thing.  Clearly, if a mother wants to move, and doing so would mean the child can't see his/her father, the mother may relinquish custody.  After all, she's the one who wants to move and deprive the child of one parent.  Why should the father be the one to give up his relationship with his child to accomodate his ex's wishes.  Simple fairness dictates that, if she's the one who wants to move, she's the one who should bear the consequences of that decision. 

Whether the Australian backlash against the rights of fathers and children will actually allow mothers to deny those rights by the simple expedient of moving hundreds of miles away, remains to be seen.  If the article is any indication, it may well do just that.
  

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 7th, 2009 at 6:51 pm and is filed under Shared Parenting, Move-Away/Relocation Cases. You can trackback from your own site.