Telegraph | News | Give equal access to fathers, demands Howard: "A Tory government could give divorced fathers equal access to their children, Michael Howard said yesterday, as he called for a change in the 'fairly chaotic' law on child custody.
He promised a wide-ranging review of legislation that would seek to shift the focus of access orders away from the mother, following complaints of courts discrimination against fathers."
It seems that at last some-one is listening to the dads in this country. While this does not go nearly far enough to prevent the shocking abuses of children and parents that I have seen these past few years it is a teriffic leap forward.
This move could be further enhanced if Philip Moor's suggestions also see implimentation.
Courts should take children away from mothers who flout contact orders by refusing to let them see their father, a family lawyer said yesterday.
Philip Moor, QC, suggested that a few high-profile rulings in appropriate cases would send a message to other mothers.
--By Joshua Rozenberg, Legal Editor for the Telegraph
This could even offer some refuge for the thousands of fathers who silently suffer phisical abuse by thier partners or ex-partners with no small degree of embarisment. I think at last Fathers4Justice may have done some lasting good for us. It would not supprise me if other nations adopted a similar method of protest in the future.
It is high time that all fathers made a stand and said "this is what it is really like, this is the epirence of being a dad!". All I see at the moment, in terms of support, written accounts and other printed material, is a middle class stereotype that no father I have known would be able to identify with. Much of this matirial is condisending and asumes the father in question has little or no actule ability. At the moment these things do more to alienate the dads and support the current prejudise that they can often do more harm than good.
They are given out often by a mis of condisending and well meaning women to other women with instructions to "get your man to read this". In the case of pregnasy packs the woman is given entire libraries on the subject while a glossy yet insulting leaflet is pushed into his hands with the expectation that he should now know everything he "needs" to. This poor substitute for real communication I find to be nothing short of insulting.
Aproximatly 2% of the world has an IQ higher than mine (a fact I was once hugly proud of), this is my forth child and my wife's second. I am a prolific reader and I remember almost all of what I read. I have spend a large ammount of time as a single dad and yet dispite all of this the looks on the faces of so many midwives says "who is this evil pleb". When they talk to me it's as if they are addressing a foolish child.
When a child is born it is true that the woman does a lot of the hard work but it is not true that this is either an easy ride for the man nor is he largely uninvolved. Unless the relationship is truely messed up seeing his love in agony is not easy for a man especially when he is so helpless to do anything about it.
The father is not an annoying addition to the story but an integral part and first point of reference along with the mother.
Untill this is recognised the midwifery practice will continue to do considerable harm not only to the role of fatherhood but to the relationships they encounter as they activly work to push the dads from the whole event.
A lot has yet to change.
