Blood shed on the family Courts hands is spilling out

More power needed for abused kids

12:00a.m. 5th May 2009

 

| By Rae Wilson

Sunshine Coast parents marched in Brisbane on Sunday demanding more power fo children who say they are abused. Photo:Contributed

When her three-year-old boy came home from an access visit with his daddy asking to be touched in private places, a Sunshine Coast mum was aghast.

But she truly reached a dark place when she learned there was nothing she could do about it.

The mum, in her late 30s, was among a contingent of Sunshine Coast parents who donned red hoods at a rally in Brisbane on Sunday to signify the blood of Australian children they say is shed by Family Law Act decisions.

The death of four-year-old Darcy Freeman, who in January was thrown from Melbourne’s West Gate Bridge in broad daylight, shocked the nation.

While her family’s story is just one of thousands of custody battles gone wrong across Australia, it has proved to be the catalyst in the push for family court reform and nation-wide rallies on Sunday.

Sally, not her real name, said she hoped the rally would “make people aware of exactly what’s happening and hopefully give others a voice”.

“I left my son’s father when he (my son) was about 10 months old. His father wasn’t interested in him and didn’t want a child,” she said.

“Then when I left he decided he did. We ended up in the family law court and it got nasty.

“When he turned three, he came home and asked me to put my fingers into his bottom.

“I reported it to the child safety department but they said children of that age really don’t have a voice.

“Until he tells an independent third party, they can’t act.

“Because he doesn’t have the verbal skills to tell a third party, he has to keep going back to his dad.”

Sally said it was empowering to see more than 50 people standing up and saying enough is enough.

“I know what’s happening and I’m being forced, like many other mothers and fathers, to send a child into an abusive situation,” she said.

“The family law court is helping the abusers continue their behaviour.

“It’s such a detrimental situation for the child. It can mentally scar them.

“You go through such intense periods of anger to falling in a hole because you can’t do anything to help.

“You feel completely powerless to the stage where some days you sit there and don’t want to function, sometimes you just can’t.

“Your child should be living a happy carefree childhood like we did, he shouldn’t have to be going through all this.

“But also your child is growing in front of you and you’re missing most of it because you’re so stressed and worried for them.”

A Sunshine Coast domestic violence worker, who has a background in child safety, said she believed a dedicated taskforce to investigate claims of abuse, particularly for non-verbal and disabled children, was paramount.

“My background is child safety and I do acknowledge each matter needs to be taken on its own merit but there is a gender issue with the discrediting of women no matter what they say,” she said.

“There’s a lot of problems surrounding women being disbelieved and disempowered in the family law courts.

“The court is hell-bent on giving access to men under any circumstance – that’s what appears to be happening at the moment.

“The statistics from the courts recently have shown custody primarily going to the female parent, with about 30% going to the other parent.

“In most cases, that’s appropriate but when there’s extreme violence or sexual abuse, 30% of the time is a hellishly long period for a child to spend time with a parent that’s abusive.

“There needs to be a more immediate response to concerns and there needs to be an attitude in the family law court process among various levels of staff that is more proactive towards women than it has been for some time.”