4/07/2011
It's not a statistic we can be proud of, but the stark reality is that one in four Australian children with separated parents have little or no contact with their non-resident parent. A staggering 1.1 million children live so far away from one of their parents that they have virtually no contact.
Australian National University sociologist Dr Bruce Smyth, who impressed these statistics on family lawyer and Maddens principal Justin Serong at a recent law conference, said that ironically, "for some children the most durable pattern of care was not seeing one parent."
The irony was not lost on Mr Serong, who deals with the fallout from relationship breakdowns on a regular basis. He, like Dr Smyth, stresses the importance of early intervention for about-to-separate or recently separated couples.
And like Dr Smyth, he emphasises that couples need to understand that any binding outcomes brought about by the legal or dispute resolution system are "always enacted only for the child's interests, and not the parents."
Mr Serong's recent decision to introduce free family law clinics at Maddens Lawyers during September and October is clearly aimed at encouraging couples to handle their relationship breakdown in a way that creates minimal fallout for children.
"The free consultation is an informal discussion where we explain family law generally, tell them where they can find Family Dispute Resolution (FDR) services. We give them the basics about the legal system; they can then decide where to go from there – whether to do it on their own or not," he said.
A significant law reform introduced in July last year is aimed at altering the attitudes and approaches of separating couples who are in the process of resolving their differences. All couples are now compelled by law to undergo FDR (lawyer-free mediation) before they pursue any further channels.
"One of the big pushes in the law are moves to increase mediation-based non legal services – with organisations such as Community Connections, Centacare as well as some private mediation counsellors – like Penny Lake," Mr Serong said.
Manager of Community Connections' Family Relationships Services Program, Silvia Mikhail, said that initiatives such as the Maddens' free family clinics were a valuable community service.
"I'm quite impressed that Maddens offer legal advice cost-free because lawyers can be expensive. If people find they need free legal advice, we refer them to the South West Community Legal Centre and to Legal Aid," she said.
The two big claims over which parents are most likely to fight over, said Mr Serong, are children and property. "They're the two big things. And there's a strict division between them; they're to be kept quite separate."
Indeed, FDR practitioners press home that same point, Mrs Mikhail said.
"For all matters in relation to separation, children or property, we advise them to see a lawyer. If there's a child support payment issue, we keep that completely separate from the issue of child access," she said.
According to Mr Serong, the majority of couples manage to resolve their child access issues through FDR.
The outcome of the FDR process is the setting up of a parenting plan. Couples can elect to register the parenting plan in the courts to make it legally binding. "Some parents choose to make their own arrangements and not go to court," Mrs Mikhail said.
The remainder, who can't even agree on a parenting plan, are the ones who face a greater likelihood of battling it out it the courts, Mr Serong said.
Child access arrangements, which are stipulated in parenting plans, are changing in recent times, according to Dr Smyth.
"In the past what normally happens in the height of confusion is that couples run on automatic and use the template of access every second weekend and school holidays," he said.
His recent research with the ANU's Australian Demographic and Social Research Institute revealed that parents were "moving to more creative access arrangements".
"Ten years ago, only three to five per cent had shared care (or week-about) arrangements, but now it's 12 per cent, and on the rise," Dr Smyth said.
"Each parent needs time to build emotional bonds; to connect with their children. To build relationships they need fun time on weekends and holidays as well," he said.
The quality of the relationship between parents after separation had the biggest bearing on how children fared, Dr Smyth said. "Kids can do well when parents separate if the parents get on. It doesn't matter how people structure the shared care; what's important is the quality of the parents' relationship."
The damage to children comes about when children are "stuck in radiating conflict – when they see it and hear it", Dr Smyth said. "What hurts children is in the lead-up when the relationship is coming off the rails; that can bleed into the children."
Poverty, too, hurts children, he stressed, which is why sharing of property and child support is another important issue. Mr Serong concurs, stressing that early intervention is the best insurance against embroiling children in emotional and other damage.
"My advice is to couples to keep talking to each other. And to remember the golden rule – that what you do is based on the child's interest and not yours."