Families do not need some fathers

In re B (a child); In re O (children) CA TLR 6 October

In dismissing applications for permissions to appeal made by two fathers who were each being denied contact with his children, the Court of Appeal took the opportunity of stating publicly that while there are cases where the principal reason for the breakdown of contact was the attitude of the children’s mother, it was far more common for contact to break down due to the behaviour of the non-residential father. These two cases were clear examples of the latter category. It was idle for Mr B or Mr O to blame either the system or the children’s mothers. The judicial findings in both cases were clear. Parents must take their share of responsibility for the state of affairs they have created. Blaming the system is no answer. Fathers must shoulder their share of the responsibility for the state of affairs they have helped to bring about. The press and some parents’ pressure groups need to understand that the reasons fathers in particular failed sometimes to remain in contact with their children was not due to gender bias in the system but to their own conduct. The judgment was handed down during a period in which the Government was consulting on the question of transparency in family proceedings. The court welcomed that consultation. For too long the family courts have been the subject of the canard that they administered secret justice. Anything which showed the proper working of the family justice system was to be welcomed. Among the advantages of transparency was the opportunity to dispel the myth that there was a gender bias against fathers within the family justice system and that the bias operated, in particular, improperly to deny non-residential fathers contact with their children.