Family violence perpetrators are routinely granted time with their children during custody proceedings, but a world-renowned expert hopes to change the culture of 'mother blaming' he says has permeated the agencies dealing with family violence.
National cabinet will discuss the findings of a review that recommended an audit into the "weaponisation of government systems by perpetrators of domestic and family violence ".Horrific, traumatic, broken, unethical — these are some of the words Australians have used to describe their experience in the family court system.
Other recommendations include upskilling Independent Children's Lawyers, urgent legal assistance for victim-survivors and supporting families to resolve matters outside the court's "harmful adversarial processes". A 2020 US study found in that judicial system "women who allege abuse – particularly child abuse – by a father are at significant risk of losing custody" of their children.
"They are incredible. They are huge, huge advocates for victim-survivors and for children. I imagine that they must find it incredibly difficult to work within that system." Joan told her manager at a child contact centre she was worried 4yo Sally might be being abused. She was later fired "Survivors have a right to protect their kids and it's not alienation. To talk to your kids about what happened, to help them understand, to make sense of it — that's not denigrating or disparaging necessarily, but that's helping kids make sense of the world and their lived experience.
Mr Mandel said perpetrators could use alienation claims to manipulate systems and the professionals working in them, making it crucial for all agencies involved in family violence to be "speaking the same language". He said professionals involved in difficult cases that don't have a lot of evidence or involve mutual allegations need to focus on the patterns and avoid falling into gender biases."'What did the perpetrator do?' not, 'how many times has mum gone back?' not, 'well the issue here is that mum's got a trauma history'.
"I also think it's important, given the long-standing problematic decisions that have been made by the family court, that consideration is given to the idea that regular independent reviews of decisions and reports are made."
Family Law System Family Violence Domestic Abuse Family Violence Training David Mandel Safe And Together Institute Gender Custody Parenting Relationships
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