As the Domestic Abuse Bill is being scrutinised by Parliament, this powerful new report highlinghts the desperate need to address a system of family justice and support that is not fit for purpose.
The UK Parental Alienation Study 2020 has just been published. It was conducted by Good Egg Safety CIC, a leading campaigner on child safety who has worked on a wide range of social justice and community safety programmes.
The study is based on over 1,500 responses from separated parents. It's results mirror the experience of FNF members and service users:
- Almost half report not seeing their childen for over six months, in many cases not for years
- 58% experienced breaches of court orders
- 80% experienced adverse health impact
When we reported our own survey findings, with similar results, some people suggested that this was just a group of angry fathers, even though we had several hundred similar responses. However, this larger study shows that the issue is reported heavily by mums as well as dads and has adverse wellbeing effects on children regardless of which parent is behaving selfishly or abusively.
The report identifies the kinds of abusive behaviours following family separation that wreak untold damage on tens of thousands of children every year. Behaviours included are isolating children from their fathers, mothers, grandparents and wider family, denigrating and devaluing of victim mothers and fathers and making false allegations against parents (often in front of the children).
It would not be an over-statement to say that the situation has become a child wellbeing issue of epidemic proportions. The adversarial family justice system has proved itself to be not be fit for purpose. It takes well over half a year to conclude family proceedings - on average! Many children's arrangements take a year or even several years. The system often fails to provide early-intervention when needed and, too late, only takes enforcement action in relation to breaches of court orders in fewer than 1% of cases. And all this, before the coronavirus outbreak delayed action for children still further.
You can read The UK Parental Alienation Study 2020 here or download it from the Parental Alienation UK website.
ACTION - What you can do
In our Newsletter of 12th June 2020 we suggested that you contact your MPs to urge them to back Philip Davies MP's amendments to the Domestic Abuse Bill specifically to include abuse through alienating behaviours, false allegation, and unjustified denial of children's relationships with their other parent. Use your own examples and draw their attention to The Good Egg report and how your experience is captured in it.
The Bill has still to have a 'third reading' in the House of Commons and MPs will have a chance to vote on it and amendments. The date for this has not yet been announced, but is likely to be soon. It will then to the House of Lords when it may be further amended before returning to the Commons. Therefore there remain a number of opportunities over coming months for amendments to be considered by Parliament.
Please support getting news of this report out by sharing information about it on social media using the hashtags #ProtectingChildrenMatters #BothParentsMatter and #DomesticAbuseBill. If you are on Twitter please feel free to include us in your posts @FNF_Media - this issue needs far more awareness than it has had so far - with your help it will!
Below is an example of a clear and effective letter to an MP:
If you don't know who your MP is, you can find out by visiting the following link.
If you wish, feel free to share with us privately the letter you send, along with reply you receive to admin@fnf.org.uk with 'Domestic Abuse Bill' in the subject header.
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