Australia’s family law system is failing to protect children by misleading separated parents into believing their children have to spend time with their ex-partner, even if they are dangerous, one of the nation’s largest children’s charities has warned…

Retired Family Court judge Richard Chisholm has written a blueprint for overhauling Australia’s Family Law Act recommending the removal of Shared Parenting as a potential outcome in Family Law Court proceedings…

SUCH are the sensitivities of family law that when the Howard government amended the Family Law Act in 2006 it provided for a review after two years. The Rudd government has its own concerns; even before the Institute of Family Studies finished the review, Attorney-General Robert McClelland asked former family court judge Richard Chisholm to look at whether the law offers adequate protection from family violence. ..

THE shared parenting law introduced by the Howard government has resulted in more children spending time with both parents after divorce, but the numbers who do so are minuscule and most children still spend the majority of time with their mothers. ..

An Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) report, commissioned by the government, established that while the principle of shared parental responsibility was widely supported, it was often misconstrued as requiring 50-50 share time. ..

The review and its recommendations are at least as controversial as the four-year-old law, finding that shared parenting laws had been misinterpreted, and were never meant to give a 50-50 custody split to each parent…

Three reports evaluating aspects of Australia’s family law system have been released by the Attorney-General, Robert McClelland. ..

The most comprehensive evaluation of Australia’s family law system – drawing on the experience of 28,000 Australians – has found that overall the recent reforms are working well for the majority of children and their parents. ..