Philip Ruddock (Berowra, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I very much respect the member for Werriwa and would normally applaud much of what he has to say. The only matter about which I want to comment positively in relation to his remarks is the importance of children—the importance of ensuring that children are safe and secure but also ensuring that children's broader rights are also recognised. It is a question of balance. I am afraid that some comments that my leader made relevant to another issue are about to be equally relevant here. My leader said recently in relation to unauthorised boat arrivals that 'John Howard identified a problem and found a solution and Labor found a solution and has created a problem'.

The Family Law Act has always been a very delicate issue. From the clients that I had to deal with when I was a young solicitor I know sometimes how entrenched certain points of view are and how determined people are to get even with their partner sometimes, whom they see has in some way let them down. I have seen the situation where, often, children are pawns as these frustrations work their way through.

Some of my colleagues in this parliament previously found complaints about family law issues occupying an enormous amount of their time, as people came to their local member of parliament to talk about issues relating to the difficulties in getting support, as some people found that the outcome that had been determined in relation to children was not to their liking and they would not support them. They found that people were very unhappy about the courts and unhappy about delays, and there seemed to be little effort to try to resolve issues before they came to court. Even my own profession sometimes could be engaged in these issues in ways which I consider quite unsatisfactory. Some lawyers are very happy to be able to fight every issue for you to your last dollar. One group of lawyers for whom I came to develop a very high regard were those who were described as 'collaborative' practitioners. They were saying, 'We are prepared to work your issues through with a practitioner who sees things in a like way to obtain a solution, and if we can't find it and you still want to fight, then you might have to find another lawyer.'

I must say that collaborative lawyers are under a lot of pressure sometimes from those who see it differently. I often experienced it myself 40 years ago with practitioners who, if you wanted to work things through in a collaborative way, would simply roll over you at every point. My colleagues found this and they were frustrated by it. The Every picture tells a story report was writtenby members of parliament from both sides and, as a result of the deliberation of the report and the consideration of it by the parliament and the former government, certain steps were taken. I think it is important in this debate to understand the fundamental principle that was involved because, I must say, it drove me as I drove these reforms. That is that these reforms should be not about the parents but about the children. I am sure that in this debate everybody is talking about the children, but sometimes it is put only from one perspective. Sometimes, when they put it as being from one perspective, they ignore the fact that that perspective was included in the legislative reforms. There were two principal instructions to those who were going to deal with these issues were to have regard to the rights of children. One was their right to be safe and secure. The legislation was never about ignoring family violence, but it was about recognising another right that I am not hearing mentioned by my colleagues, and that is the right of a child, provided they are safe, to know both of their parents. I have found over a long period any number of people who, because of the way in which these disputes have been worked through by parents, have denied a child the right to know the other parent because they felt so strongly about the way in which they have been disappointed and who are aggrieved that they have never had the opportunity to know that parent.

You think about it and the importance of it: provided the children are safe and secure they should be able to know both their father and their mother. And if role models have anything to do with future upbringing, isn't it important, because it is often the father who is denied any contact, that there be a male role model, particularly for young boys, in relation to their upbringing? Isn't that important? If you can do it, shouldn't that be the principle that is guiding you?

Where I think this government is creating a problem for itself in the future with regard to this legislation is that it will get these matters back into the courts as a matter of priority. Some of the legislation that we put before the former parliament was designed to deal with issues relating to the way in which legal proceedings are conducted. But our principal objective was, where we could, to get matters out of the courts. Before people even started their contest, there was an effort to try to work these things through collaboratively. And we did it very deliberately. We funded family relationship centres right around Australia. Before you could even start to litigate in relation to children, you had to have made some effort to try to resolve those issues. Not every issue will be resolved; not every child will be safe. There are situations in which abuse occurs where children may be subjected to violence but, as I said earlier, regard always has to be had to that. Where you can work it through and where a child has a continuing relationship with a parent, it is so much more positive and so much better.

To me, one of the most disappointing aspects of recent funding decisions by the government and the very clear signal that they are sending about where they expect this matter to go is that funding for family relationship centres and their activities will be reduced and legal aid funding for family disputes will be increased. That is against an expectation, I suspect, that the government believe there will be increased litigation. Why else would they be doing it? It seems to me that this legislation that we are discussing is very significant for the Australian people. I do not think that the reforms which were introduced in 2006 ought be unnecessarily undone without very clear and objective information that suggests that we have been going in the wrong direction.

My understanding is that the amount of litigation we have seen in relation to family disputes has declined. Why would you want to change that? Why would you want to reintroduce provisions that would enable people to make allegations which are proven later to be incorrect, blatantly wrong, deliberately fabricated, designed to mislead even a court and where there is no capacity—

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