DISCUSSIONS of child contact and court systems without mentioning domestic abuse are, I believe, akin to climate change policies that ignore human influence: ill-informed and reckless (“Parents deserve a court system that is fair but firm”, The Herald, August 28).
The most recent figures suggest that domestic abuse is prevalent in at least half of all court actions on contact raised by a parent. Perhaps some mothers choose to block contact for little or no real reason – though we predict this number to be very, very few – but the use of the court system by perpetrators to continue to abuse and control mothers and children is frequent and well documented.
Children with a parent who abuses their mother do not simply bear witness to domestic abuse; they experience it in their own right. They see and hear their mother being hurt, physically and emotionally. They try to intervene to protect their mother from harm. They are controlled, manipulated, threatened, and, in some cases, forced to participate in the abuse. As the abuser extends control over her social life, work life, finances and health, her children suffer in countless ways, and their suffering continues well after the parents have separated. In the most extreme of cases of domestic abuse, the abuser kills the children as a final act of possession and revenge.
Domestic abuse is a parenting choice made by the perpetrator, and yet our current systems routinely force mothers and children to have contact with their abuser, the same man who has inflicted terror, threats, control, and humiliation.
Men who have perpetrated abuse often feel entitled to an ongoing relationship with their children, whatever their children want or need. It is up to courts to act with children’s rights and well-being as the paramount consideration. Assumptions that contact is in the best interest of the children because “families need fathers” is naïve at best; at worst it perpetuates dangerous practices that ignore the wishes of children and the libraries of evidence which show the dangers of contact in the context of domestic abuse.
Prioritising contact with both parents in the context of domestic abuse is neither firm nor fair. If we really want a system that realises these ambitions then children’s human right to be heard in the decisions that affect them must be paramount.
Scottish Women’s Aid and the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland developed a project called Power Up/Power Down to change court contact practices so that they prioritise the safety of mothers and children. To do so we worked with the experts – children and young people with experience of domestic abuse and the mothers who work so hard to nurture and protect them.
Let’s take their expert advice and work together to transform our system and their lives.
Dr Marsha Scott,
Scottish Women’s Aid,
Rose Street, Edinburgh.
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