Submission to Family Law Council

Submission to Family Law Council

Your details

Name/organisation
(if you are providing a submission on behalf of an organisation, please provide the name of a contact person) / Kassie Pitkin
Victims Of Crime Assistance League – Family and Child Safety Unit
Contact details
(one or all of the following: postal address, email address or phone number) / Level 1/432 Hunter Street Newcastle NSW 2300

4926 2711

Confidentiality

Submissions received may be published on the Family Law Council’s webpage, except where requests have been made to keep them confidential or where they relate to particular cases or personal information. Would you prefer this submission to remain confidential? / NO

Page / Content
My experience as a victim support worker / 2
Summary of continuing issues in family court / 2
Trends observed in family court / 8
Barriers of supporting mothers going through family court process / 8
Recommendations / 9

MY EXPERIENCE AS A VICTIM SUPPORT WORKER

My name is Kassie Pitkin and I work for the Victims of Crime Assistance League Inc. NSW. (VOCAL) I am a victim support worker within VOCAL’S Family and Child Safety unit where I work with parents who are victims of domestic violence trying to protect their children from ongoing family violence. This involves having sound knowledge of domestic violence and its complexities; being trauma-informed; going through various court processes including family court, local court and sometimes children’s court and assisting mothers to have their needs met. My role commonly consists of offering practical and emotional support, preparing mothers for court and doing court support; liaising with family court solicitors, police and other services the mother is linked with; advocating for mother in multiple ways and referring mothers to relevant support services.

I graduated as a social worker at Newcastle University in 2013. Social work is a profession that is ethically based and is founded upon three core ethical principles – Respect for persons, Social justice and Professional integrity. Social work focuses on understanding the person in their place and is about addressing gaps and disadvantages a mother experiences through the various relationships and systems they come in contact with and working at strengthening support systems by connecting mother to support networks and helping to empower a mother’s sense of self and self-worth.

In my 10 months of working at VOCAL I have observed the repeated scenarios and issues amongst mothers that I find highly disturbing. The most disturbing point is the various systems that are supposed to protect victims constantly letting them down – particularly the family court. My submission goes into detail of the continuous issues I see and my recommendations of ways that these significant gaps may be improved.

SUMMARY OF CONTINUING ISSUES IN FAMILY COURT

All mothers I have worked with voice experiencing highly negative experiences within the family court process. This includes the way they are treated by family law solicitors; the reported bias and judgemental attitude of Independent Children’s Lawyers (ICL) and family report writers during interviews; the highly inaccurate reporting of family reports and the contact centres who supervise visits and report back to family court; disregard of agencies specialising in domestic violence and child protection as evidence; and the further re-traumatisation the family court process that has significant psychological impacts upon the mother and their children.

I will use the term ‘mothers’ as ‘protective parent’ due to both my experience of the protective parent mainly as the mother as well as research that indicates that domestic violence is overwhelmingly perpetrated by males.

Family law solicitors minimising and omitting domestic/family violence

Family law solicitors are frequently minimising domestic/family violence disclosures and are encouraging the mother to omit domestic/family violence in their affidavits. We find this occurs for a number of reasons. Some Family law solicitors hold the view that domestic violence is physical violence alone. One mother’s experience was her family law solicitor saying “Yes but did your ex-partner ever punch you in the face?” after mother disclosed that he would chase her, barge her into walls, scream at her for up to 6 hours at a time – in front of their children. Solicitors have been minimising and pigeon holing domestic violence to physical violence only.

Family law solicitors are influencing mother to omit domestic/family violence for a number of reasons:

One case where family law solicitor tried influencing mother to omit family violence was due to solicitor’s high assumption that father will ‘give up’ fighting for the children due to living far away. When mother would persistently say to her family law solicitor “My ex-partner will not give up and do anything to destroy me” and would regularly ask solicitor what was happening with her case, solicitor would say “Leave it to me, you don’t understand the game do you?” and continue to keep mother ill-informed of her own case. Family law solicitor would also try to pressure mother to agree to unsupervised visits or visits with paternal grandmother despite mother not wanting this.

Family law solicitors are instructing mother to omit family violence from their affidavits due to mother’s trauma from violence. One mother was instructed to leave out all family violence due to family solicitor believing she would not withstand family report process and hearing. The Family law solicitor thought it best not to expose mother to further trauma due to being currently traumatised by ongoing abuse from ex-partner. This resulted in final parenting orders of the father getting 5 nights per fortnight with future arrangement of 50% care when child reached school age despite child bedwetting, becoming aggressive, and repeating verbal insults back to mum after staying with Dad. This prevents mother from disclosing family violence in future as she would be seen as vindictive and accused for not bringing it up in the initial affidavit.

Mothers are held accountable for not acting immediately on the abuse rather than the

abusive parent for being violent! Mothers are being warned by family law solicitors that they will be scrutinised by Judge for not acting on their concerns immediately whilst in abusive relationship. One mother was instructed to omit an incident of the father slapping their baby (3 months old at the time) hard on the back due to mother not reporting to FaCS immediately. Solicitor informed mother that she would be penalised for not acting on her concern of safety at the time. Another mother was informed to leave out her ex-partner threatening to run the family off the road because she did not call FaCS at the time. Both mothers took other safety measures and left the relationship. As a result, there is no mention of domestic violence and risks to safety in mother’s affidavit which is viewed as never happening. To add domestic/family violence later is viewed as mother being vindictive and not regarded factual.

Often the mother has many reasons at the time to not immediately report and will seek support when it is safe to do so. Mothers who do seek help are often let down by police and Family and Community Services (FaCS) when reporting. The consequences of this place mother and children in higher danger if abusive parent learns of disclosure. Reasons behind why mother did not report/act on violence at the time are disregarded. Research shows that victims of abuse are most at risk of being killed when pregnant or when leaving relationship. The greater fear of risk to safety and death is a major factor of why mothers do not disclose abuse at the time, and why they remain in the abusive relationship until there is possibility of safety available.

Family law solicitors are frequently warning mother that the ‘judge will not agree to unsupervised visits’ despite mother voicing fears of risks to safety of children when in abusive parent’s care. With no knowledge of family court process mothers can feel they have no option when their solicitor is telling them what will or won’t happen and therefore agree out of fear.

Reported bias and judgemental attitude of Independent Children’s Lawyers (ICL) and family report writers during interviews and inaccurate reporting of family reports

Mothers are experiencing highly judgemental and biased treatment from ICL and family report writers. One mother said that as soon as she walked into the room she was accused of being an alcoholic due to her ex-partner alleging in his interview before hers. Mother said that soon into process report writer said that she believed mother and was just sussing out the good parent from the bad parent.

Another mother said during speaking about the domestic violence she endured, the family report writer was gazing around the room and looking at the clock on the wall. The mother instantly felt her experiences and the trauma of speaking about the violence were not being sensitively considered. The mother said to the family report writer that she has no idea of the inappropriateness of her demeanour which the family report writer acknowledged saying ‘I’m sorry’. The body language and rapport of family report writers can have major impacts upon the mother’s behaviour during the interview.

Another mother said that the family report writer never asked any questions of family violence despite the family law judge issuing a family report due to allegations of family violence. Mother said that majority of questions focused on her mental health and also at the end, reporter said that the report was mainly about seeing whether mother would consider relocating back to where the father lived which she had fled the year before due to ongoing violence.

A number of mothers have said that what was written in the family report is incorrect where important points were omitted and comments altered. Due to section 121 within Family Law Act mothers are powerless to advocate using support networks. When taken to their Family Law solicitor, often the solicitor dismisses concerns saying that discrepancies can be brought up during hearing stage. What is overlooked again is the influence of the Independent Children’s Lawyer on judge’s ruling. In all cases I have observed I have seen the ICL agreeing with the family report.

Contact agencies that observe and report to family court of supervised visits are not reporting accurately and omitting highly significant information. With one case, the mother’s 7 year old son was kicking and screaming in the car park saying “I don’t want to see Dad” The mother had to go in and get staff to help her get her son inside. Two staff members dragged the boy in, still kicking and screaming. None of this was written in the report to Family Court. The visit should have been cancelled due to child’s high anxiety levels. It is unknown why this was the case.

Disregard of state Government bodies protecting families suffering from domestic/family violence

I have observed countless times of mothers not receiving support from police and child protection services when disclosing domestic/family violence. In talking with various police, for an ADVO to be issued high level of evidence is required – particularly physical violence. Despite mother’s reporting constant abusive texts and phone calls by ex-partner police will say ‘it is a family court matter.’ Part of the complexities of abuse involves the perpetrator using the children to harass and abuse the mother. Without police support the mother remains powerless and there is no evidence of abuse for family court except what is provided within the affidavit, which is commonly overlooked due to there not being any outside evidence.

In one case, a mother was issued an ADVO after she was tortured for three hours by the ex-partner. They have a five year old son. Part of the assault included a death threat by the perpetrator on the mother and their son. The mother informed me that she had called police the following day to confirm this was included in her statement. The statement had been written directly after the attack and the mother had her son with her. She had provided a detailed account to police but could not remember if she had included the death threat. Upon telling the Domestic Violence Liaison Officer, mother was informed that this was a family court matter and she could tell her family law solicitor. I emailed Domestic Violence Liaison Officer and informed her of the importance of mother having evidence of concerns of safety for her child and adding death threat within her statement would be very important. I received the same response saying the police have done their role and family court is separate and therefore not part of the job. As a result, there is no evidence at the time of the mother disclosing her high concerns of safety. This opens the possibility of mother being accused in family court of not acting on her concerns and therefore violence either did not happen or was minimal.

I am observing cases where mothers have disclosed to Family and Community Services (FaCS) of domestic violence and are told by FaCS that they will remove the children because the mother has not left the relationship. Often the mother has nowhere to go and available supports such as women’s refuges do not have room. Rather than holding the perpetrator accountable and investigating into the violence, the mother is punished for seeking help. This fear of having children removed when the mother is reaching out for help places the mother in an utterly unfair position. Not only does she receive no support to protect her family, the risk of removal can have significant impacts in the future – particularly for family court.

The separation of powers between federal and state government creates enormous gaps in protecting children from family violence. State agencies are reluctant to get involved with families who are reporting family violence with the automatic response that it is a ‘family court matter’ despite there being disclosures and evidence of violence. In three of my cases to date the abusive parent has withheld the children from the mother. In all three cases, the role of responsibility to the safety of the children is unknown.

I have observed the following dilemmas in this circumstance:

• When there are no family orders in place both parents are regarded as having equal rights to the children.
• When mother reports to FaCS about father keeping children from her and history of domestic violence, FaCS continuously view such a situation as not meeting risk of significant harm and have said it is a family court matter.
• When mother has reported to police, unless there is high evidence of physical abuse on the children, the police will not intervene.
• When mother goes through family court process this is a lengthy process and can take months.

In all three cases, all three mothers experienced long standing domestic violence from their ex-partner and ended the relationship. One of these case comprised of the father refusing the mother to see their children after an ADVO was issued against him for assault. The mother had cared for the children daily and had close attachments to both. The father ceased all contact for approximately 2 months. The father then allowed the mother to call her children between a strict time frame and children starting saying “I hate you Mummy” “You’re not our Mummy” “We belong with Daddy” The mother went to her children’s school and day care to inform them of the ADVO and current situation. The principal ordered mother to not come onto school grounds to see her son due to her son getting upset and did not report to FaCS. The boy’s school teacher expressed concerns of the child being withdrawn, teary and highly anxious. The mother reported to police who informed they could do nothing as it was a family court matter as no family orders were in place. The mother reported to FaCS who said matter does not reach risk of significant harm. The mother is currently in the process of preparing her affidavit with family law solicitor which will take months to get court date.

In the second case, the two children (aged 5 and 1yrs old) were taken by paternal grandmother without the mother’s consent. The father is currently in custody due to physically assaulting mother. An ADVO was issued and a hearing date set. The mother informed police her children were taken by paternal grandmother and police said it is family court matter. Mother reported to FaCS informing that the paternal grandmother has always threatened she would take the kids and mother does not known of the whereabouts of her children. The first phone call to FaCS, the worker said this is a ‘kidnapping matter’ and identified that paternal grandmother was trying to play the law. Nothing was followed through. I called FaCS on mother’s behalf and worker had different response saying mother has to get an urgent recovery order through family court and FaCS cannot represent the mother.