RESPONSE TO THE HOUSE OF COMMONS WOMEN AND EQUALITIES COMMITTEE INQUIRY INTO FATHERS & THE WORKPLACE

FNF Both Parents Matter Cymru is a children’s rights charity supporting parents and grandparents to remain positively involved in the lives of the children they care about. Our work is underpinned by the UNCRC – specifically Articles 9.3 and 18.1. Most people who seek our help are fathers facing exclusion from the lives of their children

Our telephone Helpline receives around 1000 calls per annum. Our 11 face to face monthly support meetings are attended by around 1100 people each year. All of our meetings are registered with the Law Society’s charity Law Works Cymru as Legal Advice clinics.

SUMMARY

Government has a fundamental role in providing leadership to tackle the persistent problem of gender equality. Almost all activity and funding is directed to improving the position of women in terms of employment or support for their parenting role. That work is important and must continue if we are to have genuine equality in the UK. However the position of fathers – particularly support for their role as parents – must also be recognised if only to ensure that women benefit. How can women ever fulfil their potential across all aspects of civil society if we are to presume that they will shoulder the exclusive burden of child care?

KEY ISSUES IDENTIFIED

• Societal pressures – fathers and mothers perceive that children are the primary responsibility of women
• Services funded by tax payer fail to engage with fathers and show little appetite to do so.
• Non Resident fathers face the biggest barriers to engagement
• Non Resident fathers on very low incomes BELOW NI and tax thresholds face an effective ‘Marginal Tax Rate’ in excess of 100%
• No agenda around engaging women to understand that children are not their exclusive responsibility

How well do fathers feel their current working arrangements help them to fulfil their caring responsibilities for children of all ages?

1. We undertake research annually in Wales for our Welsh Dads Surveys [i][ii] These surveys are primarily concerned with the experience of men in relation to engaging with statutory services in their role as fathers. Around one in five respondents identify as a Non Resident father (the charity’s primary service user group).

 

2. Our 2016 survey noted that 44% shared caring duties with partners roughly equally, 20% provided some care and 22% said they were excluded from the care of their children. The barriers faced by fathers can be seen from the following comments regarding engagement with schools made by respondents to our 2016 survey

‘Schools are reluctant to share information with non resident parent..’

‘Pathetic, have no interest in ensuring a father who is a professional is kept up to date with their children’s progress.’

‘I had no contact from school for over a year while fighting for access.’

‘Despite asking for copies of school reports and information about parents’ evenings I am often forgotten. I need to ask each time. It never happens automatically. I feel like an afterthought.’

 

• Are there employment-related barriers to fathers sharing caring roles more equally?

3. The gender bias against fathers in the workplace was identified in an ILM report prior to the introduction of the current Shared Parental Leave arrangements [iii] The report stated that employers are culturally less accepting of a father’s rights to take paternity leave finding that 63% of employees feel their organisation is supportive of mothers taking up to a year’s maternity leave, but significantly fewer (58%) felt their employer is supportive of fathers taking just two weeks.

 

4. The ‘Fatherhood Penalty’ has been well described in the report by Working Families / Bright Horizons. The analysis reflects some of the barriers to all fathers undertaking a shared care role. However these difficulties are greatly exacerbated for separated fathers who typically have far fewer resources to be able to share care roughly equally. These men are often not perceived to be parents as they are not the primary carers for their children. This serves to further marginalise men as parents.

 

5. Most support services for parents are available almost exclusively during the primary working hours of 9-5 Monday to Friday. This means that they are much less accessible to men (and of course to women) in full time employment. In a study undertaken by our charity in 2014 [iv] one professional in parenting support stated that:

‘Fathers normally work during the hours that the parenting sessions run. Sessions in the locality are run during office hours. Fathers struggle to take time off to attend sessions.’

 

6. This perception by professionals is a major barrier to men accessing the support they need from initiatives already funded by Governments to support parenting.

 

7. One further example of the problems faced by fathers can be illustrated from a response received from a school in Cardiff about engaging with fathers. They stated ‘Not many of our children have fathers’. 

 

8. RECOMMENDATION –

• Require all services funded from public sources to record the gender of parents they engage with

 

• Do fathers have the financial support to enable them to fulfil their caring responsibilities?

9. The marginalisation of fathers is made worse by the default position that Government support such as Child Benefit is paid to mothers and cannot be easily split between separated parents. This creates a ‘Winner Takes All’ scenario that creates the impression that men are superfluous to families post separation.

 

10. Shared care of children is penalised by Child Maintenance arrangements that reward contact denial by reducing the payments to the Parent with Care for each overnight the child is with the Non Resident Parent. This becomes an issue for fathers because 90% of parents receiving child benefit payments are female.

 

11. The current arrangements for shared parental leave simply don’t work. Whilst it is good news that Non Resident Parents are recognised in the provisions – so that parents do not have to be living together – it is unclear what provision applies if the mother has refused to allow the father’s name to be included on the birth certificate and therefore he does not have Parental Responsibility.

 

12. The scheme is however fundamentally flawed as the mother controls whether – and the extent to which – the father can access Shared Parental pay.

 

13. The lack of take up of Shared Parental Leave hit the headlines in early 2016 with reports of just 1% of men taking up the entitlement. This was based on research undertaken by The Women’s Business Council and My Family Care. Delving deeper into the research findings exposes the underlying problems with the Government’s policy. 55% of women surveyed said that they wouldn’t want to share their maternity leave and around 50% of men and women believed that SPL could negatively impact a man’s career. The Government’s own estimates set the likely take up at between 2 and 8%. This highlights a lack of ambition by Government to change the dynamic of work and family in the UK.

 

14. Sweden offers a model for tackling the issues. Shared Parental Leave was introduced there in 1974. The idea was that couples got six months’ leave per child with each parent entitled to half the days each. However, men had the option of signing their days over to the women – and most of them did. As a result, two decades later, 90% of the leave days were still being used by women.

 

15. A “daddy quota” was introduced in 1995 to resolve this. It allocated 30 days’ leave solely to the father on a use-it-or-lose-it basis. If the father didn’t take a month off work, then the couple as a whole would lose a month’s paid leave. In 2002, this was extended to 60 days. Both reforms had a direct impact on the proportion of leave taken by the father so that by 2014 men were taking 25% of all the days available to the couple. As of 1 January 2016, that quota had risen to 90 days. [v]

 

16. RECOMMENDATIONS –

• Share all Government financial support for parents equally between those who have Parental Responsibility for a child
• Remove the incentive to prevent contact by eliminating the overnight care deduction from the Child Maintenance calculation as part of a wider review of Government financial support for all parents.
• Revise Shared Parental Leave to introduce a ‘Daddy Quota’ on a use it or lose it basis.

 

Are there social or attitudinal barriers to fathers in the workplace which need to be challenged?

17. Social attitudes to gender roles in caring for children are eroding all the time although they still persist in some key areas particularly when parents are separated.
18. Support in the wider population for a traditional division of gender roles has declined, though substantial support remains for women having the primary caring role when children are young. [vi]
19. This change in social attitudes can be seen by comparing responses from the mid 1980s to more recent surveys. Thirty years ago almost 50% of respondents agreed “a man’s job is to earn money; a woman’s job is to look after the home and family”. That figure has fallen to 13%. This decline is primarily a result of generational replacement, with consecutive generations being less supportive of traditional gender roles.
20. This change in attitudes is not reflected in the experience of separated fathers who remain marginalised and excluded. This is predominantly a problem where disputes occur between parents over child care and contact when many mothers feel that children are their possessions.
21. That fact can be further illustrated by examining some of the quotes from the British Social Attitudes survey [vii]

‘A job is alright, but what most women really want is a home and children ‘

 

‘Being a housewife is just as fulfilling as working for pay’

 

22. The issue of female control of families and childcare (and men’s acquiescence in that) is shown by the responses to a new question posed in 2012 in the British Social Attitudes survey

‘Consider a family with a child under school age. What, in your opinion, is the best way for them to organise their family and work life? And, in your opinion, which of these options would be the least desirable?’

 

23. The responses suggest that the public retains a view that there should be a gender divide in terms of caring responsibilities: the shift has been in accepting the idea that a mother works part-time, rather than not at all. [viii] Unpicking those gender roles is fundamental to the long term strategy of closing the Pay Gap.

 

24. RECOMMENDATION – Government funding for initiatives that:

• encourage men to see child care as their responsibility
• engage mothers to ensure that they no longer see children as their possessions.

 

• Are there changes to the workplace – such as an increase in freelance, agency or casual working – which might have an impact on fathers? Are there challenges for fathers working in particular employment sectors?

 

25. The imbalance in the Private / Public Sector employment gender balance is a key driver of difficulty. In Wales women outnumber men in the Public Sector by 2:1 [ix] yet no incentives or initiatives are in place to increase recruitment of men into areas of employment where women predominate.

 

26. In contrast the Welsh Government is a key player in both funding and setting the tone for initiatives designed specifically at empowering women to enter traditionally male areas of employment. One excellent example is the £1.5m of Welsh Government funding for Chwarae Teg’s Agile Nation 2 project [x] that ‘kick-started’ a further £10m of EU funds. Agile Nation 2 is an excellent project designed specifically to assist women into employment in 9 key sectors including Tourism which already has a higher proportion of women to men employed (58%) [xi].

 

27. The discrepancy between the genders is highlighted by the Welsh Government led campaign to recruit more women into the Fire Service [xii]compared to its indifference to the recruitment of men into the Early Years workforce.

 

28. Both these areas have a gender split of between 40 and 50:1 yet in contrast to the initiatives to support female employment in traditional male roles the Welsh Government overstated the number of men employed in the sector by a factor of 4 in its consultation document about the 10 year workforce plan where it is claimed that one in eight are male (12%). [xiii] The actual figure from the Care Council Workforce study is 3% [xiv]

 

29. There are no measures to tackle the gender disparity in the Early Years workforce despite lobbying on our part and a proposal to work with Welsh Government using a Scottish model [xv]to substantially improve the position. Our charity was told by a senior Welsh Government official that it was ‘highly unlikely that men would be attracted to Early Years as it was low paid.’ The irony that the Welsh Government is the largest employer in the sector and should have a leadership role in driving wages higher seemed not to be appreciated.

 

• What role can Government, employers and other stakeholders play in overcoming these barriers? What policy or legislative changes would be most effective in supporting fathers to fulfil their caring responsibilities?

 

30. The ONS data on the Gender Pay Gap is the most important source of information in this area, [xvi] and is pivotal in our understanding of the underlying issues.

‘When looking at the differences in pay by age group for full-time employees, the gap is relatively small up to and including those aged 30 to 39.’

31. The report carries on to state that

‘From 40 upwards, the gap is much wider. This is likely to be connected to women taking time out of the labour market to have children.’

32. The ONS report then states that

‘Having children may also change what women want from a job. The American economist Claudia Goldin sees women pursuing “temporal flexibility” as “perhaps the most powerful explanation for the gender pay gap”. What this means is women are more likely to want the ability to work flexible hours, or to work at home, or to complete a project outside a tight schedule.’

33. One interesting side note about the issue of part time working and low pay is contained in the Table Gender pay gap by age group, UK, April 2016 that indicates that men employed part time are paid less than women (substantially less in the 30-39 category).

 

34. It seems clear from this data that women believe that they are the ones who will assume child care responsibilities. Tackling that requires a societal change of attitudes emphasizing the role of fathers in childcare. The ‘problem’ can be further illustrated by examining the gender of Receiving Parents of Child Maintenance where more than 90% are female.

 

35. Tackling this huge societal problem may seem overwhelming yet there are precedents that demonstrate how this can be achieved.

 

36. Sweden has revolutionised the shared care of children in a generation creating a scenario where Joint Physical Custody (shared parenting) now accounts from more than 40% of the child care arrangements for separated parents. Benefits to children are shown in the study [xvii] but the potential gain for parents – both for fathers to play a more ‘hand on’ role with parenting and for women to close the Gender Pay Gap are clear.

 

37. Governments have a the primary role in addressing the gender bias that exists in many public services such as education, health, Family Justice and parenting support. Data from our Welsh Government funded mapping survey in 2014 indicated that parenting support services failed to reach men – with the average percentage engaged being between 3 and 11%. [xviii]

 

38. The survey received responses from 32 different services that supported 169,000 service users over a 12 month period. Professionals identified significant barriers to engagement including:

‘Mothers as gatekeepers’ 59%

‘Apathy by men’ 26%

‘A lack of interest by professionals in working with men’ 19%

 

39. The Welsh Government continues to refuse to collect data on the gender of parents engaged by its main parenting support services Families First and Flying Start as it believes that to do so would be

‘a disproportionate administrative burden’ [xix]

 

40. RECOMMENDATIONS –

• Support for Shared Parenting through initiatives such as revising the GOV.UK information on Parental Responsibility / re-examining the definition of ‘Involvement’ in s11 of the Chidlren & Families Act 2014 / tackling institutionalised sexism in Public Services supporting parents
• a major campaign of education funded by Governments to engage with women to address their deep seated belief that children are their responsibilities alone.
• A strategy to secure a 50/50 division by gender of ‘Receiving Parents’ of Child Maintenance by 2040.
• Enact the provisions of the Welfare reform Act 2009 to introduce compulsory joint birth registration.

 

• Are there specific issues facing fathers from particular groups or backgrounds, for example because of their income or ethnicity, or fathers of disabled children and young people?

 

41. Non Resident Parents (NRPs) face significant barriers to engagement with their children. A direct connection between child contact and the financial contribution from NRPs was established in research in 2014 where it was demonstrated that Non Resident fathers who saw their children several times a week were almost three times more likely to contribute financially to their upbringing. [xx]

 

42. NRPs on low incomes face some of the greatest difficulties. These result from the failure of the Child Maintenance system to take into account the effects of inflation since the qualifying thresholds for payment were set in 1998 and there is NO MECHANISM IN THE LEGISLATION FOR EVER INCREASING THEM.

 

43. Original research by Dr Christine Davies at Royal Holloway University of London has highlighted the extent of the problem.

 

44. Parents working less than ONE hour per week at the National Living Wage from 1^st April 2017 (£7.50 per hour) have to pay Child Maintenance to the ‘Receiving Parent’ irrespective of that parent’s financial circumstances. It is only if a ‘Paying Parent’s weekly income is less than £7 per week that nothing is payable.

 

45. Parents earning £100 per week (£5,200 p.a.) pay a ‘Reduced Rate’ ranging from 17% of Gross Pay for one child to 31% for 3 or more children. The threshold for paying more than £7 p.w. equates to less than 13 1/2 hours per week at National Living Wage from April 2017.

 

46. To put these thresholds into context

• National Insurance payment threshold is £155 per week
• Income Tax threshold is £221 per week

 

47. The rate at which ‘Paying Parents’ start paying Child maintenance and the £100 and £200 thresholds for higher payments were set in 1998. They have never been raised and there is no mechanism for raising them. This leads to a scenario where those on very low incomes who start to earn some money see their actual income REDUCE as they earn more. They have a Marginal Tax Rate exceeding 100% throughout the region between the £100 and £200 thresholds which falls to 99% until Universal Credit runs out.

 

48. RECOMMENDATION

– re-examine the Child Maintenance regulations to increase the Thresholds for payment

 

• Are there examples (in the UK or internationally) of best practice amongst employers that could be taken up more widely?

 

49. Sweden has shown clear examples of best practice both in terms of Shared Parental Leave as well as in Shared Parenting and on the wider subject of gender equality.

 

50. It is clear that unless the Government is prepared to properly commit to gender equality in a meaningful way both men and women will continue to suffer, the economy will not work at maximum efficiency and the burden of welfare will continue to grow. However the greatest losers will be children who will continue to lose out on the benefits of having both their parents involved positively and substantively in their upbringing – as is their right under both the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (Articles 9.3 and 18.1 in particular) but also under Article 24(3) of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.

[i] https://www.fnf-bpm.org.uk/image/upload/branch/cymru/WELSH_DADS_SURVEY_2016_report_FINAL.pdf

[ii] https://www.fnf-bpm.org.uk/image/upload/branch/cymru/WELSH_DADS_SURVEY_report_v2.pdf

[iii] Shared opportunity: Parental leave in UK business – Institute of leadership in Management https://www.i-l-m.com/~/media/ILM%20Website/Documents/research-reports/shared-leave/ilm-shared-parental-leave-report%20pdf.ashx p2

[iv] https://www.fnf-bpm.org.uk/image/upload/branch/cymru/Male_particiation_in_Family_Support_services_March_2014.pdf

[v] Where new dads are encouraged to take months off work http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-35225982

[vi] British Social Attitudes survey – Nat Cen Social Research 2013 http://www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/media/38457/bsa30_gender_roles_final.pdf

[vii] http://www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/media/38457/bsa30_gender_roles_final.pdf p119

[viii] http://www.bsa.natcen.ac.uk/media/38457/bsa30_gender_roles_final.pdf  p 114 Table 5.3

[ix] 246,000 females / 128,000 males employed in Public sector in year ending 30 Sept 2016 Source: https://statswales.gov.wales/Catalogue/Business-Economy-and-Labour-Market/People-and-Work/Employment/Persons-Employed/publicprivatesectoremployment-by-welshlocalauthority-status

[x] https://www.cteg.org.uk/who-is-it-for/

[xi] http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Tourism_industries_-_employment#Tourism_creates_jobs_for_women

[xii] Push to get more women firefighters in South Wales http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-31447069

[xiii] http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/21025/2/140922-10-year-plan-for-the-early-years-childcare-and-play-workforce-in-wales-plan-en.pdf

[xiv] http://www.ccwales.org.uk/news/2012/11/14/the-early-years-workforce-in-2012/

[xv] Men in Childcare – Scotland http://www.meninchildcare.co.uk/Global/index.html

[xvi] http://visual.ons.gov.uk/the-gender-pay-gap-what-is-it-and-what-affects-it/

[xvii] Bergstrom et al 2015 http://jech.bmj.com/content/early/2015/04/09/jech-2014-205058.full

[xviii] Mapping Male Participation in Parenting support services https://www.fnf-bpm.org.uk/image/upload/branch/cymru/Male_particiation_in_Family_Support_services_March_2014.pdf

[xix] Letter from First Minister Carwyn Jones AM to FNF Both Parents Matter Cymru dated 3^rd August 2015

[xx] Poole et al 2014 Modern Fatherhood project http://www.modernfatherhood.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Briefing-paper-Non-resident-fathers.pdf p9

Important announcement

Suffragents is not my only job, although it has seemed like it at times because I am so dedicated to righting the injustice I see every day. However, full time, I am a Managing Director of a company that employs over 600 people. It is also currently undergoing a huge reorganisation which means I have have to take a far more practical role at a time where I thought I would be easing up a little.

Unfortunately this means I have to take a huge step back in terms of Suffragents and its progression going forward. Please make no mistake, I am not giving up in the slightest. I still care about all the people I have spoken too, connected with and those who follow our Facebook and Twitter pages for support. These pages will continue to be active and, in the rare event that I manage to get a few minutes spare, I will post statuses that I hope you will continue to share and comment on. It does mean, however, that I will not be able to write as frequently as I have or personally reply/read all of your comments and emails. I get literally hundreds and it is simply too much. I will reply to them but on a far more casual basis.

Make no mistake: I am not leaving Suffragents. Or abandoning its cause. I still believe that, with enough support, we can really make a difference. I have not given up and you shouldn’t too!

For support and information, visit www.suffragents.org.

 

Learn more about Hostile Aggressive Parenting (HAP)

Over Christmas, I read an article about a mother who killed her little boy and attempted to kill her little girl (although luckily, she was ok), to spite the father. She then sent videos and texts telling him what she had done. Luckily this doesn’t occur daily, although still much more often than I would like, but it got me thinking about parents that use children as weapons in relationships.

I don’t necessarily mean those men and women who kill their children to spite their partners. I also mean the men and women who decide that, now their relationship has broken down or maintenance has been missed, that the other person doesn’t ‘deserve’ to have their child. Like they are a treat rather than a human feeling with needs and feelings. I am part of an online forum that discusses all things pregnancy and shockingly, although very tellingly, I saw posts where mums (both current and expecting) where encouraging other mums ‘not put fathers on the birth certificate because then they have rights if things go wrong’. Upsettingly, this doesn’t seem to make a difference either way. If your partner wants to stop you from seeing you child, it will happen. This disgusting behaviour will only change when the family courts and justice system stop allowing children to be treated as possessions and start seeing them as humans who can feel, love and be psychologically damaged through HAP (Hostile Aggressive Parenting) and PAS (Parental Alienation Syndrome).

Although similar, and very often interlinked, HAP and PAS are very different things and should not be confused with each other. PAS often refers to the psychological condition of the child, where a mother (or father) creates a barrier between the child and parent by consistently transferring negative feelings to them or silencing any reference to their other parent. HAP however is about the behaviour, actions and decisions of a single person towards another. For the sake of this blog, I’ve mentioned parents but actually this can be any guardian: grandparent, extended family, in laws and even day-care workers.

For the sake of this blog, I will assume the father is in the positon of being separated from his child(ren). I am not saying it doesn’t work the other way, nor that its right in any situation, but commonly it is the father who suffers. HAP is often used during child custody hearing, with the primary caregiver often stopping access until court ordered otherwise. This is because the court commonly favours the status quo and, if the child is happy where they are (which they often will be because they are with a parent) then they are unlikely to question it. This manipulation of the system often results in fathers being granted less and less access so the relationship becomes strained. This often isn’t as simple as them saying ‘you’re not having them’ – it is much more manipulative than that. They can use various excuses such as:

* Claiming that a child is ill
* Ensuring that a child is unavailable
* Scheduling activity’s during the alienated parents time
* Raising unnecessary concerns about the alienated parent’s ability to care for a child

Who is harmed by this?
As hurtful as being isolated from a child is to its father, it’s worse for the child. Whereas an adult can vent their frustrations, communicate with friends and understand their feelings, a child is stuck. They know they are upset but can often not tell why which leads to them acting out at school and at home. Regardless of if they cry to their parents or not, their feelings are often ignored as parents believe that they know best in the long run or – frankly – do not care!

According to hostile-aggressive-parenting.com, this can lead to a variety of behaviour issues including – but not limited to:

• High levels of conflict and behavioural between the child and the custodial parent
• The child running away from home or refusing to return to the HAP parent
• Exhibiting behaviour problems including anxiety, being overly quiet and reserved
• Emotionally avoiding any question about the custodial parent’s behaviour, being defensive
• Bed wetting
• Sleep disorders
• May self-harm or exhibit suicidal tendencies
• May show aggression towards the custodial parent especially at times when returning from parenting time with their father
• Can show signs of physical abuses
• May lack self esteem

If you are unsure whether your child is suffering from Hostile Aggressive Parenting, and you are one of the lucky ones who get access, you can fill out this form. Its quick, easy and takes just 15 minutes.

PTSD from divorce?

I heard an interesting analogy today, regarding the constant struggle for fathers to keep hold of their sons. It went something along the lines of this:

“Imagine your home has just been bombed and you are lucky enough to have saved your child. After a short mourning period for the life you knew, you have to move on. In a divorce, the child won’t have the life it would have had if it had both mum and a dad, your life will forever be changed but you need to focus on giving them the best possible life you can with what you have”

I thought this analogy described the trauma of divorce and custody battles flawlessly. You no longer have the right to go into your marital home, whether you’ve had it for 10 minutes or 10 years. You no longer can simply play with your child when you wish. Your lover and best friend has decided you are not a fit father and you now have to play by their rules. It’s no surprise that men who have suffered traumatic, sudden divorces – whether there are children involved or not – can suffer from symptoms similar to PTSD.

According to mentalhealthy.com, Divorce Stress Syndrome can give you the same side effects as PTSD[1]. Loose women presenter Andrea McLean has recently suffered a panic attack just minutes before she was due to appear live on TV. This panic attack happened because she was struggling to cope with the emotional aftermath of her marriage breakdown. Although PTSD is usually a term coined for war veterans, it can be applied to any emotional or social event deemed as abusive or emotionally traumatizing. I’ve seen it first-hand and its horrifying.

According to psychologytoday.com, there are two different causes for this stress – known and unknowns. The known are those anxieties that people commonly associate with divorce; how to start over, whether you keep or throw the house, loss of life as you know it and how you are going to afford it all – both the divorce and your life afterwards. Then there are the unknowns, those thoughts that keep you up at night, or as I refer to them ‘the what ifs’. Is the settlement going to be fair? Will I find a job? How will the kids fare? What happens next?

According to nhs.co.uk, there are three common symptoms that are associated with PTSD. These all can be easily associated to going through a divorce or separating from a narcissistic partner – sadly it can last years. The symptoms don’t occur every day, nor will there always be a trigger. Often you can experience long periods between symptoms so they may not even be apparent at first.

Avoidance and emotional numbing
People going through a particularly horrible divorce, or child custody battle, will isolate themselves further from family and friends. Plenty of people will have experienced isolation throughout their marriage but then they don’t go out to their way to rebuild relationships, often distracting themselves with work and hobbies. This behaviour is not to be horrible, or even because they want to be alone, but because they don’t want to face the questions that force them to re-enact it or even think about it.

Hyperarousal (feeling on edge)
Imagine if you were approached by a scary looking figure on the way home from work. For the rest of that journey, your adrenaline is pumping and you are on edge. Coming out of a divorce is very much the same way and you’ll often find yourself on guard at all times. This can lead to irritability, angry outbursts, insomnia and difficulty concentrating – even more so if your life is being absorbed fighting off the all the lies and rumours being fed to the courts about you.

Re-Experiencing
Unfortunately it’s hard to avoid a partner during divorce and custody proceedings, even more so if you have children together. It is expected that you will have negative thoughts about the whole relationship but you have to be careful to not drive yourself mad may start driving yourself crazy asking ‘what if’ questions, moving on from the flashbacks or even physical symptoms (nausea, pain, sweating).

The most important thing to remember during this difficult time is that you’re not alone. There are millions of dads across the world going through the same situation where they are fighting for their children. Don’t bottle it up, talk to someone or join our Suffragents Clubs. Open to Men, Fathers, Grandparents, Friends and supporters. For more information, visit our website www.suffragents.org.

 

[1] http://www.mentalhealthy.co.uk/news/1481-divorce-stress-syndrome-similar-to-ptsd.html

Child abuse – Police and council officers caught destroying evidence and falsifying records

RE BLOGGED FROM THE DERBYSHIRE INDEPENDENT 

Senior social workers and police officers falsified and destroyed records after Kids for Cash UK exposed evidence of harm to a twelve-year-old Derby boy whose mother was found by a court to have made multiple false allegations of domestic violence.

An investigation by Kids for Cash UK has revealed that Derbyshire Constabulary police officers and senior social workers within Derby City Council’s Children’s Services department destroyed evidence and falsified official records to conceal severe psychological harm being caused to a child after its junior officers had been duped by false claims of domestic violence made by the child’s mother.

In a Derby court, the mother was found to have lied to social workers and police officers and had gained the support of friends by concocting false accounts of domestic violence that she spread, over a period of months, using Facebook messaging. The mother had previously used the false allegations to secretly obtain a court order to prevent the father’s access, allowing her to continue the psychological abuse of the child. When witnesses came forward for a court trial with information that the child was being sedated and psychologically abused, the mother organised friends to seek out the witnesses and conduct a prolonged campaign of witness intimidation against them. Police officers and social workers failed to share key evidence from independent witnesses and allowed the abuse to continue. When the failures came to light, senior social workers and police officers falsified official records and destroyed evidence.

Lawrence English, Senior District Crown Prosecutor said, “The Crown Prosecution Service made enquiries with the police to see whether [we] could replicate the [prosecution] file submitted by the police. It became apparent that not all of the material referred to by the reviewing lawyer is still held by the police.”

Despite claims from CPS that it was willing to review the file, the Derbyshire Independent has seen documentary evidence that confirms that CPS later refused to review a prosecution file reconstructed by Kids for Cash UK after it had recaptured the original evidence, as well copies of additional evidence that had been withheld and then later destroyed by police officers.

David Gale of Kids for Cash UK said, “Our investigations have confirmed that the mother subjected the child to a prolonged period of severe psychological abuse despite the authorities admitting to having received clear independent evidence pointing to the harm being caused. It is clear from the documentary evidence that we have gathered that senior officers within Derby City Council and Derbyshire Constabulary have failed in their statutory duty to ensure that they have procedures in place to secure evidence and to ensure that official records are not falsified by officers seeking to avoid blame. The latest evidence suggests that the police, Derby City Council Children’s Services, and the Crown Prosecution Service have colluded to prevent their failures from coming to light.”

Following Kids for Cash UK’s analysis of five years’ of raw statistical data, gained through Freedom of Information requests served on the Ministry of Justice, an epidemic of false claims relating to domestic violence in the East Midlands has been exposed. The Ministry of Justice has confirmed that it recently launched a nationwide investigation into legal aid fraud related to false claims of domestic violence. That investigation is starting in Derbyshire.

Derbyshire Constabulary’s Chief Constable, Mick Creedon, declined to respond when we asked him to comment on this case.

International men’s day

 “It’s a shocking fact that around the world, one man a minute dies by suicide with men and boys being twice as likely to die by suicide as women and girls. That’s not just a statistic, that’s somebody’s son, husband, brother, father or friend dying and we can and must do more to save these men’s lives.”
-Warwick Marsh, InternationalMensDay.com coordinator

Saturday 19^th November 2016 marked a historical day for men. Finally, after years and years of fighting for it, we received an international day that focused on men’s issues such as

• Mens and boy’s health
• Improving gender relations
• Promoting gender equality
• Highlighting positive male role models
• Celebrating their achievements and contributions, in particular their contributions to community, family, marriage, and child care while highlighting the discrimination against them.

Men, like women, make sacrifices every day in their work, role as husband and fathers, for their families, their friends and communities etc. Over 60 different countries across the world worked together to celebrate this contribution and – more importantly – discuss the silent killer that is taking so many fathers, sons, husbands, brothers and grandfathers from us: Suicide. Find out more below but an important fact to remember is that 4 men commit suicide to every 1 woman.

In the UK, 4,630 men killed themselves in 2014, men are nearly four times more likely to kill themselves than women with 13 men dying from suicide every day. International Men’s Day UK invites all people, all over the UK, to use 19th November 2016 to start a national conversation about male suicide in your country.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRktbxX2Zos

According to dedicated website, ukmensday.org.uk, The theme is designed to help more people consider what action we can all take to “Make A Difference” by addressing some of the issues that affect Men and Boys such as:

• The high male suicide rate
• The challenges faced by boys and men at all stages of education including attainment
• Men’s health, shorter life expectancy and workplace deaths
• The challenges faced by the most marginalised men and boys in society (for instance, homeless men, boys in care and the high rate of male deaths in custody)
• Male victims of violence, including sexual violence
• The challenges faced by men as parents, particularly new fathers and separated fathers
• Male victims and survivors of sexual abuse, rape, sexual exploitation, domestic abuse, forced marriage, honour-based crime, stalking and slavery
• The negative portrayal of men, boys and fathers

 

A long fight
Although an amazing day, and one that will change a lot of lives, it hasn’t been an easy fight. The first call for International Mens Day was over 50 years ago in the 1960s. Many men came forward and asked for 23^rd February to be International Mens Day, the male equivalent of International Women’s Day which is on March the 8^th. In 1968, journalist John P. Harris, wrote an editorial brining to light the lack of balance in the Soviet System which promoted the day for women without celebrating men. Amongst the article is a quote about the communist system still very much relevant to society in general today, if not more so:

“makes much of the equal rights it has given the sexes, but as it turns out, the women are much more equal than the men[1].”

The interest in International Mens Day has been nothing less than outstanding with 60 different events across the country to bring attention to these issues. It has also made history. Following an argument bought forward by MP Philip Davies, the backbench MPs discussed the highlighted issues and bought them to light including male suicides, male victims experience of domestic violence and marginalization amongst others. They have published the full debate online which can be downloaded and read here.

 

We don’t need to tell you how happy we are to see International Mens Day and hope that it makes a positive difference around the world. But that doesn’t mean we can sit back and relax, there is still so much to do. We need you to keep talking about it, sharing things you see (including our tweets and Facebook posts) and highlighting any person who is seen to be actively promoting the denial of a father to his children. Join the fight and keep the conversation going – without that, men will still suffer in silence.

[1]  John P. Harris, ‘Red Women – Painted Town’, Salina Journal, p.4. 28 March 1964

Persona Non Grata

One of the hardest parts of any divorce, whether domestic abuse was involved or not, is the loss of your child. The courts, and partners, struggle to see the child’s best interest through the hurt and ‘petty wins’ of the divorce, often resulting in the child not being able to see their father other than a few hours a week.

Thomas Parker gave us a sneak peak at ‘Persona Non Grata’ at our Suffragents conference. Recently he got in touch to show us the final copy of his fantastic video. He uses brilliant visuals and a genius script to show the trials and trepidation that comes with battling for your child in a court of law.

Many of us have been in the same situation and, with the sharing of this video across social media, hopefully the world will see the hurt and hardship that comes with it.

Let us know what you think and, please, please, please share it all you can. You can make the difference!

SUFFRAGENTS CLUBS

As part of the continuing campaign to seek Justice for Fathers and Children in our Family Courts and changes to the Law we are launching informal Suffragents Clubs throughout the UK.

An ideal opportunity for fathers and extended family/friends to interact on the best way to seek Justice for Fathers and their children. If there are mums out there who would benefit then please join.

 

Aims:

A/     To seek 50/50 Shared Parenting to be set as the default presumption.

B/     No Fault Divorces to reduce acrimonious and costly legal battles,

C/     To have the unique contribution of both parents in children’s lives recognised

D/     To eliminate charges to Non Resident Parents using Contact Centres

E/     To seek a review on the sexist presumption that women are better carers than men,

F/      A forensic examination is required if accused of ‘Unreasonable Behaviour.

G/     ‘Beyond a reasonable doubt’ to be the key for Justice, not a balance of probability

H/     To accept that children have UN rights to both parents

J/      To examine that both partners can work and follow the European model

K/     That a more realistic approach to Financial Arrangements is adopted

 

Administration:

Each club to be locally lead.

I suggest 19.30 – 22.00 hrs in a local Hotel or other place for a social gathering, without loud music,

I suggest a maximum of 20 per club to allow opportunities for all to contribute.

At least two/three topics to be discussed, notes to follow

A small donation of £1 to be collected and forwarded to one of these active Charities, each third month.

1/     Families Need Fathers-Both Parents Matter  Month 1

2/     Mankind Initiative                                         Month 2

3/     Dad’s House                                                   Month 3

 

In other words it will cost £1 per meeting for a good cause.

 

Opportunities for Pro-Bono Solicitors and McKenzie Friends to be asked to chat with members,

I should also wish that invitations are offered to outside ‘Services’ to show our inclusion to see if opinions are in the best interests of children.

These are not to be turned into secretive anti-woman events, rather that serious discussion takes place for the sake of Justice for kids.

Already people are expressing interest from Aberdeen to Plymouth. These will be your local gathering points to build a National Pressure Group seeking change.

Please respond to contact@suffragents.org in order that I can fill the map with local opportunities. Can you also indicate your willingness or otherwise to lead an informal group and locate a suitable meeting place in your town.

We do not wish to take away from the admirable work that many groups offer but we feel that open and face to face interaction can give support to one another at this particularly stressful time where currently men are at a disadvantage in being treated fairly and it will be the children, our next generation, that will suffer.

Thank you for your time and I look forward to the development of this next stage as promised in our quest for Equality.

Grandparents particularly are welcome as well as partners in second relationships.

Kids need both!

Why both parents are VITAL for a balanced, healthy child

A recent article in the Daily Mail, entitled ‘One-Parent link to smoking and drinking at 11’, showed that children who grow up in a single parent household are likely to smoke or drink at an early age. These results were found after the University College London questioned nearly 11,000 children who had ‘lost’ a parent through separation, divorce or death. This theory is further explored by German biologist Anna Katharina Braun who conducted research on Degu pups, animals that are characteristically raised by two parents (less than 10% of animal species raise offspring with two parents), to look at how it affected their behaviour. Obviously we can’t directly apply the results of these findings to that of a human, especially as our frontal cortex is a lot more complex than in any animal, but the basic wiring between the brain regions in the degus is the same as with us. In addition to this, the nerve cells function is identical so they are a good place to start.

As explained in an article published in the Neuroscience journal[1], the experiment split the degus into two groups. Half were raised with both parents while the other half were raised by just the mum (they removed the father one day after the birth). The primary difference they found was in the amount of interaction the pups received from their parents. In two parent families, both parents cared for their partners in the same way; sleeping next to them, grooming them, playing them etc. However, with a single mum, the interaction between mum and her pups was a lot less frequent so they received less touching and affection. This can easily be applied to parenting, and has by many studies. Single parent households generally mean less quality time is spent with the child. This can be for a variety of reasons; a single parent needs to work to bring in an income and complete the errands associated with running a home (cooking, cleaning, shopping etc) meaning there is less time available to spend with the child(ren). This restriction often leads to single parents having lower educational attainment (although it can be assumed this is in relation to young mothers who may struggle to continue their education), less social support and poorer psychological well being (Usalki, 2013[2]). By having both parents available to the child(ren), whether married or co parenting, parental responsibilities can shared meaning the child gets the attention they need without sole responsibility falling on one parent.

Another interesting result of the degu experiment is the effect being raised by one parent had on the pups. Those who had just one parent were more aggressive and impulsive than those raised by two. This theory was supported by Rosie Taylor in her Daily Mail article and Usalki who stated in his report ‘Comparison of Single and Two Parents Children in terms of Behavioral Tendencies’  that the most ‘common problems seen in single parent families’ children are depression, stress, loneliness, aggression, compliance, smoke, alcohol and narcotics’. To help further support the argument that children need two parents, Usalki goes on to show five different research bodies who have shown that, generally, two parent families have better cognitive and behavioral outcomes compared with children who have ever lived in single-parent families. This disruptive behaviour will come from a weakened relationship with the single parent (for reasons mentioned throughout) and from a feeling of guilt over the divorce and confusion as to why they no longer see the dad they were previously raised by. These feelings can disappear overtime but, at least in my case, there is always an underlying feeling of hurt that can affect normal day to day behaviour.  This instability can affect their ability to feel emotionally close to their fathers or feel they can turn to them in order to discuss problems that they may not be able to speak to their mothers about. This frustration and confusion can quickly turn into aggressive, violent behaviour. A report by Patrick F Fagan and Aaron Churchill[3] explained the results of an experiment by David P. Farrington, Professor of Criminology at Cambridge, found that those who experienced divorce before the age of 10 were more likely to experience adolescent delinquency and adult criminality.[4] As they grow up, adolescents will display more antisocial and violent behaviour than adolescents brought up in ‘intact families’ (Breivik K and Olweus D).

We appreciate that marriages breakdown and that, sometimes, people have no other choice than to walk away. We’re not against this, infact we have know many people raised by divorced parents leading healthy, happy lives. The main factor is that both parents work together as the unit they once were for the sake of the child. We’re not saying it won’t be difficult, especially as you work your way through the divorce proceedings, but putting on a strong face for your children is vital for their upbringing – an opinion echoed by hundreds of dads on our Facebook page who are desperate to see their children again! At one point, they were considered great partners but, as soon as the marriage or relationship breaks down, they are forced to see their children for just a few days every other week.

[1] Wang, S (2009) This Is Your Brain Without Dad, The Wall Street Journal

[2] Usakli, H (2013) Comparison of Single and Two Parents Children in terms of Behavioral Tendencies. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science, pg 256-269

[3] Fagan P and Churchill A (2012) The Effects of Divorce on Children, Marri Research

[4] David P. Farrington (1990), “Implications of Criminal Career Research for the Prevention of Offending,” Journal of Adolescence 13: 93-113.

Why is male domestic abuse taboo whilst women are being encouraged to speak out?

Young girls are taught that we are never to stay in a relationship where we’re hit, controlled or treated as anything other than a queen by our partners. Boys, in turn, are taught to treat women with respect and be a perfect gentleman. These are perfectly acceptable rules and, over time, have become a societal norm but things need to change.  According to an article by Siobhan Fenton in the Independent, the number of women convicted of domestic violence is at a record high. This could be due to the fact that more existing male victims are choosing to come forward about their experiences or that society is getting less tolerant of it but 5,641 women were convicted of perpetuating male domestic violence in 2015. Apart from a slight dip in 2012-2013, this has been an alarming trend since 2006 and yet male victims are given nowhere near the same budget as female victims to campaign or offered support by the police or courts – they are alone in their fights.

Graph shows the shocking rise in abuse perpetuated by women.

Societal perceptions
A major part of the problem is societies perception of females hitting males. A large proportion of people seem to think that this is acceptable and that it is nowhere near as bad as a male hitting a female. An example of this double standard was shown in a societal experiment conducted by ManKind that flipped the roles on domestic abuse and tested what a crowd would do if they saw a male hit a female. To make the experiment fair, they first had a male attack the female. As to be expected, when the male actor shouts and shoves the female actress, the passing crowd were furious and intervened quickly to protect the female victim. However, when the tables were turned and the female adopted the aggressive role, not a single passerby got involved. They either walked pass or, in the most shocking act at all, even laughed at what was happening. If you want to see this experiment for yourself, click here. These results do pose a more serious question though – why is females abusing males seen as funny whilst the opposite as seen as horrendous? Men experience exactly the same emotions when abused as females do, they have just been made to feel that it’s a sign of weakness to express their feelings the same way.

So what can we do? Unfortunately, there is no quick solution to this problem. There are some seemingly obvious fixes that would go a long way to helping such as allocating some of the £80 million a year dedicated to female abuse victims to male abuse victims, using both male and females in promotional material so it becomes a ‘norm’ (not normal that they are hit but normal that both sexes can be hit) or not promoting laws that refer to solely protecting woman and girls. These are not immediate fixes, and will take time, but don’t get disheartened there are five crucial things you can do in the mean time.

 Talk!
The biggest thing you can do is talk about domestic violence. Talk about it with your friends, talk about it with your family and talk about it with your children. The more we talk about it and bring it out into the open, the less taboo it becomes. Throughout these discussions, keep your language gender neutral. Make it clear that it is just as bad for a woman to hit a man as it is for a man to hit a woman, that no one should make you feel inferior, especially not a partner and encourage them to defy the gender stereotypes and discuss any problems or concerns they have in their relationships. Many men stay in abusive relationships longer than they should because they are embarrassed to admit that they are being abused by a women – reiterate that this is nothing to be ashamed off and is as frowned upon by society as a man abusing a female.

Share, share, share!
Social media is an incredibly powerful thing. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is the most powerful mainstream communication of the 21^st century, so let’s use it. Firstly, join the Suffragents Facebook and Twitter page to join a community of over 9,000 followers, all of which are fighting for the same thing: justice. Join in the discussions we have, then share and retweet our statuses on your page to get people talking about it. Not just our statuses either. Share pictures, articles, blogs and anything that you find that you think the world needs to know. It doesn’t have to just be positive either, use your social media to call out people in powers (MP, celebrities etc.) that are saying things that encourage sexism or imply, in any way, that domestic violence only happens to women. This includes released reports such as Women’s Aid ‘Nineteen Child Homicides’  which horrifyingly implied that the secret courts should make it even harder for fathers to get access to their children (read more about it here)

 Question
Question those in power, question reports that put fault at the feet of a single sex (both female and male) such as the latest report by Women’s Aid and question your local MP’s. Visit their surgeries, write them letters/emails and ring them. Make it difficult for them to ignore the clear lack in support they have from the police as victims and from the judicial courts as fathers.  To make this even easier for you, we have collected the details of all the MP’s in the UK (available here). These are sorted by constituency so you’ll be able to find the details you need quickly.

Sign our manifesto
We have worked hard to create a manifest entitled ‘Manifesto for Mens Rights: Children and Grandparents in Divorce Cases’. Each of the 35 points have been made after scrupulous research, discussion and planning. It has been designed with the aim of changing the law so that fathers get treated exactly the same as mothers in the eyes of the secret family courts. It is long but not fully developed yet. Read through the points and let us know what you think by emailing us at contact@suffragent.org – no point is too small so, if you think it needs adding, let us know! Once it is fully formed, and we’re sure we haven’t missed anything off of it, we will try and push it through to parliament and make a change that is long overdue and desperately needed.

Finally – fill in our survey!
The founder of Suffragents recently met with a Police and Crimes Commissioner at a social event. Ever the opportunist, he asked the PCC why women are given so much help whilst male victims are pushed to the backburner and left to fend on their own. The PCC informed him that, despite the ONS acknowledging a massive 40% of domestic violence is against men (which I strongly believe is incorrect as we know men under report cases), they believe women are more abused which is why they get their help. This is where we need your help. As of 4.30pm on the 10/10/2016, we were approaching 9,500 followers on Facebook, and we need each and every one of them to fill in our survey! This survey has just 40 questions and should take no longer than 5 minutes and will ask you questions regarding your experiences with the police in regards to the abuse. This can change the future for victims everywhere so it is vital you do it – otherwise you can’t complain!