Children and Adoption Bill

Child contact disputes can be tremendously painful and affect everyone involved in them. They can leave long-lasting damage in their wake, so it is in everyone’s interest to keep them to a minimum. For families, it is a deeply personal and private decision whether parents should live together or separate, and, if they separate, what arrangements should be made for caring for their children. We—as the decision makers—and the agencies and courts that affect those people’s lives should be very aware of the difficulties that people have in engaging with the state when they have to make those private decisions. I have often wondered about the preparations that we make for having children. I cannot recall going on a parenting course and I have never had any help with the tricky questions that have arisen from time to time as I have raised my children. People have expected that I will naturally know what to do because I am a parent. That is the case for many people. As we consider how, through the Bill, we can reduce the number of painful disputes and the severity of those that we cannot eliminate, the starting point for our deliberations should be much further back. The Bill may not be able to cover some of my interests, such as a universal parenting support service, but we should remember that services for parents in difficulty are woefully inadequate. There is some preparation. The external assessment process for adopting and foster parents may prepare them for what is to come. Some people attend marriage preparation courses, during which they may give some thought to their future duties and responsibilities as parents. I want to draw the House’s attention to a little-celebrated change in the law eight years ago, whereby unmarried parents who jointly register the birth of their child both acquire the joint parental responsibility automatically accorded to married parents under the Children Act 1989. Many people have overlooked that change. I asked my local register office why we could not have a ceremony to mark the registration of a birth and was told that there was one but not many people asked for it. Such a ceremony could be an occasion for parents not only to celebrate the joy and pleasure that they will derive from parenthood, but to learn a little about their duties and responsibilities, which is relevant to our debate about parents’ responsibilities for the welfare of their child when they are in dispute. The Children Act is that rare bird—a good law passed by a Conservative Government. We should recognise the success of a long lasting, wise law. The concept of joint parental responsibility, much overlooked in today’s debate, has been extremely successful. The statistic has become hackneyed in our debate today, but in nine out of 10 cases parents who separate come to their own agreement about the future care of their children, because they exercise their joint parental responsibility. Most of our focus has been on some of the cases in the other 10 per cent. The existing law is sound, but some of the practices about which we have heard today are unacceptable. We need to give thought to them in designing legislation to improve the situation. When parents separate, children benefit from a continuing relationship with both of them, provided that it is safe. The Children Act makes the welfare of the child rather than the rights of the parent the paramount consideration for the family courts. Both parents have equal status and equal value in the eyes of the court. When I was involved in such a case as a lawyer, the court was certainly gender-neutral.