Welfare Reform Bill

Perhaps I may ask the noble Baroness what evidence she has of fathers seeking to be on birth certificates but being blocked by mothers. I do not doubt that there is occasionally such a case but in my experience most single mothers are desperate to involve the father because they put the child’s well-being first. I am not referring to divorced fathers here, because they are locked in and are very highly committed to their children’s well-being, but it is the young, more casual father whom the mother might well seek to involve in the life of the child but who does not want to know. He feels that he has been trapped, and it is only if his own mother comes into play and tries to inculcate some sense of paternal responsibility that there is any chance of the child having a father in his life. I do not disagree at all with the noble Baroness’s general propositions; I simply wonder to what extent they are evidence-based and what evidence she has not only that mothers, on the basis of ill-founded allegations, exclude fathers but that fathers seek to be included but are blocked by the mothers. If I could think of five such examples over 10 years, I would be amazed, but I can think of 500 times that number of women who are desperate to involve the father in the life of the child but cannot encourage him to take part.