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UK Government 2 days in the dock for discriminatory, sexist and racist treatment of fathers who are engaged in co-parenting after parental separation or divorce (EU 79/7)
COURT OF APPEAL
HOCKENJOS V SEC OF STATE - C3/2003/0893
img: picture of the facade of royal court





2 day hearing at the UK Court of Appeal with UK Government stating the case in favour of discriminatory, sexist and racist treatment of fathers who are engaged in co-parenting after parental separation or divorce.

May 20, 2004:

Lord Justice Ward stating that judgment is reserved and will be handed down as soon as possible.
Subsistence Benefit Appeal by a Father ordered by court to provide Childcare:


BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
An outline of the May 2004 hearing
"The Children Act 1989 made the shared care of children a possibility after parental separation or divorce. Yet when shared care gets ordered by the courts on the grounds of welfare needs of the child, or when parents themselves agree that it is best for children when parents share the care, the law relating to Social Security law states: "Only one parent can be treated as responsible for a child". No benefits are paid to fathers with dependent children once a man gets sick, looses his job or suffers from an industrial disability. The UK Government refuses to implement the Children Act into Social Security legislation, and instead forces fathers to starve during periods when they care for their children. "This is outrageous" said Bob Geldof ... more
Times Law Report, May 17th , 2001:
Jobseekers' allowance sex bias unlawful
 
Rising gun and drug crime and increasing exclusion rates of black boys from secondary schools ...
Blame the Law and not Black Fathers
Thanks to the Black British Forums for first airing text only version at their
Forum Index -> Events Location

This is an edited version of support fathercare received from JB:
The ruling that only one parent per child can be deemed as "responsible for the child" for the purposes of Social Security and Tax Credit is in our view quite unacceptable. It is, in the jargon terms used, 'indirect' sex discrimination. It is unfair. State support to parenting should go to all the people providing parenting and not exclusively to just one of them. It prevents a considerable number of parents, especially those of limited means, from having a relationship with their children. it sends out quite he wrong signals - that children have only one parent that matters.

It follows that we support your challenges to these rulings.

12:02 AM, May 20, 2004 UPDATE

So many thanks for you making such BIG efforts. Yes, it's great to see the Government in the dock for its awful treatment of fathers instead of, again, ranting on about misbehaving judges. Maybe we fathers were wrong blaming the judges, maybe we ought to have realised sooner that it is government policy to prevent implement the Childrens Act 89 (11.4) which is at the hub of so many problems ...

In the event, the presiding judge said to the public that when he first entered the he chamber, that he "had expected to find Spiderman hanging from the ceiling...."

The Court of Appeal did not know at that stage that Spiderman and Matt were far too busy upstaging Case NUMBER: 2003/0893 by attacking the Prime Minister in the House of Commons with a purple powder equality flower bomber... As the wise men say: It takes all sorts to make the world a better place for children.

Rest of the day went quite well. All judges launched a vicious attack on the Secretary of State's barrister. Three times recently have I seen judges putting claer water between themselves and the government. ... It was all very healing to those of us who have laboured for years to make the injustices visible and to deal with the detail, and make things better now.

At some stage, I was so moved by the words of Lord Justice Ward, that I become so emotional that I cried... yes I weeped in court ... the bosslady even came right across the court and brought me a stack of tissues. Heck, I have fought this battle with the state for for 6 1/2 years...

For those lucky enough to make it to the RCJ I am told it's been worth it every bit of the effort, because of what we were hearing from their Lordships. Lady Justice Arden might even have started a process that heals the battle wounds between judiciary and fathers. As did Lord Justice Baker-Scott, who likewise demonstrated the wonderous process under the fair and sharp and efficient Court of Appeal. I respectfully bowed to the hospitable command of Lord Justice Ward. Men got so used to the abuse in family courts that we forgot to take on the Government (rather than Family Court Judges!) in front of fair non-family division judges.

Please forgive my inability to give a propper report, I need sleep. It's all very exiting.

Maybe only just another half a day, so let's keep our cool. We in court felt we witnessed history in the making.

Be there at Court 74, at ten 30.

Love to you all - see you at the RCJ and beyond

Eugen
(you can contact me here )
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And finally... done a bit of OCR so we do not ignore this piece of House of Commons history:
Discrimination on the grounds of gender revealed in Parliament          ... revealed in Parliament

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