While
many chose flowers and chocolates to convey their valentine message
on Friday, a group of men from around the country took unusual
steps to get their particular message across to a woman who has
been rocking their world for some time now.
Choosing to impersonate the late Elvis Presley
(pre hamburger era) they mustered in Essex Street at midday. Curtains
twitched in the nearby offices as the Rhine stoned jump suited
Elvis' got ready to rock n 'roll.
To
the sound of Heartbreak Hotel blasting from a stereo they gyrated
their way along Essex Street bearing their unusual pall - a 20foot
high inflatable heartshaped balloon, their message clearly emblazoned
across its front.
END
FATHERS' HEARTBREAK
Led
by Elvis in a scarlet jump suit contrasting with the white
suits of the others, they emerged onto Fleet Street, stopping
traffic and workers alike with their vivid display. Having
successfully
maneuvered themselves to the front of the RCJ they made it very
clear to everyone that they were no longer willing to tolerate
the injustice meted out on a daily basis to fathers on family
breakdown. Regrettably they were unable to take their billowing
heart into the confines of the RCJ but their heartfelt message
clearly reached out to those who witnessed the spectacle from
outside.
Elvis
and his clad cohorts then entered the RCJ to deliver their
missive to the object of their wrath, Dame Butler-Sloss
who has
presided over the family courts for years. Emerging later he
reiterated
that if things did not change they would be back again and again
and again.
A
light hearted visual approach had caught the imagination of the
public and was able to hammer home to anyone who witnessed this
event the very serious message of intent of those involved.
And what's the view of the Government?
Not surprisingly given the resistance of the system, when 'Elvis'
met with Rosie Winterton, Minister
for the Family, in the TV studio of BBC NEWS 24 the following
day, she was not only unwilling to share a platform,
but was also unwilling to entertain the notion of a presumption
of shared parenting on family breakdown.
Instead
Winterton advocates that vast sums of taxpayers money are to be
spent on the expansion of outsourced Contact Centres.
Contact
Centres have been shown to be part of the process of validating
and sanitising the cutting off of a child from its parent. At
the same time they make money for bureaucracies (i.e grant-aided
groups and churches), who for their own gain connive, willingly
or unwittingly, with the stigmatization of fatherhood in the crucial
period after family break up.
Family
Law is big business. Is it not surprising that further public
money is being used to expand its already lucrative portfolio?
