Thousands of Dads are in battles for access to their kids and fighting to alter absent father stereotypes. RS Spelling is a ‘Sunday McDad’. The kind of father who buys his son an extra milkshake in McDonald’s on a Sunday, an awkward gesture to make up for the lost bath times, bedtime stories and birthday parties.

Black men have been eternally typecast as roguish, absent fathers who wilfully abandon their children and their partners, miss child support payments and forget to send birthday cards.

But Spelling has never missed a birthday by choice. He last saw his two youngest sons a week before Christmas when they opened their gifts early.

He has not seen them since because his ex-wife, who he divorced in 2000, refuses to abide by the shared residence order handed down by a Judge. Along with hundreds of black men, he is fighting back against the stereotype of the absent black father and, with cruel irony, the system is making it virtually impossible.

STUNTS

Spelling, 55, is a legal bigwig for Fathers For Justice, an increasingly militant campaign group. With a series of high profile stunts of civil disobedience, it has brought the plight of thousands of fathers denied access to their children into the public eye.

One stunt that caught the media’s attention involved a distraught father in a superhero suit and a towering crane. In October 2003, 36-year-old Dave Crick caused severe gridlock across central London for six days after he climbed up a 180ft crane at Tower Bridge dressed as Spider-Man, his six-year-old daughter’s favourite comic book hero.

He was granted access by the courts but his ex-partner refused contact.

Two weeks earlier two men dressed as Batman and Robin camped out for three days on the roof of the Royal Courts of Justice where many custody hearings are heard in the family court.

And in December 2002, to mark the campaign launch, 200 fathers dressed as Santa Claus staged a sit-in in the lobby of the Lord Chancellor’s Department.

Subsequent actions have included the ongoing ‘Purple Door Campaign’, which has led to numerous Children and Family Court Advisory Service (Cafcass) office doors being painted purple, the international colour of equality.

Jamaican-born Spelling, a father of six from Woking, is in a bitter custody battle with his ex-wife, who he was with for over 17 years, to gain access to his 11- and 13-year-old sons. She testified that he beat her and threatened to burn down her house, allegations which Spelling denies.

He told The Voice: “It is time for black men to stand up and take responsibility for their children. Sadly, there are many men like me who desperately want to see their children but are prevented from doing so by vindictive ex-partners. Black fathers are no longer only the strict disciplinarians who pull out their belts and women are no longer just the stay-at-home nurturers. Times have changed. Black women go out to work and many fathers are very emotionally intimate with their children.”

Fathers for Justice was founded in 2002 by father-of-two Matt O’Connor, who struggled to see his children after an acrimonious divorce. He spent nearly £20,000 in the courts and believes that the family courts work against fathers.

O’Connor, 36, told The Voice: “Dads are less likely to get legal aid to fight for custody than mothers and many men spend up to £100,000 fighting to see their children. The family courts are not open to public scrutiny, allegedly to protect the interests of the children.

“A father has to spend three months preparing a case for court during which he does not see his child. A judge will say that since the children have been fine for three months without a Dad, two weekends a month would be enough. The courts do not look at how much time a father spent with the child while they were living in the family home. Most of the 6,000 Dads on this campaign do not want to be second class parents.”

One in three marriages in Britain end in divorce and though most parents agree to share custody of their children, many fathers who leave home soon realise that they have no automatic right to see their children. Under the 1989 Children’s Act, Dads who leave the home or non-resident parents only have the right to apply to see the children and have to prove their right to access.

A resident parent can stop all contact by claiming that either they or their child will be caused distress by regular visits. Many applications for contact are denied on these grounds and appeals more often than not lead to a judge offering less frequent visits or in extreme cases a complete severance.

Last year over 60,000 parents applied for contact orders and, according to the 1998 government paper Children First, 40 per cent of mothers admitted to thwarting contact even where the courts had granted visitation.

Mothers who flout contact orders can be imprisoned or fined, but the courts often decide that their enforcement would not be in the best interest of the child. This leaves many men paying child support for children that they are never allowed to see.

O’Connor said: “It is not rocket science. Community service orders can be imposed or residency can be transferred from the mother to the father. It is not as difficult as the government makes it sound.”

A spokesperson for the Department for Education and Skills, which oversees Cafcass, said that Children’s Minister Margaret Hodge would be making announcements about improving contact for fathers in the coming weeks when the report Making Contact Work is released.

ACCOUNTABLE

Fathers for Justice are campaigning for a legal presumption to contact similar to the Australian family courts where fathers have an automatic right to contact unless there is abuse involved. They are also demanding a Bill of Rights for the family, which would include an open and accountable system of family law.

But according to family psychotherapist Judith Lask, a family court will always presume that the mother has more intimate contact with a child.

She explained: “A lot of things conspire against fathers being chosen as the primary carers when a relationship dissolves. There will always be the view that mothers do it best, which in a lot of cases is true.

“Fathers panic, because they realise that they are going to lose something immensely precious and this is usually where the battle for contact begins. “If parents are in conflict and the children are aware of this, there will be a negative outcome. Conflict is the worst possible scenario for a child and courts will always put the child’s best interest first.” Statistics show that on average women spend more time with their children than men. But there are many unsung men who act as the primary carers.

According to the Office of National Statistics, there are 161,000 lone father families in Britain compared to 1,463,000 lone mother families. Spelling said: “The system is treating us unfairly. When you lose a child there is a dull, continuous ache. We fathers have no choice but to fight for what is rightfully ours.”

But for Judith Lask, accessible mediation services, rather than drawn out custody hearings that tend to drain all involved, would be the best option for families facing the split.

She said: “Though the relationship between the two parents has broken down, the father will still be a very big part of the child’s life and his absence or presence will affect how they view themselves. The child should always be consulted, if he or she is old enough, and every effort should be made to ensure that both parents play an important role in their child’s life.”  

The Voice Britain's Best Black Newspaper.

26 Jan 2004