Shared Parenting Information Group (SPIG) UK

• The promotion of shared parenting
• Equal treatment of parents - an end to discrimination in courts, schools and elsewhere
• Promotion of frequent and continuing access / contact / visitation being an essential criteria for a resident parent
• an end to abusive terminology (absent parents / deadbeat dads)
• improved terminology e.g. 'Parenting time' replacing access / contact / visitation.
• enforcement of access / contact / visitation orders
• makeup access / contact / visitation after it has not occurred
• restrictions on movement / relocation - acknowledging a child's right to contact with parents, grandparents and the community (part of the responsibility of being a parent)
• access to court files, schools, doctors

Australia

• Family Law Amendment Bill 1999 - enforcement of child contact orders
• Enforcement of child contact orders - summary of the final report of the Family Law Council - June 1998 - essential reading
• Improved enforcement of parenting orders - Australian Government acts to enforce contact orders - February 1999 (news release)
• Enforcement of contact orders - proposal for dealing with breaches immediately - April 1998 (press item on the interim report)

Belgium

• Shared custody (1995)
• Shared social security (1997)
• Shared tax benefits (2000)

Canada

• Shared parenting approved - Federal cabinet gives the go-ahead
• For the Sake of the Children - Special Joint Committee on Child Custody and Access proposes shared parenting
• Enforcement of Access orders - Alberta
• Unmarried fathers recognised

New Zealand

• ensuring that minor children have frequent and continuing contact with both parents after the parents have separated or dissolved their marriage:
• encouraging parents to share the rights and responsibilities of child rearing to effect this policy:
• assuring parents to the greatest extent practical, an equal role in the physical and legal custody of their children.

UK

• UK government misses the opportunity to promote Shared Parenting - prefers to keep with outmoded 1980's concepts
• Judge backs angry fathers over contact with children - Call for sweeping changes to family justice system after 'shameful' court failures
• Child contact with non-resident parents - Family Policy Briefing Paper University of Oxford Department of Social Policy and Social Work
• Making Contact Work - A Consultation Paper on Facilitating Contact and Enforcing Contact Orders
• Supporting Families - Government Green Paper
  • SPIG submission
• Support Services in Family Proceedings - Future Organisation of Court Welfare Services
  • SPIG submission
• Unmarried Fathers - Lord Chancellor proposes automatic Parental Responsibility
  • SPIG submission to Lord Chancellor
  • Article:Unmarried Fathers - are we ending discrimination at last?, by Peter Townshend and Arthur Baker, Justice of the Peace, (1998) 162 (13) p 236-8 extract
• A better deal for children - IPPR report proposes shared parenting
• Access to court files - Freedom of Information bill

USA

• US law - summary of US law on custody and access
• Parenting time - replaces access / contact / visitation.
• Kansas - bills in progress
• Tennessee - bills in progress

Equality: we demand no more; we will accept no less