Private Member’s Bill C-422 - Equal parenting (Mr. Velacott)

[logicalvelocity]

c/p

From:

VellaM0@parl.gc.ca email


The following article appeared in today's National Post. Responses to the letter are greatly encouraged. You can submit letters online on the NP website here: Letters | Contact | National Post or send them to letters@nationalpost.com.

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Tasha Kheiriddin, National Post · Tuesday, Jun. 15, 2010

Tomorrow, June 16, is a day that has come far too quickly: my daughter Zara's first birthday. It is a time to pause and reflect on the joys and craziness of parenting, and on the realization that Zara will never again repeat her first steps and first words (no, not Mama or Dada, but "car". Oh well, at least the kid knows what she likes).

Her birthday also falls less than a week before Father's Day, and thus also brought to mind a piece of legislation before Parliament which would radically change child custody and access laws in Canada: Bill C-422.

This private member's bill, introduced by Conservative MP Maurice Vellacott, would amend the Divorce Act to mandate "equal shared parenting" when parents split up. Courts would start from the presumption that parents share time with the kids and decision making on a 50-50 basis, and put the legal onus on parents to show that such an arrangement would not be in the child's best interest.

Before I had a baby, I would probably have supported this legislation. Who would deny a child the right to the equal love and care of both parents? Why do mothers get custody so much more often than fathers?

Raising an infant as a single parent for the past year, however, has changed my opinion. Not because I think that children don't need fathers, but because I realize that they need each parent in different ways at different stages of development. And unfortunately, Bill C-422 presumes that equal parenting is best regardless of circumstance, including the age of the child.

Children are constantly changing, and what may work for a 12-year-old may hurt a two-year-old. Case in point: shared physical custody. A pre-teen can fully understand that when he stays with mom one week and dad the next, he will be seeing mom again soon. But an infant cannot grasp this fact. Even a toddler is unable to fully verbalize desires and feelings, while teenagers, if I recall the drama I put my own parents through, are only too able to express themselves.

When it comes to very young children, the presumption of the bill contradicts the first law of every parenting book on Earth: Disrupt a baby's routine as little as possible. Expert after expert advises parents to establish one sleep routine, nap routine and meal routine, and to ease young children slowly into transitions, such as moving house or mommy going back to work. They further warn that vacations -- or any time away overnight from home -- will prove disruptive. Indeed, what parents haven't returned from a trip with their tots only to find that they suddenly won't sleep through the night, or cling to your leg like Saran Wrap?

Add to that the advice of the medical community that breastfeeding is best for infants under one year. As a mother who nursed for that time, I can testify only too well that breastfeeding is about much more than food. It is about comfort-- when baby cannot sleep or is sick, teething or cranky. No offence, dads, but there are some things men just cannot do. Separating a breastfeeding infant from its mother is just plain cruel, never mind impossible if the child refuses to drink from a bottle.

Which brings us back to Bill C-422. Equal shared parenting would mean that very young children could be constantly shuttled back and forth between their parents' homes. Breast here, bottle there, stay-at-home parent here, daycare there. This type of endless transitioning will do them no favours -- in fact, it can do a lot of damage. Courts can already order these kinds of arrangements, even without shared parenting rules, and there is mounting evidence that the stress hurts a young child's ability to attach to either parent, and to other people in general.

Bill C-422 would make this type of arrangement even more common at a time when other jurisdictions are questioning this model. Case in point: The Australian government, which four years ago introduced mandatory equal parenting legislation, is currently under pressure to revise its laws in the wake of several damning reports. Researchers found that not only were some children at risk of being placed in violent situations, but even children who were physically safe felt depressed, stressed and confused, and suffered adjustment problems. They also found that some fathers' motivation in seeking shared custody was not to bond with their children, but to reduce the amount of child support they had to pay.

A consistent theme in child psychological literature is that children under the age of three need stability to grow up to be well-adjusted and confident adults. In Zara's case, she is fortunate to have a father who gets that, and puts her needs ahead of his "right" to take her overnight alone, even under current laws. Until she is ready for overnights, Zara visits with him regularly at her home in the GTA and at his home in Montreal, with both parents present. Now one year old, Zara recognizes her father, greets him with her sunny smile, calls him Dada and is happy in his presence and his arms -- all without suffering the anxiety of being torn from one parent to another at a young age.

Granted, this type of arrangement takes compromise by both mom and dad, and would not work for everyone, but isn't that the point? Imposing a universal shared parenting presumption, with equal time regardless of age or situation, is not in the best interests of children. Respecting their stages of development is, and so is allowing parents to come up with their own solutions.

I hope our lawmakers will allow other fractured families the same latitude, and defeat Bill C-422 or amend it to respect the needs of very young children, and other special circumstances. Until then, happy birthday Zara, and happy Father's Day, Ian. You both deserve the best celebrations a daughter and dad can have.

tkheiriddin@nationalpost.com

Read more: Sometimes unequal works

[dadtotheend]

Blah blah blah...Holy tender years doctrine.

And there are some things that Dads do better than Moms, like throwing a baseball.

OK, set up the law to provide for mandatory 50/50 access when the child turns one. And when the child gets to age 7, keep him/her with Dad for a year in order to round them into sports shape...because Mom throws like a girl.

Did those researchers also find that some mothers' motivation in breastfeeding well past a year old was not to bond with their children, but to increase the amount of child support they received? Nice character attack thrown in there to cement your argument Tasha.

[Mess]

The article is so slanted it makes my neck hurt trying to read it.

There are "best" situations to raise children. I'm sure 99.9% of parents want the "best" for their children. Not a single parent is able to provide this theoretical "best" in all catagories. We have to make choices, compromises, not to mention mistakes. Somehow our children thrive despite not having everything be the "best" choice.

The "best" choice is for a child to have full 7 day a week access to two involved parents, not mention a supportive extended family. Divorce precludes the "best" choice. More time spent with the mother is better for the mother/child relationship and bonding, at the expense of the father/child relationship. This isn't "best". It's one possibility that is not "better" than a shared parenting arrangement.

[logicalvelocity]

The parent's view is behind the times and is not supported by empirical infant child development research such as Kelly/Lamb or for that matter - For the Sake of the Children.


http://www2.parl.gc.ca/HousePublicat...&Parl=36&Ses=1

[dadtotheend]

I'm still steaming over that piece of s**t.

No doubt she has invited a huge response from parents that disagree with an approach that works for her and her ex, who live hundreds of miles from one another b/w Montreal and Toronto.

I guess she failed to see that her approach is absolutely nonsensical for the many (tens of?) thousands of co-operative separated parents who live around the block from one another because they realize that those kind of living arrangement compromises (where child comes before career) make 50/50 shared parenting highly workable.

Projecting her unique situation where the two of them have chosen to live so far apart onto everyone else who put their child's proximity to them ahead of their career (or whatever other selfish reason that caused them to live so far apart) is reprehensible.

Shame on her.

[logicalvelocity]

The median is tendering further views...

[LostFather]

Originally Posted by dadtotheend

Blah blah blah...Holy tender years doctrine.

And there are some things that Dads do better than Moms, like throwing a baseball.

OK, set up the law to provide for mandatory 50/50 access when the child turns one. And when the child gets to age 7, keep him/her with Dad for a year in order to round them into sports shape...because Mom throws like a girl.

Did those researchers also find that some mothers' motivation in breastfeeding well past a year old was not to bond with their children, but to increase the amount of child support they received? Nice character attack thrown in there to cement your argument Tasha.

Yeah, exactly, she's all for the breast to the bottle campaign, when there are thousands of baby's that don't breast feed at all, or mom pumps, today more than ever, as mom is a as busy with career as dad.

Then there is the status quo argument, now that baby has been with mom over that last year, so we can't change routine now! Ahh, the crap reasons are still the same. Oh, and they still have to through in that "dads don't want to pay CS". What about all the moms that don't want to give up all that CS? That goes both ways, or so you would think?

[dadtotheend]

Link into the article. She gets blasted by everyone who commented on it.

[SillyMe]

Originally Posted by dadtotheend

Link into the article. She gets blasted by everyone who commented on it.

Link to the full comment....

[HammerDad]

Did anyone read this comment:

THere are few involved fathers compared to mothers.The only thing most of the dad are loking for is the reduction in child support.If give a choice between seing their children with child suoport and not seeing them with no child support majority will pick not to pay and not to see .
Its natural that mothers have more emotions and are more responsible when it comes to their children

I rarely hope violence on anyone, but I really hope this lady gets a kick in the head someday.

All men want is a reduction in child support? FU!!! I want to be a material part and influence on my daughters life. Right now, due to not having any substantial time with my daughter, I cannot. I would happily continue to pay full support even if I did have 50/50. It is about my relationship, not money. And for her comment that most dads would choose not to pay support and not see their child if given the option is complete BS. The vast majority of men are involved in their childs life and pay their support. It is only a small percentage of deadbeats that give the rest of us that do what we are supposed to do that give us a bad name.

As for having more emotions and generally being more capable parents, but I thought we are all equals.....oh, right...we are only equals when it benefits you, not when its the other way around....hypocrit.