A Message of Optimism For 2010

I have sought the guidance of the Geek and there is hope for the family bar after all…Apparently I need first to ditch hubby number one and find a more…uh…economically viable on. I KNEW I was missing a big part of the economic equation that made this job worth it. The solution is so simple. Thanks GL and happy 2010.

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Blawg Review of the Year

Nominations for Blawg Review of the Year are open and will be announced in the New Year. You can find out how to nominate your favourite Blawg Review of 2009 at Blawg Review 244, along with a list of all the 2009 Blawg Reviews (instructions at the bottom).

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Facebook Divorce

Thanks to @nickbilton for the RT of this story in The Telegraph about the number of online divorces citing facebook as a contributory factor. In fact the headline is ‘Facebook Fuelling Divorce Research Claims’ with a strapline of ‘Facebook is being cited in almost one in five of online divorce petitions, lawyers have claimed’.

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I don’t doubt that as a general proposition facebook may be a feature of 1 in 5 online divorces. I do wonder though what support The Telegraph has for the reference in the title of the article to ‘Research’: When one reads the story it appears that in fact Divorce-Online have totted up the number of their own petitions which make reference to facebook and have come up with a figure of 1 in 5. I don’t doubt that figure, but I’m not sure it warrants a headline of ‘Research Claims’ by a national newspaper.

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There appear to be three strands to what is claimed: 1 that facebook and similar sites make inappropriate relationships easier to conduct, 2 that they present a temptation to the spouse with a roving eye, and 3 that they are the means of a spouse finding out about infidelity and subsequently a source of evidence used to prove that infidelity. Of course what Mark Keenan quite properly says is that one in five of his cases ‘make reference to facebook’ – not that one in five cases are ‘fuelled by’ facebook: contrary to the headline there is no claim (let alone research) that one in five divorces are fuelled by facebook at all.

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And on a more philosophical level – how many of those divorces can we really blame on facebook? One might reasonably suggest that rather than treating these statistics at face(book) value we need to look deeper and consider whether or not these so called facebook divorces are simply the way in in which an already failing relationship has come to end: spouses stray and spy on one another because their relationship is already damaged, has one some basic level stopped functioning. If  facebook weren’t around to blame how many of these divorces would have happened in any event?

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Surviving a Stepfamily Christmas

I must be moving up in the world: I haven’t dealt with a single last minute spat over who gets the kids on Christmas Day this year. I had steeled myself for the annual onset of the Christmas Contact frenzy: desperate attempts to shoehorn in urgent hearings, and to persuade a judge to give the judgment of Solomon in a 30 minute directions slot. But the only cases I have dealt with this year have been thought through well in advance and agreed sensibly, usually by saying one parent has Christmas Day and the other Boxing Day, in some cases a split on the day (where parents live nearby).

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There is an interesting and thoughtful piece in The Times today about just this issue: how blended and stepfamilies manage the minefield of Christmas. Christmas is a recipe for fallings out at the best of times but it can be a really tough time for those who are separated or divorced, and for their kids and their wider families.

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Reporting the Reporter

I have a current bugbear, but don’t get me wrong: I don’t want to add to the mass of negativity surrounding the dread word ‘social worker’. This post really only concerns the cases where the quality of s7 reports prepared by social workers in private proceedings falls far short of the expected standard. Most reports are adequate, many are much more than adequate. But there is a certain (how shall I say it?) patchiness.

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Even Forrest Gump knows that s7 reports are like a box of chocolates (you never know whatchu gonna git – are you going to get the truffle, or the orange creme nobody wants? Apologies for the naff analogy but it’s nearly time to knock off for the hols and a big tin of Christmas chocs is beckoning…) As for s7 reports, I’ve had a few orange cremes lately, and whilst I am the kind of social outcast who is happy to scoff all the orange cremes at the bottom of the tin (I love ’em), when it comes to duff s7 reports there is an important point of policy beneath that sparkly foil wrapping (Okay, enough of the analogy it’s making my teeth hurt).

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Occasionally a Judge will decide that a s7 report is flawed or that there is some other good reason to depart from a recommendation contained in it. Usually they do so politely and without hurting anybody’s feelings. Very occasionally a Judge will decide that a s7 report is so badly flawed that it warrants being spelt out in the judgment in terms which are quite strongly critical of the report writer. I have dealt with perhaps 3 or 4 of these in the last couple of years. Very very occasionally the Judge will be so unhappy with the quality of the s7 report that they will order a copy of the judgment be sent to social services to ensure that they are aware of the court’s concern (this can only happen with the court’s permission – parties cannot disclose the judgment themselves without permission). Incidentally, I’ve yet to deal with one of these cases where the media has been present, but I suppose it is only a matter of time before a similar case is identified by the media and permission given for it to be reported.

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In most of the cases that I have dealt with where a judgment has been highly critical of an unsatisfactory s7 report that report has been prepared by social services: by a social worker who may or may not be experienced but who has very little experience of private law work or of s7 reports (in one case a CAFCASS report was prepared by a sandwich year social work undergraduate on a work placement at CAFCASS). Clearly this is nothing like a statistically valid sample, but my sense is that (for better or for worse) the organisational quality checks on reports may tend to be more rigorous within CAFCASS than elsewhere. Big generalisation, but that’s my sense. In some respects this should come as no surprise since it used to be the expectation (not so any more since CAFCASS has ground to a halt) that most s7 reports were produced by CAFCASS as a matter of course – its what CAFCASS DO, and its more of a sideline for social services. In recent times of course the courts have been forced to fall back on social services to prepare s7 reports where CAFCASS cannot, and no doubt this is an additional pressure on often reluctant Local Authorities who would frankly rather be focussing their resources on child protection and on actual or potential care cases.

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A Festive Message

I’ve been moderating comments on the Pink Tape for some time (see here also) to ensure that abusive or inappropriate posts are not published by those with little or no respect for myself or readers of Pink Tape. It works pretty well, although its a pain for me to have to individually check each message and it does sometimes mean comments don’t go up instantaneously as I don’t have time to check them due to work commitments. I try to only edit where necessary, but in general I’d rather edit and publish than simply bin an otherwise interesting message because part of it is not publishable.

But I’m making a New Year’s resolution: those of my loyal readers who think that one of the functions of this blog is to make the same point over and over and over again and to make it in an increasingly offensive way (usually without having the courage to publish your real name) will find that your posts are now not published at all because I will block your IP or email address. I feel quite strongly that the internet should be a space where people can air their views confidently and openly, within the confines of common courtesy and the law – but I DO draw the line at personally abusive comments. And in 2010 I do not want to waste any of my precious time reading them – I have better things to do. Don’t confuse me with the big bad system: if you take time to read the blog posts you will see that I am often as critical of as you are – bitching at me is a misdirection of your effort. Upsetting me ain’t gonna change nuttin’.

As ever, you don’t need to agree with me to post comments. I hope that much is obvious from the comments I regularly publish – I cherish our discussions and disagreements. No, this little Christmas message goes out only to the one or two of you who may have forgotten that at the end of the day this is my blog and I retain the editorial control. If you want to be abusive go do it elsewhere on your own blog. Blocking your nasty little messages is my prerogative.

Yours truly

Loo xxx
(AKA Family Laxative)

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