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Tony Critiques Feminism's avatar

As I recall, the legislation establishing AIFS gave them responsibility for this sort of research. And it's been them who did it in the past.

In my experience, ANROWS publications are, at best, riddled with misinformation.

I worry that there is no longer any credible source of information in this area.

Moreover, as I noted in a previous comment here, ANROWS are also taking over some crime reporting from the Australian Institute of Criminology. There is a pattern.

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Lori Lavers's avatar

Sorry I didn't reply sooner, Tony - I'm writing about the pattern right now.

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William Maxwell's avatar

The ABS is definitely not a creditable source due to various data filtering techniques they now use and the AIFS reports are very dubious at best as they cherry pick research to "substantiate" their conclusions.

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Lori Lavers's avatar

I address the methodology of the ABS reports in one of my longer articles on DV (and it's limitations), but even if its just a glorified survey, its the biggest data set we have. It's generally flawed data or no data.

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William Maxwell's avatar

Sometimes it's better that there is no data than biased flawed data

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William Maxwell's avatar

One of the pivotal reasons for the 2023 FL Act changes was "domestic violence" as outlined in the "Consultation Paper" which relied for substantiation solely on the Australian Law Reform Commission's (ALRC) Family Law for the Future report that itself referenced then barrister (now FC judge) Grant Riethmuller 2015 opinion piece about DV and FC matters. That is these DV changes were not based on robust, peer reviewed research, rather they were solely based on the opinions of a "wannabe" judge. No doubt we'll see similar dubious /discredited claims used for the upcoming round of FC Act amendments

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William Maxwell's avatar

One thing the data does not address is that "Applications Contravention" are filed by email to the Registry rather than by upload to the FCFCoA portal. This process allows the registrar of the Registry (or there associates) to reject any application of legitimate and spurious grounds. Applications so rejected are not recorded in the FCFCoA Annual Report. I'd say that the 65% of cases that are withdrawn or dismissed is grossly understated.

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Lori Lavers's avatar

Thanks William, I've never been through the Family Court myself so I am happy to admit I am very much looking in from the outside.

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William Maxwell's avatar

Too many people who haven't been through family court or had close friends /relatives /colleges go through it, seldom appreciate that it is not the appropriate means of resolving parenting matters and that it is unfit to do so.

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