Further evidence submitted by Tony Coe,
President Equal Parenting Council in response to evidence given
by Dame Elizabeth Butler-Sloss, President, Family Division
I should like immediately to make the following
brief representations to the Committee regarding Dame Elizabeth
Butler-Sloss's written comments on my submission to the Committee[1]which
you kindly attached to your email.
1. There are, of course, plenty of EPC representatives
that the President (or her judicial colleagues) could have
met with apart from me. Never once did the President (nor any
of her colleagues) suggest that they could not meet for the
reason tendered by her now for the first time. It is EPC's contention
that the President (and her colleagues) are deliberately
avoiding input from parent-consumers whose views they largely
treat with contempt.
2. This is further evidenced by the fact
that the Family Justice Council rejected excellent candidates
from parenting organizations (including—among
many others—one from EPC Vice President, Paul Duffield)
in favour of a contributor who would not "rock the boat"
from an organization that (a) has no practical experience
of the court system and (b) relies heavily on Government
funding. The plain fact is that the judiciary are determined to
provide no machinery for factoring-in the views of qualified parents/court
consumers.
3. The President is right that I have appeared
before her as a Litigant in Person. However, I am at a total loss
to understand why she would want to deliberately mislead this
Committee by stating that I was "unsuccessful". Both
my Children Act appeals were successful. Indeed one of my two
successful Children Act appeals was reported extensively in Family
Law Journal. On the subsequent appeal, the President kindly went
out of her way to make plain to me, early in the hearing, that
she and her fellow Court of Appeal judges were ALLOWING my appeal.
No doubt the Committee will form its own conclusions as to the
President's motives for being economical with the truth.
4. It is noteworthy that the President has
not commented upon my criticism with regard to educational events
that in EPC's view our top family judges should most certainly
be attending—especially those run by AFCC which are attended
by family judges (and family law experts) from all over
the world. I raised this issue with a prominent High Court Judge
whose gave me this lame and defensive response, "How do I
know we've even received an invitation? " We of course made
sure they had full details to no avail!
All this reinforces EPC's position that our
judges need to be held accountable. It is important not to accept
what they say simply because they are judges—even if they
are very senior judges!
I should be most grateful if you would kindly
forward this email to the Committee members.
Tony Coe
President
Equal Parenting Council
10 January 2005
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