CEPC Issued a summary rebuttal to the CBA Statement of Opposition to the popular Equal Parenting Bill C-560. In the summary, there were links to the details. This post covers CBA Claim #5.
CBA Claim #5:
“The CBA agrees that shared parenting is a good outcome for many families. Where equal time and responsibility can be shown to be in the best interests of children, judges can and do make that order under the current law. The CBA supports legal reform and resources that will help parents effectively share parenting, in whatever ways meet their own children’s needs best. One size does not fit all.”
CEPC Response
This CBA Claim would be laudable if it were consistent with the facts of Family Law in Canada today. According to Dr. Edward Kruk, in his book: “The Equal Parenting Presumption: Social Justice in the Legal Determination of Parenting After Divorce” (2013) (Page 18, Chapter 2), a study by Millar (2009) of litigation outcomes in contested custody cases showed that the mother obtained either sole custody or joint custody with primary residence in 89% of the cases studied. Diminishing the father’s role to merely a “bystander” in 89% of cases contradicts the CBA claim that courts can and do create “many” equal parenting arrangements or that they act in the “best interests” of children.
The CEPC agrees with Dr. Kruk when he wrote in the “The Equal Parent Presumption” that in Canada. as implemented in the Family Courts the last 25 years, “Best-interests-of the child-based decisions reflect a sole custody presumption, with primary residence orders being the norm.”
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