Men in Wales face ‘institutional sexism’ from family services, says leading fatherhood advocate

March 8, 2015 by Inside MAN 18 Comments

Paul Apreda is National Manager of FNF Both Parents Matter Cymru. Here he explains why men in Wales need more help and support than they currently receive from the Welsh Government.

Over the last five years as National Manager for the charity in Wales I’ve seen literally hundreds of cases of parents who’ve turned to us for help. Most just want to see their kids.

We started – like our sister charity in England, Families Need Fathers – by providing, information and support to parents and grandparents who are excluded from the lives of their children. Rapidly we moved into providing advice –joining Advice UK – as well as advocacy, despite the fact that we have almost no resources. We even help parents and grandparents deal with Children’s Services in child protection and Public Law issues.

It’s not just dads we help -but most who need us are men. So what do we do – and why do we do it? Probably the best way to illustrate that is to share some of our stories.

Helping male victims of domestic violence

Will is a 40 something dad in South Wales. He split up from his ‘ex last year and now she won’t let him see the kids. A family mediator sent him to us as she was worried about his mental state caused by not seeing the children he loves. His ex has ignored two letters from solicitors and an approach from the mediator. Mum’s brother and her cousins have physically assaulted him twice – fortunately on CCTV so they are awaiting trial for that. His GP has diagnosed him as a victim of domestic violence which has seriously impacted on his emotional well-being.

I undertook the CAADA–DASH risk indicator checklist with him and he scored 18 out of 24 – making him very high risk. I referred him to the local MARAC (Multi Agency Risk Assessment Conference) only to find that they didn’t want to accept him as a victim because the Mum was already recognised as high risk on their system.

Then HE was arrested for harassment on the grounds that he sent text messages and phone calls to his ‘ex trying to see the children. The Police ‘tactfully’ arrested him away from South Wales when he was visiting his elderly mother in her care home. After keeping in the cells overnight they charged him with the offence. We’ve helped him get Legal Aid for contact and have arranged for a criminal solicitor to defend him against the harassment charge.

Dads excluded from kids’ lives

Another dad – let’s call him Nathan – has just been ‘evicted’ from the hostel where he was living with his ex partner and young child. They haven’t given him a reason. Our volunteer advocate who has helped him try to find the reasons for his removal has had a complaint against her of harassment by the hostel manager. We’re helping Nathan mount an appeal against the eviction and to bring his case in the Family Court.

A third dad – we’ll call him Evan – had a letter from his daughter’s primary school telling him that they couldn’t communicate with him about his daughter as the mum said he didn’t have Parental Responsibility. Children’s Services put the children on the child protection register and tried to stop them from seeing Evan. We went with him to countless child protection meetings and eventually Children’s Services gave up – but not after the social worker told the three teenage girls that if they said they wanted to see their dad they could be taken into care!

From my perspective we are dealing with a culture of ‘institutionalised sexism’. Men are seen as a danger at worst and an irrelevance at best. I’ve known this was the case for years but have said to many people that if I used the phrase publically it would be an admission of defeat.

We can do better than this

The Fatherhood Institute has produced research in Wales showing that one Council’s children’s services department has improved its engagement with dads from 47% to 82% for those invited to take part in the Core Assessment. We have proposed to Welsh Government that ALL local authorities should be monitored on their father engagement with Children’s Services. They have declined.

We produced our own research about the engagement of parenting support services with men. This found that across 33 services and 169,000 service users the average participation level for men was between 3 and 11% of all parents. We proposed that services should be asked to report on the extent to which they engage with men. The Welsh Government refused – telling me in a face to face meeting that ‘it would be too difficult to do’.

But there is some light at the end of the tunnel! Following a successful challenge we made to a Welsh Government Equalities Impact Assessment I started a dialogue with the officials in their Equalities division. It appears that the Welsh Government have been labouring under the misapprehension that there are no bodies or organisations that represent men in Wales. I was abe to share the good news with them. We are here – and we’re not giving up.

—Photo: Flickr/[Duncan]

Nigel

This is such important work. It is so clearly institutional sexism and Equality Impacts are an important place to start. The Sexism blinds officials to the fact that sex and gender in their assessments actually includes males. Good for you pushing and pushing.
Healing Men

Paul’s organisation has dealt with deep cutbacks in government funding and does all this fantastic work on a shoe string … In contrast; Welsh Women’s Aid accumulated £1,306,638 in net assets, including £493,468 CASH in the bank from Welsh Government money in just 25 MONTHS as a limited company. ONE MONTH’s income would support the Mankind Initiative Helpline for 4 YEARS and, I think, FNF-BPM Cymru’s helploine for 20 YEARS. Shouldn’t questions be asked?
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karen woodall

Forgive me for asking this but didn’t FNF BPM recently give its support to the VAWG bill in Wales rather than standing against it? Perhaps that strategy is part of a wider strategy against institutionalised sexism, if it is it would be good to hear how that works and how lending support to the VAWG bill will achieve the goal of change in this arena,
- Inside MAN
  
  Karen
  
  I think the approach is to call for a separate strategy on violence against men and boys—-though Paul would need to confirm that.
  
  Glen
- Healing Men
  
  The VAW Bill is [almost] wholly misandric and securely “on message” with the Feminist Party State that is the sorry State of Wales as we speak. Unfortunately, it is an extremely inconvenient truth that there happens to be men in Wales … damn them. Soooo .. the Welsh Government tickled the words so that “VAW” technically includes men and boys … FNF BPM wanted some clarity – “lets have a VAW Bill” …so far so good. Now that’s clear and gender focused, lets have a “Violence Against Men Bill” … and if not, why not and focus on a clear iniquity instead of the muddle we have at the mo. Would you believe the Minister has stated on his Facebook page “Leighton Andrews AM; It doesn’t discriminate against men and boys and of course support will be on the basis of need.” Of course it does Leighton. How silly of me. …
Nigel

I’m sure you have thought of this but all legislation/policy has to have an Impact Assessment (given various names but it should include assessment of the impact on the equality strands in the Equality Act.) Usually the Gender part of this is taken to mean “women” but of course there is no reason in law for this so an impact assessment can be challenged on the basis it has not included a proper consideration of the evidence on gender because it has left out evidence on males (or indeed any of the other equality strands). The Impact Assessment is usually published along with a bill/policy/guidance but could be asked for using a Freedom of Information Request. Because one has to be done they cannot use the excuse that it is too expensive to give this information because it has to be done anyway. If it has not included such information the resultant policy/bill/guidance could be challenged by “judicial review” or indeed through Ombudsman on the grounds that a proper process was not followed (in that it was incomplete). Interestingly the VAWG Law in the USA was eventually given a drubbing in Congress and Senate for much the same reason. that its sex specific provisions were disproportionately discriminatory against men based on modern evidence. Sadly few small organisations or individuals will be able to pay the legal fees to start Judicial Review Proceedings but may be able to mount an Ombusman’s complaint.
- Healing Men
  
  Hi … Thanks for your comments. The Equality Impact Asessment for the “Violence Against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Bill” has been obtained and reviewed and a complaint has been lodged with the Complaints Dept of the Welsh Government about the WG not having “due regard” (a legal requirement) to all relevant evidence regarding domestic abuse (DA) i.e. not considering the high quality and huge quantity of evidence that reveals female participation and instigation in DA and that the WG may be putting children at risk by not assessing these dynamics. Specifically and tactically this does not seek to overthro’ the “gendered” approach but to have “non-gendered” approach considered by a legislature in its EIA. This may be a first and a prize. The WG will try to wriggle out of this, but the complaints process also includes an Obudsman (in Wales) and external oversight of research and statistics from Whitehall … hoping to bring objectivity to the process. IF .. a big IF, the EIA is re-assessed, then it is expected that the VAW .. Bill will not be able to proceed in its present from. This is important – because this Bill is explicitly a trailblazer for other legislatures and Wales is a hot-bed of radicalised ideologues (a single Feminist Party State) being used to set precedents for elsewhere …. we are working hard to do do what we can to upset it. Judicial Review – early days yet but we have everything in place and joined up, and the first steps have been taken. A meeting is planned for later this week to move on to the next stage. Its fragile but realistic and we are determined. Wish us luck!
karen woodall

Not quite following what is going on here.

Healing men appears to say that FNF BPM did give it’s support to VAW on the basis that it should be clear that it is a bill about violence against women (not inclusive of men’s needs) and that it would establish a precedent that there should be a separate violence against men bill. Is that the case? Have FMF BPM called for a VAM bill?

I would agree Glen that the way to deal with institutionalised sexism in legislation is to have a VAM Bill – or to stand against a bill which is supposed to cover women AND men’s needs but which is called VAW.

I am interested to know which approach has been taken by FNF BPM.
karen woodall

yes Nigel the way to challenge this is through the impact assessment and also Judicial Review. I am also interested to know whether FNF BPM is doing either of these as part of their strategy against the VAW bill.
Nigel

The name of the bill itself breaches the Act. For even if there are a small minority of victims in the categories it covers then it is breaking a convention of neutrality. Think of “firefighter, police officer, ” operatives at work” and so on. The proponents of the bill have to show exclusivity , that only women and girls can be victims to have the bill so named. Yet clearly boys are sexually abused, forced into marriage, abused as are men subjected to abuse and violence . If the Bill’s case is that it focusses on the victims it’s title itself is discriminatory to male victims however small their number. Indeed if is is the case, as it is , that males are much less likely to report their victimisation one would expect a proportionate act of positive action to ensure this minority of victims were recognised and may know they are not ignored.
One doesn’t have to show parity just that there are male victims and they are damaged by being specifically ignored on the titling of the Bill.
I hope the action leads to more public debate as clearly the proponents are guilty of sexism and guilty of hypocrisy for they would not so deliberately marginalise people in this way if they were a racial minority, disabled etc.
I believe that the well attested evidence of the difficulty of males coming forward is a strong place to start to show the titling of the Bill is harming in it’s inaccuracy Good luck.
Anne O Regan

As a volunteer for FNFBPM and as an activist for men’s rights, I can assure all concerned the response from FNFBPM was to have a separate bill to support men and boys. What we have ended up with is a bill that even discrimates against boys. We all knew there was no chance of changing this VAW bill they even changed the title to gender based violence but it meant exactly the same. 98 % of funding going to women’s support services I am disappointed in the negative comments about FNFBPM we are a charity where we give our time voluntarily. I would never stick my neck on the block for an organisation that supported discrimination of men and boys. The men’s movement is fragmented and needs to think why the feminists movement is so powerful,its because they sing from the same hymn sheet, Its about time we started a choir.
karen woodall

Anne, I was asking a question, I am entitled to do that am I not?

Whilst the men’s movement may be fragmented, there are ways of appearing to sing from the same hymn sheet whilst doing something entirely different from behind the scenes and that is what I am interested in. I asked a simple question, it was this

Did FNF BPM give its support the VAW BIll as it stood or did it stand against it?

It is a very simple question but the answer is very important to the men and boys who rely upon this organisation to represent it.

Just as the Fatherhood Institute in England represents a problem for men and boys in the English Parliament because of it’s identification with feminism, FNF BPM needs to be transparent in Wales about its stance on the issues that it represents men on.

And just because people volunteer for that organisation does not mean that it should not be transparent.

I am asking a simple question and a simple answer is all that is required.
Anne O Regan

FNFBPM are absolutely supporting an agenda in Wales that equally supports men and boys.
karen woodall

Not really the question I was asking Anne, I have been asking it for quite a long time now but still don’t have any kind of answer.

Did FNF BPM stand against the VAW Bill or did they support it?

To make it easy, all anyone connected to FNF BPM needs to do is say a or b

a) FNF BPM Stood against the bill.
b) FNF BPM supported the bill.

I am not being difficult, I just want to know what the answer is.
karen woodall

well, I got my answer which is B they supported the Bill and the name change. This comes from the submission by FNF BPM to the Consultation.

‘We are persuaded by the arguments from women’s groups that the potential for obfuscation and a lack of clarity about the purpose of the Bill will undoubtedly lead to a failure to achieve the important goals it is seeking to target – i.e a culture change to educate men and boys to be more respectful and less abusive towards women and girls.’

The other arguments in the submission are that there should be a separate bill for men and boys on the basis of the evidence that men and boys suffer DV – all well and good and what we would want to see in such a submission. Unfortunately, in my view, the ill conceived nature of the plan – to support the bill in the hope that the women’s lobby would in return support the call for a men and boys strategy – has been completely and utterly rendered pointless by the statement above, which hands to the women’s lobby, all the ammunition they need to say that there is no need for a men and boys strategy.

I worry about this I really do. What is the point of telling the world that Wales has a problem with institutionalised sexism whilst giving the people who uphold institutionalised sexism the very tools they need to keep it in place? It is a little like black people in South Africa supporting white people to make legislation that benefits only white people in the vague hope that the white people with power will somehow unilaterally give some of that power away.

The reality of the DV industry is that it cannot give one single inch of its power and funding away by acknowledging that men and boys suffer a large percentage of family violence. It just can’t, because the moment it does the whole illusion of the patriarchal analysis of DV comes tumbling down and bang goes your funding, your jobs for the girls and your power base. Why don’t people understand that you cannot cosy up, be friends with or persuade the women’s lobby to think rationally on this matter.

I know people don’t like me saying it and I know people think I get bees in my bonnet but these trojan horse strategies are just completely doomed in this environment. The only way is to stand together as men and women and face the illusion until it cannot be held up anymore.

Appeasement is not a strategy in a gender war which is being waged by the other side.
Nigel

So does FNF in Wales believe Welshmen are deliberately disrespectful and abuse to women and girls? In which case why would a family need a father? I’m afraid it does indeed look like a total “own goal”. After all the most frequently advanced reason that there should not be presumption of equal contact is that fathers supposedly present a high risk of abusing either the children or former partner on the dissolution of a relationship. I’m gobsmacked.
Nigel

However I would like to applaud the work done by Anne and FNF in frequently difficult circumstances. I sincerely hope your glimmer of hope does light up and move things forward. But I do have to agree with Karen about the opposition you face.

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