A new overhaul of Australia’s Family Law aims to crack down on false allegations of violence or abuse and on obstruction of access to a child. The proposed amendments to the Family Law Act will also require compulsory mediation for the parents and strengthen the concept of joint decision-making.

The law change comes less than 10 years after the Act had last been reformed, then abolishing the concept of custody and encouraging shared parenting after separation – changes that have only last year been adopted in New Zealand with the Care of Children Act.

However both Australian fathers’ rights groups and law experts say virtually nothing had changed, and parents still have a variety of tools to prevent the other parent from having any influence over the child’s life.

The Australian government plans to back up the law with a nationwide network of Family Relationship Centres which will help parents draw up an agreement about a child’s parenting after separation.

Together with compulsory mediation this is hoped to discourage parents to go to Court over their children.

It is estimated that about 40% of relationships with a dependent child in Australia break up, and in about 12% of cases the children end up living mainly with the father (New Zealand: around 15%).

However, fathers’ groups warn that the new measures could still fail if the issue of radical feminist views is not addressed in those organisations picked to run the Family Relationship Centres.