Rough Justice?

[johnca]

I am a divorced father and I have had 50% contact with my daughter for the past 5 years. My daughter's mother decided to restrict my established contact when she started a new relationship, this caused me to apply to the Courts for a Shared Residence Order. The case lasted 9 months and cost me £6k in legal fees. At no point during this process was my parenting skills or level of care criticised. The Judge refused my Application for Shared Residence and made a Contact Order, this was in May 2006. My 'term time' contact was reduced in line with CAFCASS recommendations by 1 day/fortnight, the order also stated that "holidays are to be shared equally following the normal 2 weekly cycle".
 
8 weeks after the Contact Order was issued it was amended by removing the word "equally", this served to further reduce my daughters contact with me by 1 day/week during school holidays. Equally shared holidays was accepted by both parties and CAFCASS throughout the case. The terms of the Contact Order were ambiguous and had to be amended twice because of other errors. My solicitor objected to the amendment but the judge refused to change the Order, the judge offered no explanation for this action. It has taken 12 weeks to finalise the Contact Order (all 4 sentences of it) and I feel tricked and cheated ... my daughter is very upset and feels I have let her down by losing a substantial amount of contact with her father.
 
Surely it is not fair for a County Court judge to retrospectively amend a Contact Order 8 weeks after the Order was made. My solicitor advises that his fees would be £15-25k to Appeal which I can not afford. Seems it is not viable for me to Appeal without legal representation so I have no option other than to accept the amended terms of the Contact Order.
 
The Family Law Courts are secretive and can not be held to account other than by people with substantial financial resources. In future I would refuse to attend any Family Court as I have no confidence in them, I can understand why many fathers refuse to be subjected to this humiliating process and decide to forego contact with their children. I can not believe what has happened!
 
Can you suggest any other means of getting redress other than writing to the Lord Chancellors Office? (which I understand is a waste of time).
 
I would like to join an active pressure group to change the way Family Law Courts operate, can you help with any suggestions please?
 
Any help would be greatly appreciated, hoping to hear from you soon.
 
Thanks

[Kent]

First off, I want you to know that you are not alone. There are many others out there, just like you. As a single person, you cannot accomplish much.

Where are you?
Look for a Fathers4Justice in your area.

Kent!

[fooman]

I went through the same thing and have been fighting an uphill battle eversince, but no matter how much b.s. I have to put up with my daughter knows that I love her and that every other weekend I will be there to pick her up. No matter what her mother does or says she knows deep down how I feel,and your daughter will too.



   Good Luck and never forget that this is the time that your daughter is going to need your emotional support the most.

[johnca]

I live in Lincolnshire. I can not seem to get anywhere contacting F4J assuming they have disbanded. Are there any other credible pressure groups?

Thanks for your kind words