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Fathers Battling Injustice
A little refresher, Renate ...
Posted By: Athena
Date: Monday, 21 February 2000, at 5:15 p.m.
Unfortunately I no longer have your submission to the Committee on C-41.
All the caps in the following excerpts are mine.
Ms. Renate Diorio (Founder, Families Against Deadbeats): Good morning. My name is Renate Diorio. I am founder of Families Against Deadbeats. I would like to take this opportunity to define our terminology for “deadbeats”. We do not consider an individual, non-custodial parent who is paying for HIS child or who has access to HIS child a deadbeat. We deal with the individual who has clearly misused HIS title as parent and who takes no part whatsoever in HIS children's. That is OUR TERMINOLOGY for “deadbeat”.
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Senator Duncan Jessiman: Thanks, Madam Chair. I don't there's anyone on this committee who isn't sympathetic to those who find themselves in the position where the court has ordered custody payments or maintenance payments to be made and they're not made. Bill C-41, brought in just about a year ago, really strengthened that situation. So if a non-custodial parent does not pay, we now have not only the court that can put him in jail...which really is not the answer, because if you put a person in jail, either party, you're depriving that person from earning a living so he can pay the support. So they've come along and they've strengthened it to the extent that they can take away their driver's licence, their passports, other licences. That's fair, and we all agree with that. • 1025
But would you not agree—and I know from where you're coming, but I want you to try to be as honest with us as you can, because you've heard others before you just today—there is another side to this? Let's assume we have these people who are not deadbeats, as you say, because they're paying their support, but for whatever reason the custodial parent—and usually it's the woman—decides in her wisdom she's not going to give access to that child. We also know that there is the law and if a person is in contempt of court that custodial parent could be put in jail. And that's actually happened in Ontario, but it took 22 times of contempt of court
My question is, would it not be reasonable on the same basis it's reasonable for non-payment, that if they don't give access when the non-custodial parent is paying—not a deadbeat—the custodial parent also lose her driver's licence or her passport or get similar treatment, so that she would know in advance that, if she didn't do this, it was a possibility? I ask any one of the three groups.
Ms. Renate Diorio: I agree with you. I think there should be harsh punishment on that side as well. However, we experience that—within our membership we don't get child support from our ex-spouses—access is in place and these parents do not exercise their right to see their children, some of them going back for ten years. And we just admire anybody who wants to see their children. Our hearts expand when we hear about a parent or a father who cannot see his child, when HERE WE HAVE FATHERS who have all the rights and can see their child any time they want to and just can't be bothered.
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Ms. Renate Diorio: Yes, I know. As I said, in our group, the deadbeat is the lowlife. HE'S the individual who refuses to take accountability and responsibility for the children HE created. HE walks away, doesn't want to see them, doesn't want to help support them, doesn't want any part of their lives. To us, THAT'S A DEADBEAT. It's not someone who's a few dollars in arrears. That's not the case at all.
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Ms. Renate Diorio: Our brief will be coming in the next week, and I can provide you with the stats that I can get hold of in terms of intimate femicide. I'm not clear on thing, though. Did you want statistics on how many women are abused, or did you want statistics on how many women with children are abused?
Renate's contribution to the Special Joint Committee
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