Putting asunder: the restructuring of the Australian Family Court

This article reviews the Australian Family Court system. In describing the history, the author argues that the system is still incomplete: each state or territory has a different division of labour between their own and the federal courts. The Australian system has been criticised, not least from senior members of the judiciary in Australia. But the author concludes that some of the criticisms are exaggerated, and the benefits have been ignored. The fundamental problem is still the low status and priority given to children and families by lawyers.     

Gender and Social Work: Will Dip. S.W. make a difference?

Correspondence to Moira Kirwan, Gateside House, Hill Road, Gullane, East Lothian EH31 2BE. Summary With the publication of Paper 30 (CCETSW 1991) and the developmentof Dip.S.W. programmes which incorporate a strong emphasis onequal opportunities, it might be reasonable to expect that socialwork training is now going to take on board the issue of gender.Dip.S.W. programmes are immersed in concerns about anti-discriminatorypractice and aim to provide up-to-date training for an up-to-dateprofession. This paper is based on a study of the Dip. S.W.programmes running in Scotland in 1991/92. This was when thefirst Dip.S.W. qualified social workers emerged from the newtraining. Do these social workers have a new way of lookingat issues such as gender? This paper argues that the Dip.S.W.programmes are focusing on practice issues while ignoring theissues within the profession. Practice issues cannot be separatedout in this way. Social work cannot be anti-oppressive as longas the social work profession itself continues to oppress itsfemale workforce. Dip.S.W., as it is currently provided, doesnot offer the prospect of a change in the gender imbalance ofthe profession and thus it will not make a difference to howemerging Dip.S.W. social workers can tackle the issue with colleaguesor clients.