Upside down!

The Federal Council's decision not to pass any legislation on joint parental custody as a matter of course for the time being is unjustifiable. It is a victory for those forces that seek to prevent equality between fathers and mothers for ideological reasons. GeCoBi has therefore published the following press release:

For almost eight years, the Federal Council has been working on a new regulation for joint parental custody. For two years, the Federal Council has been promising to present a draft bill.

And now, a clearly focused proposal that already enjoyed majority support is to be turned into a political patchwork. Under the guise of "majority support," an issue is being buried that can no longer be stopped in any other way. The majority of the population and the majority of parliamentarians have long since spoken out in favor of joint parental custody as the norm. With the transparent trick of linking custody to child support, the inevitable is now to be postponed for several more years. The apparent goal is to reignite old conflicts. The fact that we have a legal vacuum in this area since the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights in December 2009, because the existing laws violate human rights, seems to be of no concern to the Federal Council.

The Federal Council apparently still hasn't grasped that this approach is going in precisely the wrong direction. Joint parental responsibility, as GeCoBi has been advocating for years, presupposes that both parents share responsibility. This also means that both parents should have the opportunity to assume both childcare and maintenance responsibilities after separation. However, this is only possible if the starting point regarding custody rights is equal for both parents. The current regulations clearly and blatantly disadvantage fathers, who have no way of obtaining or retaining parental custody without the mother's consent. Conversely, they also reinforce outdated societal structures, almost inevitably leading to divorced women being forced into childcare, while divorced men are forced to work full-time due to alimony payments. Fathers who want to fulfill their role as parents are thus pushed out of their children's lives.

If, instead, the legislature insisted that both parents jointly find a viable solution for childcare and maintenance in cases of separation and divorce, and provided these parents with appropriate assistance (mediation, etc.), significantly more positive solutions for all parties involved could be expected.

A child's right to both parents is a fundamental human right. Making this right dependent on a financial arrangement is putting the cart before the horse.

Oliver Hunziker,
President of GeCoBi

13.1.2011