From todays Daily Mail

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2137070...vorce-addiction.html

I read this in my lunch break, very interesting and some interesting comments.

If I''m honest I suppose I agree to a certain extent. I would have loved to have stayed married and brought the kids up together. But I couldn''t move forward from the complete disrespect of my love and trust.

I disagree with the conclusion, but his comments are well thought out.

I think that they reflect a wealth of experience and evidence, but that the nature of the campaign requires much more serious thought. Examples of domestic violence and abuse are rife, must they go to counselling?

The ending of a marriage no longer precludes a moral judgement. Once upon a time you said your vows before God and to break them was immoral. With the increased secularisation of our society (which I view as a mixed blessing), this concept of morality seems to have ended. Divorce no longer carries a moral stigma and I think this is all for the good.

However, if the evidence is there that marriage is a positive thing, perhaps it''s worth listening to. At the end of the day we will ultimately make our own decisions, regardless of any public campaign.

I''ve said elsewhere that this story is just a re-hash of an earlier story n the same issue. Its no surprise that this story is being re-run ahead of tomorrow launch of Coleridge''s "Marriage Foundation".

I will be very interested to see the exact proposals when they are announced tomorrow, although I am slightly skeptical, I do think that anything that looks at family break-down and attempts to address those issues holistically, rather than just legally, is worth supporting.

I think that marriage does reflect commitment even though many who chose to live together might disagree. However, there are times when a marriage has deteriorated so badly, that the two people concerned have to let go.

Where the system fails children, is that there seems to be support for only one of the parents and that is usually the mother.

It is generally assumed that mum should remain in the family house with the care of the children. This designates mum as the parent with care and she thus qualifies for all the state help.

Nothing seems to be in place to help both parents with their decisions regarding care of the children. Unless both parents are flexible and willing to come to an agreed arrangement regarding the children, Court appearances with all the ensuing stress and expense, seem to be the only available option. mediation will only work if the parents can agree. Usually it is dads who struggle for contact with their children, but not always.

It is no good Judges and Ministers bleating on about the effect that divorce has on children unless they are prepared to do something about it.

Which is my mind is - unless there is a very good reason why dad should not have contact with his children, there should be an assumption that both parents should have equal care of their children. They did when they were married, so what is the difference when they are divorced. Enquiry into the incomes of both parents should be done right at the start of the separation in the hope that some sort of parity of income can be achieved. The mother''s income usually is propped up by state benefits, unfortunately dads get no state help whatsoever, even when their income falls well beneath that of the mother.

It is not just mothers who find themselves on the breadline following divorce and help should be given to fathers,especially those who are not highly paid, when they have children to care for following divorce.

I tried for nearly 24 years to make my marriage work. In the end after years of suffering depression I had to get out. My daughter actually said I wish you had left earlier. Sometiems however, hard you try it''s not good enough and something has to give.

It''s not been easy starting again but I''m glad I have.

I heard him being interviewed on the Today programme this morning and didn''t think he had much of a case, to be honest. Plus his foundation seems to be intending to offer people ''relationship support'' - isn''t that what Relate have been doing for years? He also seems to think that judges have extra expertise on marriage, rather than expertise on what happens when gone-wrong marriages become acrimonious, which is not the same thing.

Article about all this in the Guardian here:

www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/ap...judge-paul-coleridge