Mr. Keith Walsh:

One certainly feels it when one practises in this area rather than other areas. It is not a very sexy area of practice and is not treated particularly well in the hierarchy of the courts. From our perspective, we view it as something that has traditionally had difficulty getting funding allocated to it. It requires a lot of funding but it does not necessarily get it. There is a perception there. One of the difficulties relates to the in camerarule. People do not realise what is going on behind closed doors in respect of delays and so on. The in camerarule effectively prevents things about the courts being reported on a daily basis. If something happens in any of the other courts it is reported. There is very little reporting of the family law courts. The 2004 Act does allow for certain journalists to go in and report on the courts but the reality is that, because of resource issues in the media, the media does not want to devote resources to people going in to sit at the back of courtrooms.

We need some sort of change to the in camerarule to allow people to see into courts. It should not allow anyone's identity to be revealed, but should allow people to see how fathers, mothers and children are treated in the District Court with regard to guardianship, access and custody and how people are treated in respect of separation of divorce. People should be allowed to see how child abduction cases are handled in the High Court. Most people are not even aware that such cases happen. Transparency and further relaxation of the rules would assist the whole system but this is a hugely divisive issue. The people who are going to court do not necessarily want anything reported by the time they get there. It is a really tricky issue for the users or litigants in person and for the lawyers. This is an area on which no two people agree. More transparency is essential, however, otherwise family law will remain the poor relation. We have to acknowledge that this is one of the reasons for it.