In this the International Year of the Child the law relating to children's rights has come very much under scrutiny. I do not propose in this article to canvass the rights of the child under the Criminal Law but to examine the rights of the child in that area of the civil law which in these days of increasing marital breakdown, (at a rate from between 1 in 7 to 1 in 5 of every marriage in Australia) is most likely to affect him, namely under the Family Law Act.

I then want to postulate as to how those rights can be extended and improved both by statutory recognition as well as policy administration.