The pro-euthanasia lobby often promotes — or, at the very least, piggybacks upon — media reports of people facing difficult prognoses who want to end their lives rather than face the prospect of deterioration and all the difficulty that such an outcome may visit upon them. Such persons often become, for a short while, celebrities…

Two changes are needed for the taxation and family benefits system to improve efficiency and achieve equity between families. The first step is to replace the current complicated family tax benefit payment schemes with a single lump-sum payment per child. All existing family allowances, childcare subsidies, maternity allowances and other concessions for children in the…

So who is responsible for the most deaths ever? The communists? The Nazis? Armies at war? None of these. We now have the rough figures on the cause of the most deaths, and it is not from soldiers, dictators or criminals, but from doctors and those involved in the medical services. Abortion, it appears, is…

Following the South Australian branch of the Australian Medical Association’s recent rejection of the Hon. Dr Bob Such MP’s Ending Life with Dignity Bill in SA, the Tasmanian AMA last month rejected the Voluntary Assisted Dying proposal of Tasmanian Labor Premier Lara Giddings and Greens leader Nick McKim MP. The Hobart Mercury (March 16) cast…

The program for next month’s World Congress of Families (WCF) in Sydney shows that the congress will bring together many of the best thinkers and writers on the natural family, along with leading practitioners and family organisations from Australia and the rest of the world. The program is available on the congress’s website at www.wcfsydney2013.org.au/program.…

A brand new survey of what women really want concerning paid maternity leave is most revealing. Contrary to the usual line that basically all women want a paid career, with perhaps family thrown in on the side, this new Galaxy poll finds overwhelming support for the importance of stay-at-home mothering. Commissioned by the Australian Family…

Recently, federal Opposition leader Tony Abbott unilaterally announced that the federal Coalition, if elected, would implement one of the most extravagant paid parental leave (PPL) schemes in the world. Women in the paid workforce will receive six months’ maternity leave on a government maternity wage at their full pre-leave pay-rate, up to $150,000 per annum…

Why have stay-at-home mothers and home-based child-rearing been so consistently undervalued? Distinguished American social commentator and family activist Dr Allan Carlson finds some unexpected answers in history and economics. Contemporary issues surrounding family life, gender roles and child-care usually generate controversy. Accordingly, it is important to remember that the “collision” between home and work –…

The institutions of marriage and family are barely recognisable in Sweden today, writes Bill Muehlenberg. There are plenty of countries in the West which have promoted secular, leftist ideologies and have embraced radical social engineering. And these utopian schemers are quite happy to use the coercive powers of the state to enforce their radical objectives.…

Husbands have no protection from paternity fraud, thanks to legal rulings by the Family Court and High Court, writes Charles Francis QC. At a public function where Sir Owen Dixon, then Chief Justice of our High Court, was present, a guest remarked to him that he must feel very proud to have administered justice for…

Men’s groups are disappointed that the Government’s amendments to family law don’t go far enough, writes John Hirst. In June 2003, Prime Minister John Howard declared family law was not working well because too many children were growing up without contact with their fathers. The various men’s groups around the country hoped that finally they…

No-fault divorce has not yet led to no-fault weddings. Marriage services are now very varied, but in one form or another the couple make a commitment to each other. So far there are no services where the couples declare: “I promise you nothing” or “I will leave when I like”. These would be the words…

Children adopted from overseas should be taken into intact families in which both parents are married, says the Australian Family Association (AFA). The House of Representatives is currently conducting an inquiry into the laws governing adoption of children from overseas. In Australia, laws on adoption (including overseas adoption) are state matters, and are influenced by…