A father has recounted his experience of the family law system as “deeply unfair and deeply biased”. Fathers’ right campaigners have consistently highlighted what they say is the unfairness of family law.

Writing in the Sunday Independent, the man, who did not given his name for the sake of privacy, said his experience is that a mother can decide a marriage is over and “the husband is expected to move out and pay up”.

Then, “if he doesn’t leave his children, a playbook of tactics and allegations is employed to ramp up the pressure”.

He said he lost count at 50 court dates and the countless number of times he walked out of courtrooms feeling the system was determined to “force” him out of his child’s life, “despite all the evidence that exists as to the powerful affirmative role fathers have”.

In particular he questioned the use of Section 47 child welfare reports which can be ordered by a judge hearing a family law case.

The unnamed father said he experienced malpractice with multiple Section 47 practitioners: “incompetence, gender-bias, basic sloppy mistakes, money-grabbing, a lack of compassion and basic bad manners”.

“It is an unregulated, unprofessional Wild West — an abomination which needs to be exposed and replaced. There is no transparency, no accountability and no oversight. All is shrouded in secrecy behind the ‘in-camera’ rule”, he said.