If you have just separated, the thing keeping you awake is probably some version of the same fear — that you will lose time with your children, that the other parent will not be reasonable, or that sorting this out will turn into a drawn-out fight with lawyers you cannot afford. Start with this: around 97% of separated Australian parents never end up with a judge deciding their parenting arrangements for them. 

Even if you go to court all of the processes are designed to encourage you (some say push you) into reaching your own agreement, which is then made into court orders by consent. 

Most parents never see a judge

The Australian Institute of Family Studies surveyed about 6,000 separated parents roughly 18 months after separation. Only about 3% used the courts as their main pathway to sorting out arrangements for their children — and those were predominantly families affected by ongoing family violence, child safety concerns or other complex issues.

Everyone else worked it out another way. About 16% used family dispute resolution services or lawyers. The rest sorted it out between themselves.

That pattern has not shifted. The Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia received 101,092 family law applications of all kinds in 2024–25, parenting, property and divorce combined,  in a country where tens of thousands of couples with children separate every year. Court remains the exception. More than half the applications are for Consent Orders from people who’ve never even started a family court application. 

Family dispute resolution works — even when parents think it won’t

Family dispute resolution is the process the Family Law Act 1975 established in 2008 sets up for separating couples. A Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner — an FDRP — is registered with the Commonwealth Attorney-General’s Department and trained to help you and your former partner make workable arrangements for your children without a judge deciding for you. They do not take sides and they do not decide anything for you.

It is not only about the children, either. FDRPs help separating couples work through parenting arrangements, finances and property settlement agreements. Often in the same process, over a series of mediation sessions because in real life those decisions are tangled together. 

Where you live, what you can afford and how the week is split are one conversation, not three. The Section 60I certificate requirement applies to disagreements about the children, but there is nothing stopping you sorting out the rest at the same time.

Relationships Australia followed 704 parents through its national Family Dispute Resolution Outcomes Study. Over half,  57.5% reached agreement on at least one issue, including parents who had walked in expecting to end up in court. Almost three-quarters (73.2%) were satisfied with the process itself.

The finding worth sitting with is this one: even parents who did not reach agreement came out of the process with less hostility and ill-will towards each other than they went in with. Nothing about a courtroom does that.

What actually matters for the children

Parents often assume the arrangement itself, the nights, the split of time, the schedule,  is what determines how their children cope following separation. The research says otherwise.

The Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) found that among school-aged children in separated families, 86–93% of parents rated their child as doing the same as, or better than, their peers across most areas of life. What separated the children who struggled from the children who did well was not the parenting schedule. It was exposure to conflict and family violence.

Which means the most useful thing most separating parents can do for their children is to lower the tension between the adults. That is precisely what family dispute resolution is designed to do.

Why any mediator won’t do

Mediation is a general term for a process where an independent person helps people negotiate with each other. Good mediators work in workplaces, commercial disputes, neighbourhood conflicts and elder mediation and family decision making. For separating families, though, the law is specific. You need a Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner.

Three reasons this matters:

• Only an FDRP can issue a Section 60I certificate. If your dispute does end up going to court, you generally cannot file for parenting orders without one. A mediator who is not a registered FDRP cannot give you that certificate, however skilled or experienced they are. That means you could complete an entire mediation and still have to start again with an FDRP.
• Check the register. Accreditation and registration are what tell you a practitioner is the real thing, so look them up before you book. If the person you are considering is not on the relevant register, keep looking.
• Every nationally accredited mediator in Australia is listed on the AMDRAS National Register. 
• Every Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner is listed on the Attorney-General’s Department FDR Register. 
• An FDRP must not proceed unless you can both negotiate freely. This is a legal obligation under the Family Law (Family Dispute Resolution Practitioners) Regulations 2025, not a courtesy. Before anything starts, the FDRP has to be satisfied that each of you is genuinely able to make your own decisions — weighing up family violence, safety, health and whether one person holds all the power. If something is in the way, they have ways to work around it: keeping you in separate rooms so you never have to sit across from each other, allowing a support person, sending you off for legal advice or counselling first, or simply taking more time to prepare. What they must not do is run a process where you cannot freely decide what you are willing to agree to. If it cannot be made safe and fair, they stop.

So by all means use a mediator for the fence line or the business partnership. For your children, use an FDRP.

What has changed in the law

If you are reading older articles about family law — including the 2019 AIFS research above, be aware that the framework has changed substantially:

• 6 May 2024 — the Family Law Amendment Act 2023 removed the presumption of equal shared parental responsibility. This does not mean your responsibility as a parent is automatically stripped away. It means a court no longer starts from the assumption that decision making must be shared, and instead looks at what is safe and best for your child. Section 61C is untouched: unless a court orders otherwise, both parents keep parental responsibility and the Act encourages you to consult each other about the major long-term issues where it is safe to do so. But a court can order that one parent decides alone if it finds the two of you are not able to reach agreement about some or all of the major long-term issues — your child’s health and medical treatment, their schooling, or where they live.
• 1 April 2025 — the Family Law (Family Dispute Resolution Practitioners) Regulations 2025 replaced the 2008 Regulations, including a new Section 60I certificate.
• 10 June 2025 — the Family Law Amendment Act 2024 substantially changed how property is divided, and two of those changes are significant. First, the effect of family violence is now a consideration on both sides of the calculation — what each of you contributed during the relationship, and what each of you needs going forward. Economic and financial abuse is defined in the Act for the first time, and the definition of family violence has been broadened. Second, housing the children appropriately is now a listed future need. Property is no longer treated as though it sits apart from what happened in the relationship, or from where the children will sleep. Companion animals are also dealt with specifically.

What has not changed: before you can apply to a court for parenting orders you generally need a Section 60I certificate from a registered Family Dispute Resolution Practitioner — unless an exemption applies, such as family violence, child abuse or urgency.

What “best interests of the child” means now

Every decision about children under the Family Law Act comes back to a single test: what is in the best interests of the child. Since 6 May 2024 there is a shorter, plainer list sitting behind that test, set out in section 60CC of the Act. A court considers:

• what arrangements would promote the safety of the child and of everyone who cares for them, including safety from family violence, abuse, neglect and other harm
• any views the child has expressed
• the child’s developmental, psychological, emotional and cultural needs
• each person’s capacity to meet those needs
• the benefit of a relationship with both parents, and with other people who matter to the child, where that is safe
• anything else relevant to that particular child

On top of those, a court must consider any history of family violence, abuse or neglect, and any family violence order.

For an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander child, the court must also consider the child’s right to enjoy their culture, and the support they need to stay connected to family, community, culture, country and language.

There is no longer a starting point of shared care

This is the change parents most often have not heard about, and it matters.

The old section 65DAA required a court, in certain circumstances, to consider ordering that a child spend equal time with each parent or failing that, substantial and significant time. It has been repealed. A court can still make those orders where they genuinely suit the child, and many arrangements do look like that. But there is no longer any requirement to work through those options first, and no presumption that shared care is what a child needs.

So the question is not what is fair between two adults, or what a parent is entitled to. It is what works for this child, in this family, safely. And that is a question the two of you are far better placed to answer than a judge who will meet your family for an hour or two. It is the whole argument for sorting it out yourselves, with help.

Plain talk about family violence

Separation brings out behaviour that most people would never otherwise recognise in themselves. That is not an excuse and it is not a judgement, it is just what we see. But it is worth knowing exactly where the law draws the line, because a lot of people are on the wrong side of it without ever having thought of themselves that way.

The Family Law Act defines family violence as behaviour that coerces or controls a family member, or causes them to be fearful. It does not have to be physical. It does not have to look like anything you have seen on television. The Act sets out examples:

• assault
• sexual assault or other sexually abusive behaviour
• stalking
• repeated derogatory taunts
• intentionally damaging or destroying property
• intentionally causing death or injury to an animal
• unreasonably denying financial autonomy
• unreasonably withholding financial support needed for reasonable living expenses
• preventing someone from connecting with their family, friends or culture
• unlawfully depriving someone of their liberty

Read that list slowly. Punching a wall is on it. Smashing a phone is on it. Cutting off the bank account, or putting someone on an allowance, is on it. Turning up at a workplace uninvited, or tracking someone’s location, is on it. Wearing someone down with the same contemptuous remarks until they stop arguing back is on it.

Plenty of people who do these things would never call themselves violent. The system does not ask how you would describe it.

Children notice more than you think

The Act says a child is exposed to family violence if they see or hear it, or otherwise experience its effects. That includes overhearing threats, seeing an assault, comforting a parent afterwards, cleaning up something that was broken, or being there when police or an ambulance arrive.

Parents routinely tell us the children were asleep, or in the other room, or too young to understand. The research above is blunt on this point: exposure to conflict and violence is what separates the children who struggle from the children who do well. Not the parenting schedule. 

If you recognise yourself in this

This is the hardest part to read, so we will keep it short. If something on that list sounds like you, the useful response is not shame. It is a phone call. The Men’s Referral Service on 1300 766 491 is the national counselling, information and referral line for men who want to change their own behaviour. Your FDRP can also point you towards local behaviour change and counselling services.

Making that call before things go any further is one of the most protective things you can do for your children and it is a great deal easier than explaining it to a judge later.

If something on that list sounds like what is being done to you, 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732 is available 24 hours a day. In an emergency, call 000.

Either way, tell your FDRP. It changes how the process is run,  separate rooms, different timing, more preparation, sometimes a referral somewhere else first. It is not a reason to be turned away. It is the reason the assessment exists.