 |
| Formation | 2003 |
|---|---|
| Founder | Matt O'Connor |
| Location |
|
| Website | http://www.fathers-4-justice.org |
Fathers 4 Justice (or F4J) is a fathers' rights organisation in the United Kingdom. Founded in 2003, the group aims to gain public and parliamentary support for changes in U.K. legislation on fathers' rights mainly by staging stunts and protests, often conducted in costume.
F4J was founded in the U.K. by Matt O'Connor, a marketing consultant. [1] He is the sole shareholder and a director of Fathers For Justice Limited. [2]
On 21 October 2003, campaigners Eddie "Goldtooth" Gorecki and Jonathan "Jolly" Stanesby scaled the Royal Courts of Justice in London while dressed respectively as Batman and Robin. [3] The following day, the group's members protested through London in a military tank in support of Goreckwi and Stanesby. [4] Nine days later, David Chick climbed a 120 feet (37 m) crane near Tower Bridge while dressed as Spider-Man. The Metropolitan Police subsequently set up a cordon around the area that disrupted traffic through some of East London for several days. [5] Chick was later cleared of criminal charges. [6]
In 2004, Stanesby carried out a "citizen's arrest" of the then-Minister of State for Children Margaret Hodge at a conference, handcuffing himself to her and stating: "Margaret Hodge, I'm arresting you for covering up child abuse." Both Stanseby and Jason Hatch (who had also attempted to handcuff himself to Hodge) were later cleared of false imprisonment charges by a jury. [7]
On 19 May 2004, an alert was caused when two members of the group threw purple flour bombs at Tony Blair during Prime Minister's Questions at the House of Commons. [8] Charged with public order offences, activist Guy Harrison was fined £600, [9] and Ron Davis given a conditional discharge.[ citation needed ] Following the House of Commons incident, The Times wrote that the group "has succeeded in becoming the most prominent guerrilla pressure group in Britain... within eighteen months of its founding". [10]
In September 2004, member Jason Hatch climbed the walls of Buckingham Palace dressed as Batman; all charges relating to his protest were later dropped. [11] Also in September, David Chick climbed the London Eye, forcing the attraction to close. He was found not guilty of charges of causing a public nuisance. [12]
In May 2005, campaigners dressed as superheroes protested on top of the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield during the World Snooker Championship. [13]
Protester Ray Barry also climbed St Peter's Collegiate Church in Wolverhampton on Fathers Day in June. He was later cleared of a public order offence charge, after which he repeated the protest on Christmas Day. [14] On 27 September 2005, protester Guy Harrison climbed the Palace of Westminster unveiling a banner stating "Does Blair care? For Fawkes sake change family law." A jury acquitted him of the charge of committing a public nuisance offence. [15]
During January 2006, The Sun published a story in which it claimed F4J members planned to kidnap Leo Blair, the young son of former Prime Minister Tony Blair "for a few hours as a symbolic gesture". The police said they were aware of such a plan [16] but added it had probably never progressed beyond the "chattering stage". [17] However, F4J Founder O'Connor condemned the alleged plot and threatened to shut down the group because of it. Within days, the group was disbanded. [18]
In March 2006, F4J member and barrister Michael Cox was jailed for refusing to pay money he owed to the Child Support Agency. Cox told a hearing in Southampton he refused to pay on principle, as he had joint custody of his children, and his former wife wrote to the court in support of him. [19]
F4J then re-formed again in May and protested during the showing of the BBC lottery show The National Lottery: Jet Set on 20 May. The show was taken off-air for several minutes after six F4J protesters ran from the audience onto the stage displaying posters. [20]
On 8 June 2008, two fathers from F4J climbed onto the roof of Labour Party deputy leader Harriet Harman's house while wearing superhero-style costumes; they called themselves "Captain Conception" and "Cash Gordon". One of the fathers, Mark Harris, said he wanted fathers to have the same rights as their children's mothers' new partners. He also said they would not come down unless Harman read Harris' book, Family Court Hell. [21] In the same month, Bristol Family Court was evacuated after a fire alarm was set off in the building during a F4J protest outside the building. [22]
On 9 July, F4J members Nigel Ace and Tony Ashby, this time in Spider-Man and Batman outfits, climbed Harman's roof and draped a banner that read "Stop The War On Dads." [23]
In 2010, campaigners interrupted an interview with snooker player Steve Davis, causing the BBC to cut to a pre-recorded video segment. [24]
In July 2011, O'Connor staged a hunger strike just outside UK Prime Minister David Cameron's home in Oxfordshire, demanding that he honour what O'Connor said were pledges about grandparents' rights to see their grandchildren, as well as rights governing shared parenting. [25]
In 2012, F4J staged a naked protest inside the Oxford Street branch of retailer Marks and Spencer in order to protest the shop's advertising on parenting website Mumsnet which F4J believed "promotes gender hatred". [26]
In June 2013, Paul Manning glued a picture of his 11-year-old son to John Constable's 1821 painting The Hay Wain in the National Gallery in London. (However, F2J later publicly withdrew support for Manning in January 2014, following alleged breaches of their terms and conditions.) [27]
Also in 2013, Tim Haries spray-painted the word "Help" on a portrait of Queen Elizabeth at Westminster Abbey. O'Connor announced that he would additionally target other art works in order to highlight his campaign. [28]
On 9 August 2013, F4J protester Martyn Judd climbed onto the balcony of the Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel to protest what he asserted to be the inequality of fathers' treatment in family court cases during a CAFCASS conference at the hotel. The protest came to an end when sprinklers flooded the hotel. [29]
On 8 January 2014, Tim Haries was found guilty of defacing the portrait of the Queen. [30] On 5 February 2014, Haries was sentenced by Judge McCreath at Southwark Crown Court to six months in custody. [31]
On 30 November 2015, two men involved with the group were arrested after a few hours of standing on the roof of Queens Gallery, an art gallery on Buckingham Palace grounds. [32]
On 15 June 2016, three F4J protesters stormed the stage of ITV's Loose Women shouting "No Kids No Cash." The show was briefly taken off air. [33]
On 22 August 2016, O'Connor walked on stage dressed as a priest during a live broadcast of the Rose of Tralee during Cavan Rose Lisa Reilly's interview with host Dáithí Ó Sé. He was subsequently removed from the stage by security staff before being taken away by Gardaí. [34]
On 4 September 2018, while streamed live on the F4J Facebook page, O'Connor and his fellow protester Paul Robinson staged a messy protest at an ASDA Supermarket in Peterborough by pouring Coco Pops and milk all over the floor in the cereal aisle. The pair claimed that Kellogg's latest slogan "Loved By Kids, Approved By Mums" was promoting cereal discrimination against dads. The pair paid for the items afterwards when police were called to the protest. [35]
On 15 December 2024, F4J protester Chris Todd scaled the Trafalgar Square Christmas Tree whilst dressed as Santa and hung up a poster of Keir Starmer bearing the words: 'Put the father back into Xmas, No Ho Ho! It's Scrooge Starmer!' He then proceeded to put up another poster bearing a photo of himself and his daughter on the tree and remained perched on the Christmas Tree's branches whilst allegedly shouting "Keir Starmer has blood on his hands!" The protest resulted in the temporary closure of Trafalgar Square whilst police tried to convince Todd to come down from the tree. He was eventually arrested for causing criminal damage to the Christmas Tree and will go on trial at Westminister Magistraites Court on the 22 January 2025. [36] [37] [38]
Members of the group have been accused of conducting intimidating attacks in order to upset court staff, family lawyers, and Members of Parliament. [39] During protests outside the offices of the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (CAFCASS), individual case workers were identified by name. One office of CAFCASS was forcibly entered by F4J members who then detained an unnamed employee; no criminal proceedings are known to have resulted. [40]
Former members of the group have claimed F4J and the O'Connor family have "lost its way" by being sidetracked from reforming family law and instead descending into personal attacks on Twitter, libel (for which they were sued), and allegations of illegal acts such as putting an MP under surveillance and tracking her movements with a GPS tracking unit. [41] Former members who do not agree with O'Connor's leadership went on to form the New Fathers 4 Justice group in 2008. [41]
An unintended result of the F4J campaign has been the exposure of flaws in security at Buckingham Palace, resulting in security enquiries or reviews there [42] and also at the House of Commons. [43]
Charles Leslie Falconer, Baron Falconer of Thoroton, is a British Labour politician, peer and barrister who served as Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice under Prime Minister Tony Blair from 2003 to 2007.
Harriet Ruth Harman, Baroness Harman,, is a British politician and solicitor. She was a Member of Parliament (MP) for more than 40 years, from 1982 to 2024, making her the second longest-serving female MP in British history after Baroness Beckett. Harman was MP for Camberwell and Peckham from 1997 to 2024 and MP for Peckham from 1982 to 1997. A member of the Labour Party, she was Deputy Labour Leader and Chair of the Labour Party from 2007 to 2015, and also briefly served as Leader of the Opposition in 2010 and 2015, after the resignations of Gordon Brown and Ed Miliband, respectively. She served in various Cabinet and Shadow Cabinet positions. She has been a member of the House of Lords since 2024. The same year, Harman succeeded Labour Party MP Jess Phillips as co-host of the Sky News podcast Electoral Dysfunction, alongside political editor Beth Rigby and former Scottish Conservatives Leader Baroness Davidson of Lundin Links.
David Lindon Lammy is a British politician who has served as Foreign Secretary since July 2024. A member of the Labour Party, he has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Tottenham since 2000. Lammy previously held various junior ministerial positions under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown between 2002 and 2010.
Liberty, formerly, and still formally, called the National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL), is an advocacy group and membership organisation based in the United Kingdom, which challenges unjust laws, protects civil liberties and promotes human rights. It does this through the courts, in Parliament and in the wider community. Liberty also aims to engender a "rights culture" within British society. The NCCL was founded in 1934 by Ronald Kidd and Sylvia Crowther-Smith, motivated by their humanist convictions.
The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) is a non-departmental public body in England set up to promote the welfare of children and families involved in family court. It was formed in April 2001 under the provisions of the Criminal Justice and Court Services Act 2000 and is accountable to Parliament through the Ministry of Justice. Cafcass is independent of the courts, social services, education, health authorities and all similar agencies.
The fathers' rights movement in the United Kingdom consists of a large number of diverse pressure groups, ranging from charities and self-help groups to civil disobedience activists in the United Kingdom, who started to obtain wide publicity in 2003. Studies show the majority of the UK population support the need for change and protection of fathers rights to meet the responsibility through 50:50 contact. The movement's origin can be traced to 1974 when Families Need Fathers (FNF) was founded. At the local level, many activists spend much time providing support for newly separated fathers, most of whom are highly distraught. Although some have been accused of being sexist by some commentators, these groups also campaign for better treatment for excluded mothers, women in second marriages, other step-parents and grandparents – all of whom suffer discrimination in respect of contact with their (grand) child(ren).
SPEAK is a British animal rights group working to end animal testing in the UK.
John Eugene Joseph Dromey was a British politician and trade unionist who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Birmingham Erdington from 2010 to 2022. A member of the Labour Party, he served as Deputy General Secretary of the Transport and General Workers' Union and later Unite from 2003 to 2010.
Anthony Edward Timpson, is a British politician who served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Eddisbury in Cheshire from 2019 to 2024. He is a member of the Conservative Party.
SirKeir Rodney Starmer is a British politician who has served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom since 2024 and as Leader of the Labour Party since 2020. He previously served as Leader of the Opposition from 2020 to 2024. He has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Holborn and St Pancras since 2015, and was Director of Public Prosecutions from 2008 to 2013.
New Fathers 4 Justice is a UK-based direct action fathers' rights group campaigning for the rights of fathers to see their children. It is a splinter group of Fathers 4 Justice.
Caroline Fiona Ellen Nokes is a British Conservative Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Romsey and Southampton North since 2010. Elected as a Conservative, Nokes had the Conservative whip removed on 3 September 2019 and sat as an independent politician until the whip was restored to her on 29 October.
Shabana Mahmood is a British politician and barrister who has been serving as Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice since 2024. A member of the Labour Party, she has been Member of Parliament (MP) for Birmingham Ladywood since 2010. Between 2010 and 2024 she held various shadow junior ministerial and shadow cabinet positions under leaders Ed Miliband, Harriet Harman, and Keir Starmer.
The Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) is an activist organisation in England and Wales. It was founded in the UK in 1982 and incorporated in 2004 as Palestine Solidarity Campaign Ltd. In 2023, The Guardian described it as "Europe’s largest Palestinian rights organisation".
Bobby Smith is a British political and fathers' rights activist. He is the founder and leader of the Give Me Back Elmo party which he set up to seek to change the law in family courts after his own experiences.
Jonathan 'Jolly' Stanesby is a British fathers' rights activist.
Roger 'The Court Jester' Crawford is a British author and fathers rights activist. Born in the Autumn of 1948, he was adopted as a baby and given up by his birth parents who were not married and extremely poor.
Campaign Against Antisemitism (CAA) is a British non-governmental organisation established in August 2014 by members of the Anglo-Jewish community. It conducts litigation, runs awareness-raising campaigns, organises rallies and petitions, provides education on antisemitism and publishes research.
Woman to Woman, known in the media as Harriet Harman's Pink Bus, was a political campaign in the United Kingdom for the Labour Party at the 2015 general election. It was led by Deputy Leader of the Labour Party Harriet Harman, and involved a pink battle bus visiting marginal constituencies, promoting Labour policies and rallying support among female voters. It was described by Labour as the party's "biggest ever women's campaign". The Pink Bus was criticised in the media as "sexist and patronising".
The British prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, practised law before his political career began in 2015. Since becoming a barrister in 1987, he mostly dealt with criminal defence work on human rights matters. In 2008, he became Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and Head of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), holding these positions until 2013.