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Australia

Jurisdiction code: AU · Legal system: common-law
Language(s): en

Australia is a federal common-law jurisdiction whose family-law architecture is the Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) as substantially reshaped by the Family Law Amendment Act 2023 (in force 6 May 2024). Schedule 2 of the 2023 Amendment Act rewrote the Court Children's Report (CCR) regime, repealed the s.61DA presumption of equal shared parental responsibility, and rewrote s.60CC best-interests with safety primacy. The Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (FCFCOA), formed by the 2021 merger of the Family Court of Australia and Federal Circuit Court, is the operational forum. FLA s.121 imposes a strict anonymisation regime — no individual CCR writer or party may be named in published reporting. Green & Green [2024] FedCFamC1F 896 is the principal post-reform PA-engaging FCFCOA case study. Practitioner regulation runs through AHPRA / Psychology Board of Australia (PsyBA).

PA recognition status

  • Statutory: indirect-hook
  • Apex court position: middle
  • Professional regulator position: silent

Statutory framework

  • Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) s.60CC — Family Law Act 1975 — best-interests considerations (post-2023 amendment safety-primacy rewrite) (1975) — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2023C00404
  • Substantive best-interests test for parenting orders. The 2023 Amendment Act Schedule 1 rewrote s.60CC to prioritise the safety of the child and persons caring for the child, removed the prior 'two-tier' primary/additional consideration structure, and inserted explicit guidance on family violence. PA-adjacent fact-patterns are decided here under the welfare standard.
  • Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) s.61DA (repealed by 2023 Amendment Act) — Family Law Act 1975 — presumption of equal shared parental responsibility (REPEALED 6.5.2024) (2006) — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2023C00404
  • Repealed by Schedule 1 of the Family Law Amendment Act 2023 (in force 6 May 2024). The former s.61DA presumption was a Howard-government 2006 reform that the 2023 Amendment Act removed in response to ALRC Inquiry 135 (2019) and Joint Select Committee 2021 evidence that the presumption was being misapplied in family-violence cases. Repeal is the load-bearing 2023 structural shift in Australian custody law.
  • Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) s.121 — Family Law Act 1975 — restriction on publication of court proceedings (1975) — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2023C00404
  • Strict anonymisation regime forbidding the naming of parties, children, witnesses, judges in some contexts, and individual Court Children's Report writers in publications of Australian family-court proceedings. s.121 is the structural reason no named-evaluator PA case-law equivalent to Re Y [2026] EWFC 38 (England & Wales) exists in citable Australian form, even where equivalent quality concerns motivated the 2023 Sch 2 reform.
  • Family Law Amendment Act 2023 Schedule 2 — Court Children's Report regime — Court Children's Report (CCR) — replaces 'family report' label and tightens evaluator standards (2023) — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2023A00087
  • Schedule 2 of the 2023 Amendment Act (in force 6 May 2024) replaces the prior 'family report' label with the tighter Court Children's Report standard, formalises the FCFCOA Family Report Writers Network (FRW pool) as the institutional vehicle, and operationalises evaluator-quality standards parallel in policy intent to the Re Y [2026] EWFC 38 reform in England & Wales.
  • Family Law Rules 2021 (Cth) Reg 7 (Expert Evidence) — Family Law Rules — single expert witness regime + FCFCOA Expert Witness Code of Conduct (2021) — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/F2021L01177
  • Single-Expert Witness regime: a single court-appointed expert (not duelling party-experts) writes the Court Children's Report. The FCFCOA-controlled FRW pool is by design the structural middle-camp evaluator architecture. This is operationally distinctive vs the duelling-party-expert regimes common in US and EU jurisdictions.
  • Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia Act 2021 (Cth) — FCFCOA Act 2021 — merges the Family Court of Australia and Federal Circuit Court (2021) — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2021A00013
  • Constitutes the FCFCOA as the unified federal family-law forum (Division 1 — superior court of record; Division 2 — Federal Circuit equivalent). Operational platform for all post-2021 Australian family-law proceedings including Green & Green [2024] FedCFamC1F 896.
  • Health Practitioner Regulation National Law Act 2009 (as adopted in each State and Territory) — Health Practitioner Regulation National Law — AHPRA framework (2009) — https://www.ahpra.gov.au/
  • National scheme establishing AHPRA and the Psychology Board of Australia (PsyBA). AHPRA registration is the load-bearing statutory credential for any Court Children's Report writer or court-appointed expert. The Australian counterpart to UK HCPC, Canadian provincial colleges, and US state psychology boards.
  • Australian Law Reform Commission Inquiry 135 (2019) — Family Law System review — ALRC Inquiry 135 — 'Family Law for the Future' (March 2019) (2019) — https://www.alrc.gov.au/publication/family-law-for-the-future-an-inquiry-into-the-family-law-system-alrc-report-135/
  • Comprehensive ALRC review of the Australian family-law system; the policy-evidence anchor for the 2023 Amendment Act's repeal of s.61DA and rewrite of s.60CC. ALRC recommendations on family-violence-informed decision-making form the doctrinal backbone of the 2023 reforms.

Apex courts

High Court of Australia

https://www.hcourt.gov.au/ - High Court of Australia is the apex court for federal family-law appeals. No High Court decision has directly engaged the parental-alienation construct as a contested scientific category. The High Court has addressed s.60CC welfare reasoning and s.61DA presumption in McCall v Clark, MRR v GR (2010), Goode and Goode, and others, but PA-construct adjudication has not reached the apex. (2026) — middle

Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (FCFCOA) Division 1 (Appellate)

https://www.fcfcoa.gov.au/ - Green & Green [2024] FedCFamC1F 896 — principal post-reform Australian PA-engaging FCFCOA decision. Engages the Court Children's Report regime under the 2023 Schedule 2 reform and the rewritten s.60CC safety-primacy frame. Anonymised parties per s.121. (2024) — middle — green-and-green-2024-fedcfamc1f-896

Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (FCFCOA) Division 2

https://www.fcfcoa.gov.au/ - First-instance federal family-law forum (former Federal Circuit Court track). The bulk of Australian custody and contact disputes including PA-adjacent fact-patterns are decided here under FLA s.60CC, with appeal to FCFCOA Division 1. (2026) — middle

Professional regulators

  • Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) / Psychology Board of Australia (PsyBA) — AHPRA / PsyBA is the statutory regulator for psychologists in Australia under the Health Practitioner Regulation National Law. PsyBA has issued no PA-specific position statement, no code-of-conduct guidance on PA-construct use, and no notifications standard on PA-engaging practice. Regulator silence on the construct is the EU6/NL/BE-parallel pattern at the Australian load-bearing-credential level. — https://www.psychologyboard.gov.au/
  • Australian Psychological Society (APS) — Principal voluntary professional society for psychologists. APS MAPS / FAPS / FCCLP designations are the customary post-AHPRA specialist credentials. APS has issued no public PA position statement engaging the construct directly. APS Section literature occasionally references PA-adjacent fact-patterns but the Society has not adopted a recognition or critique stance. — https://psychology.org.au/
  • Australian Association of Family Therapists (AAFT) — Self-regulatory family-systems / family-therapy professional body. AAFT sits alongside PACFA, ACA and AASW in the non-AHPRA self-regulated layer. No PA-specific position statement issued. — https://www.aaft.asn.au/
  • Australian Counselling Association (ACA) / Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia (PACFA) / Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW) — Self-regulated counselling, psychotherapy and social-work professional bodies. None has issued a PA-specific position statement. Practitioners registered with these bodies (e.g., Korosi PACFA, Price-Tobler PACFA, Graham FDRP) are flagged in directory stance_notes with the regulatory-analogue caveat parallel to the post-Re Y UK debate about non-HCPC practitioners. — https://www.theaca.net.au/
  • Family Report Writers Network — FCFCOA-administered — Institutional CCR-writer pool administered by the FCFCOA under the 2023 Sch 2 reform. Structurally the load-bearing operational middle camp by design — court-appointed single experts who write the Court Children's Report. Individual writers cannot be named per s.121 anonymisation. — https://www.fcfcoa.gov.au/
  • Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) — Federal statutory authority for family-research in Australia. AIFS research informs policy (including ALRC 135 evidence base) and includes Moloney + colleagues' critique-camp publications on PA / DV intersection. Not a regulator but a load-bearing knowledge institution. — https://aifs.gov.au/

Anonymisation convention

FLA s.121 imposes strict anonymisation: parties, children, witnesses (and in some contexts judges) cannot be named in published reporting of FCFCOA proceedings. Court Children's Report writers cannot be named in any public reporting. Cases are cited by pseudonym + year + court abbreviation + case number (e.g., 'Green & Green [2024] FedCFamC1F 896' uses generic surname placeholder). This regime is the structural reason no Australian appellate-named PA-expert case-law analogue to Re Y [2026] EWFC 38 (England & Wales) exists in citable form even where equivalent quality concerns motivated the 2023 reform.

Key developments

Structural findings

  • FLA s.121 ANONYMISATION REGIME is the structurally defining Australian feature. Strict anonymisation forbids the naming of parties, children, witnesses and individual Court Children's Report writers in published reporting of FCFCOA proceedings. This regime is the reason no Australian appellate-named PA-expert case-law equivalent to Re Y [2026] EWFC 38 (England & Wales) exists in citable form even where equivalent quality concerns motivated the 2023 Sch 2 reform.
  • 2023 AMENDMENT ACT (in force 6.5.2024) is the load-bearing recent shift: Schedule 1 repeals s.61DA presumption of equal shared parental responsibility and rewrites s.60CC best-interests with safety primacy; Schedule 2 replaces 'family report' with the tighter Court Children's Report standard and formalises the FCFCOA Family Report Writers Network. Policy-evidence base is ALRC Inquiry 135 (2019) + Joint Select Committee 2021.
  • SINGLE-EXPERT WITNESS REGIME under Family Law Rules Reg 7 is operationally distinctive: a single court-appointed expert, not duelling party-experts, writes the Court Children's Report. The FCFCOA-controlled FRW pool is by design the structural middle camp evaluator architecture, parallel in policy intent to the Re Y [2026] EWFC 38 reform but operationalised differently.
  • RECOGNITION-CAMP CLINICAL PRACTICE clusters around three vehicles: UTAS Matthewson research lab (first Australian PA research lab); Dialogue in Growth Korosi (Melbourne); Eeny Meeny Miney Mo Foundation / Parental Alienation Australia & New Zealand (EMMM-PAANZ) NGO axis. Recognition-camp critique of the 2023 reforms is led by EMMM/PAANZ at the institutional level.
  • CRITIQUE-CAMP PRACTICE IS OVERWHELMINGLY ACADEMIC NOT CLINICAL: Cathy Humphreys (University of Melbourne, social work, DV-research); Anne Hollonds (former National Children's Commissioner); Lawrie Moloney (La Trobe / AIFS). No clinical-practitioner-led DV/critique voice located at directory standard. Structural feature: Australian critique pole is academy-anchored, not clinic-anchored — inverse of the recognition-pole structural pattern.
  • TRANS-TASMAN AU+NZ CLINICAL DIALOGUE: Matthewson (UTAS), Korosi (Dialogue in Growth / PAANZ) and the late Dr Bryan Moriarty operate explicitly trans-Tasman. Moriarty is recognition-anchor cross-listed in both AU and NZ directories. EMMM-PAANZ functions as a structurally trans-Tasman NGO.
  • DUAL REGULATOR FRAMEWORK AHPRA + PsyBA is the load-bearing credential for any court-facing PA work. Practitioners listed without AHPRA-psychology registration (PACFA, ACA, AASW, FDRP) are flagged with regulatory-analogue caveat parallel to the post-Re Y UK non-HCPC debate.
  • NO HIGH COURT PA-CONSTRUCT JURISPRUDENCE: the High Court has addressed s.60CC welfare reasoning and former s.61DA presumption in McCall v Clark, MRR v GR (2010), Goode and Goode and others, but PA-construct adjudication has not reached the apex. Australia clusters with NL/BE/DE in the 'no-apex-PA-position' bloc, distinct from Italy (Cass. 9691/2022) and Spain (STS 519/2017).

See also

  • case-study:green-and-green-2024-fedcfamc1f-896
  • practitioner:au.matthewson-mandy
  • practitioner:au.korosi-edwina
  • practitioner:au.moriarty-bryan
  • practitioner:au.humphreys-cathy
  • practitioner:au.moloney-lawrie
  • practitioner:au.hollonds-anne
  • practitioner:au.emmm-foundation
  • practitioner:au.paanz
  • practitioner:au.fcfcoa-frw
  • jurisdiction:new-zealand
  • jurisdiction:england-and-wales

Sources

  1. Federal Register of Legislation — Family Law Act 1975 (Cth) consolidated — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2023C00404 (Australian Government — Office of Parliamentary Counsel) [en]
  2. Federal Register of Legislation — Family Law Amendment Act 2023 — https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2023A00087 (Australian Government — Office of Parliamentary Counsel) [en]
  3. Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia (FCFCOA) — https://www.fcfcoa.gov.au/ (FCFCOA) [en]
  4. High Court of Australia — https://www.hcourt.gov.au/ (High Court of Australia) [en]
  5. AustLII — Australian case-law database — https://www.austlii.edu.au/ (Australasian Legal Information Institute) [en]
  6. Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA) / Psychology Board of Australia — https://www.psychologyboard.gov.au/ (AHPRA / PsyBA) [en]
  7. Australian Psychological Society (APS) — https://psychology.org.au/ (APS) [en]
  8. Australian Law Reform Commission — Inquiry 135 'Family Law for the Future' — https://www.alrc.gov.au/publication/family-law-for-the-future-an-inquiry-into-the-family-law-system-alrc-report-135/ (ALRC) [en]
  9. Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) — https://aifs.gov.au/ (AIFS) [en]

Editorial notes

  • Primary-source order: Federal Register of Legislation cited first (FLA 1975 consolidated + Amendment Act 2023); FCFCOA + AustLII for case-law; AHPRA + ALRC + AIFS for regulatory and policy material.
  • FLA s.121 anonymisation is foregrounded as the principal structural Australian feature — drives both the absence of named-evaluator appellate case-law and the FRW pool's institutional-rather-than-personal directory presence.
  • Australia treated as a federal jurisdiction; State/Territory family-law variation is procedural rather than substantive (FLA is federal under Constitution s.51(xxi) marriage power + state referrals).
  • Trans-Tasman AU+NZ overlap recognised: PAANZ + EMMM Foundation are structurally bi-national; cross-link practitioner:au.moriarty-bryan to NZ entry. New Zealand jurisdiction deepening must take account of this shared circuit.
  • Preserved correction from au.json therapist v2: 21 candidate practitioners reviewed → 12 verified, 9 excluded — reflects high evidentiary bar AU regulatory landscape imposes for safe listing.

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