Parenting Coordination is a service provided by someone with a legal or social science background to parents who have final Court Orders or a Parenting Plan covering the day-to-day parenting arrangements for their children. Its purpose is to ensure compliance with the orders or plan, help resolve any disputes about the orders or plan, educate and monitor the parties and improve the communication and problem-solving skills of the parents. The goal is to make parties better co-parents and focus on the needs of their children and not their ongoing dispute.

Parenting Coordination is a form of dispute resolution and is another way of assisting in co-parental disputes to avoid the parties initiating and/or further litigating in the Federal Circuit and Family Law Court.

A Parenting Coordinator (“PC”) will assist parties through education, communication strategies and management of disagreements which also includes assistance in interpreting Family Court orders and Parenting Plans. PCs will guide the parties through their post separation issues and ensure they achieve a child focused outcome by way of short to long-term ongoing involvement with the family.

Implementing parenting arrangements post separation can be challenging and it is usually a new concept for most parents. Parties can benefit from a PC assisting them to navigate the readjustment to day-to-day life as co-parents who are now living separately and apart.

Given a Parenting Coordination programme requires a regular schedule of meetings with each other over a period of months or years, the assistance of a PC will guide parties through old and new challenges as they continue through a significant period of their co-parenting relationship.

A Parenting Coordinator must have a legal or social science background and have undertaken the relevant mediation and Parenting Coordination training. Both Belinda Crawford and Joanne Chayna have this training but in addition, they have had extensive experience in the court system, both having worked as Registrars of the Court for over 15 years. This has given them invaluable insight and experience in parenting matters and dealing with clients that have struggled with communication and co-parenting. They have dealt with Family Court parenting orders on a daily basis and have extensive experience in assessing and dealing with parental conflict and offering solutions to assist with resolving those disputes/conflict. They are also lawyers with Accredited Specialisation in Family Law along with accredited Mediators, Arbitrators and Family Dispute Resolution Practitioners.

• Additional time for Parenting Coordination work outside of the sessions themselves is charged at $660 per hour incl GST and is generally shared equally between the parties (more details included in the Parenting Coordination Agreement).