Family life in meltdown, says judge

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During a conference speech in Brighton, Family Division judge Mr Justice Coleridge warned the breakdown of the family would, within 20 years, "be as marked and as destructive as global warming".

The judge, 58, said that in urban areas family life was "in meltdown or completely unrecognisable".

He said children born into broken homes were increasingly turning to drink, drugs and crime, and the results were affecting the mental health of parents and children across the country.

Venting his personal views, which he maintained many in the family law profession supported, he added: "In some of the more heavily-populated urban areas of the country family life is, quite frankly, in meltdown or completely unrecognisable."

"In some areas of the country, even including the more urban parts of the sleepy west in which I operate, family life in the old sense no longer exists.

"So I suggest the general collapse of ordinary family life, because of the breakdown of families, in this country is on a scale, depth and breadth which few of us could have imagined even a decade ago."

He said he was not criticising single parents and praised some of them. He said: "I am not saying every broken family produces dysfunctional children but I am saying that almost every dysfunctional child is the product of a broken family."

A spokeswoman for the Department for Children, Families and Schools defended the Government's record on families and children. She said: "Most children and young people in England today are safe, healthy, and achieve well."

"We are absolutely committed to improving the wellbeing of all children, young people and families. We do not agree that there has been a breakdown in the family - 70% of families are headed by a married couple and a recent BBC poll suggests that three-quarters of people in Britain are optimistic about the future of their families, 24% higher than when the same question was asked in 1964. Our Children's Plan puts children and families at the centre of everything the Government does."