The High Court and family law: The Hague child abduction cases

Abstract

This article is the first of what we hope will be a series of papers examining the contribution made to family law by the High Court of Australia. It deals with the Hague Convention on International Child Abduction. We analyse the six existing High Court decisions on various aspects of implementation of the Convention in Australia, and explore how the Court deals with some of the issues that have troubled courts internationally as they implement the Convention. We hope this discussion, together with future articles in this series, will contribute to an understanding of the role and significance of the Court as the ultimate Australian court of appeal, and the nature of its contribution to fam..