Written by Sasha Goldman
A former professional boxer is running across the country to raise
awareness about what he calls the failure of the family justice system
in Canada.
David Nash passed through Portage last week and says he's been averaging
between sixty and seventy kilometers a day as he attempts to run from
mile zero in Victoria, B.C., to Cape Spear in Newfoundland.
Nash notes he's doing the run unsupported, so he's also been pushing a
chariot carrier jogging stroller with sixty pounds of supplies.
He adds the hills of British Columbia were kind of tough but it's so
been so much easier here on the prairies.
Nash says the family justice system as well as the federal and
provincial governments of Canada have failed this nation's children
because there have been numerous opportunities over the last thirty
years to reform the Divorce Act but it has yet to happen.
He notes Canada is a signatory to the UN Convention on the Rights of the
Child, and says our family justice system violates numerous articles of
that convention.
Nash adds a special committee was formed back in 1998 to do a review of
the system and made nearly fifty specific recommendations which were
ultimately ignored.
He believes the Canadian Bar Association has been lobbying the
government to keep the broken system in place because it generates a lot
of money for lawyers.
Nash says the average divorce involving children now costs between
eighty and one hundred thousand dollars to settle.
He notes he's met many people during his trek across the country who
support his cause and say it's about time something was done to change
the laws.
Nash adds his own son is his biggest supporter and says basically he's
doing this run so no other child has to go through what his boy did
following the Nashs' divorce.
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