Push for mandatory paternity testing in Australia

This story in The Australian is interesting. Quote:

'A men's rights group has called for mandatory paternity testing of all babies after government figures revealed almost 600 instances of men compelled to financially support children they did not father.

Since changes to child support laws four years ago, there had been 586 cases of men successfully using DNA testing to show they were not biologically related to children they had been financially supporting, the federal government has revealed to The Australian.

In the overwhelming majority of these cases, the courts have not forced mothers to pay back the money they have received.

Of the 586 cases, only 74 mothers have been told to pay back the money. Those reparations total in excess of $533,000.'

It's quoted in the article that up to one third of men who seek paternity testing find they are not the father. Mind you, the article also includes an interview with the head of the president of the sole parents union - who immediately tries to quash the idea. I heard her interviewed on radio where she blatantly stated that most men who seek paternity testing are trying 'get out of their parenting responsibilities one way or another'.

What's more interesting for me is how the press reports this. I did a quick news hunt and turned up several stories over the past couple of years where women had their babies swapped at a hospital and took the wrong one home. When this was discovered and reported, the mothers were horrified that they'd been raising another woman's baby, and the news coverage was extremely sympathetic. Now I know this isn't the same thing as having paternity fraud put upon you, but it's pretty damned close - and when PF is reported (if it is at all) there seems to be no coverage of the emotional damage done to the man at all.