Self-represented litigants have had the ability, in certain circumstances, to cross-examine their victims during family law matters.
But the Federal Government will today introduce legislation scrapping the practice, citing significant community concern and a desire to avoid further trauma of victims.
“In the criminal jurisdiction, many years ago, the practice was ended where a self-represented litigant would be able to cross-examine their victim in a sexual violence or in a rape matter,” Attorney-General Christian Porter told ABC News Breakfast.
“That situation, unfortunately, persists in a very small number of incidences in the Family Court.
“For those very small number of cases where there are clear allegations or indeed convictions of violence, the perpetrator of the violence should not be able to cross-examine the victim of the violence.”
Courts would also have the discretion to stop the direct cross-examination where domestic violence was alleged, and would be required to put in place extra protections for alleged victims — including screens or video links in court rooms — where questioning was allowed to occur.
Where questioning is allowed, it would have to be done by a lawyer, including legal aid lawyers where an alleged abuser does not have their own representation.
“In those circumstances, cross-examination can and should probably still happen, but it will have to be conducted by an independent counsel,” Mr Porter said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-28/domestic-violence-offenders-can-no-longer-cross-examine-victims/9915058
Category: Domestic Violence
State of Origin domestic violence research: Violence spikes on Origin.
For twelve hours, from 6pm this evening, Australia’s women and children are at more risk of harm than on almost any other Sunday evening of the year.
Emergency services know this. The police know this. Hotels and pubs around the country certainly know this.
Because from now until 6am tomorrow morning, we’ll be riding through one of the few days in the year when incidences of domestic violence surge by 40.7 per cent.
“It’s crystal clear that the State of Origin fixtures are leading to a surge in domestic violence. It’s happening on the National Rugby League’s watch and women and children are being harmed as a direct consequence of these games,” says Michael Thorn, Chief Executive of the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education.
The link between booze and football is where all these statistics are pointing – what they’re screaming about, really – as the experts who collate them question the decisions to let alcohol brands advertise around these games, to sponsor teams, to continue to be so very prominent in every aspect of preparation and celebration of big sporting occasions, both for fans and players (Mad Monday, anyone?).
https://www.mamamia.com.au/state-of-origin-domestic-violence-research/?
Police Prepared For A Rise In Domestic Violence Ahead Of England’s First World Cup Match
New research has found that reports of domestic violence rose by as much as 38% when England lost a match during the 2014 World Cup.
“We know the tournament leads to an increase in both alcohol-related violence and domestic abuse,” Chief Inspector Mike Haines, from the Hampshire Constabulary, told Sky News. The force has introduced an extra five patrol cars and 10 additional officers specifically for responding to and supporting domestic-violence victims.
In the alcohol-fuelled, hyper-masculine world of the World Cup, it’s women who are put in danger.
So much so that women aren’t safe if England win either – the research found that domestic violence also rose by 26% when the team were successful or drew. Last World Cup, there was still an 11% rise in domestic violence on the day after an England match.
The level of domestic-abuse incidents reported to police during the World Cup has steadily increased over the past decade – 64 reports were recorded in 2006, jumping to 99 in 2010. Of course, this may reflect a shift in more victims feeling empowered to report their experience of abuse – but it by no means minimises the troubling link between football and the violent outbursts of abuse hurled at women.
https://www.the-pool.com/news-views/latest-news/2018/25/Emily-Baker-on-rise-in-domestic-violence-when-England-lose-World-Cup-match
Secret NSW Government report says out-of-home care fails to help vulnerable children
A long-awaited report into child protection services in New South Wales that labels the system “ineffective and unsustainable” has prompted calls for the resignation of Family and Community Services Minister Pru Goward.
The independent review, authored by David Tune, was commissioned in November 2015 in response to the growing number of children in out-of-home care, rising system costs and futile past reforms.
The report was handed to then Premier Mike Baird in 2016 and has remained secret ever since.
The review found government spending was allocated to an “ad hoc” variety of programs that were delivered in “agency silos” which made it difficult for clients to navigate.
“Interventions are not adequately evidence based or tailored to meet the multiple and diverse needs of vulnerable children,” the report argued.
It recommends the Government establish a new statutory authority to provide “personalised support packages” to vulnerable children and families and bridge gaps between agencies.
The report also highlighted the increasing cost of out-of-home care partly due to the transfer of services from Family and Community Services (FACS) to the NGO sector.
The Government spends $41,000 for a child in NGO foster care compared to $27,000 per child in the care of FACS.
Greens MP David Shoebridge said by withholding the report for months the Government was “playing politics” with the lives of vulnerable children.
Mr Shoebridge said the minister had “failed utterly” to respond to the call for self-determination and ignored the complex needs of Aboriginal children and communities.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-12/secret-report-shows-out-of-home-care-fails-to-help-nsw-children/9857966
‘I could have ended up dead’: why UK women’s refuges face a fatal new threat
A proposed change to funding means vulnerable women would not be able to pay for refuge placements with their housing benefit. It is the single biggest threat these shelters have ever faced.
Sandra Horley, who is now the chief executive of Refuge, currently the largest single provider of domestic abuse refuge services in the country, worked there from 1983. “Nothing had existed like it before,” she says. “Women and children just flocked to our doors in their hundreds.” It was, she says, chaotic. “Very distressed women, women with black eyes, broken bones … they were all very traumatised and had been emotionally abused, controlled, blamed by their families and friends, because it was a taboo subject then.”
While Horley stresses that not all women want to go to a refuge – they have community-based services for those cases – many do. Yet refuges are facing unprecedented cuts: “There aren’t enough spaces to meet demand. Finding one is like finding gold dust, sometimes,” she says. Local authorities across England have cut their spending on refuges by nearly a quarter since 2010, according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. In March of this year, 65% of councils responding to freedom of information requests by the Guardian confirmed they had cut funding in real terms over the past seven years. Since 2011, Refuge has seen funding for its safe-houses slashed, on average, by a third.
All of this is against the background of what Refuge calls the “single biggest threat to the future of refuges”: government proposals, published last October, to remove refuges from the welfare system, meaning vulnerable women will not be able to pay for placements using housing benefits. Currently, more than 50% of refuge funding comes from those benefits.
If the proposals, due to come into force in 2020, go ahead, Refuge is warning that four out of 10 refuges will have to close. According to Women’s Aid, 60% of all referrals to refuges were declined in 2016/17, usually owing to a lack of space, with figures suggesting that rate is even higher for BME women. The upshot is women are being left without the support they need at what can be the most fraught part of their journey – the time they try to flee.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2018/jun/11/i-could-have-ended-up-dead-why-womens-refuges-face-a-fatal-new-threat
Women’s rights in Russia's North Caucasus: between “national traditions” and “ordinary” m urders
In February 2018, the European Court of Human Rights awarded €20,000 in compensation to Khava Bopkhoyeva from the village of Galashki in Ingushetia. Her daughter Zaira was 19 when she was taken to hospital and diagnosed as having been poisoned by “unknown substances”. The girl fell into a coma as a result of impaired oxygen flow to the brain.
A couple of months previously, Zaira had been bride-kidnapped on her way home from college. Though bride-kidnapping is banned – at least on paper – in Chechnya, it is still practised in Ingushetia and North Ossetia.
Honour killings are not a ubiquitous phenomenon, of course. But they do exist, and they’re justified on the basis of tradition, which renders any discussion around women’s rights absurd. Furthermore, there has been a recent tendency to make allowances for “national traditions” even in court, especially when it comes to post-divorce custody decisions. We’ve witnessed many cases of Ingush and Chechen women being forcibly separated from their children. So many, in fact, that one is tempted simply to focus on those where everything ended happily.
Having reviewed Elita Magomadova’s appeal, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in April 2018 that her right to family life had been violated and awarded her €15,000 in compensation for moral damages. This marks the first time that a case concerning familial relations in Chechnya has been resolved in such a senior court.
Elita’s son was returned to her only in 2016, three years after the boy was kidnapped and relocated from Moscow to Chechnya by her ex-husband.
Elita did her best to put up a fight. But the Russian court ruled again and again that the child would remain with his father. Even after the latter was killed in a road accident, his relatives still refused to give the child back to her mother. Though Elita managed to win the case following numerous legal proceedings, the court bailiffs spread their arms in a gesture of helplessness: we cannot find the child! Desperate now, Elita appealed to the ECHR, which sent an inquiry to Russia. As was to be expected, however, our country failed to recognise that any rights violation had taken place. The court’s decision not to return the kidnapped child to her mother and leave him in the care of his father’s family was explained with reference to “the national idiosyncrasies of child-rearing in Chechen families”.
https://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/svetlana-anokhina/womens-rights-in-the-north-caucasus
This Is How Women Can Lose Custody Of Their Children When Courts Believe Their Abusive Ex-Partners
Survivors of domestic abuse have called for a radical overhaul in the family court system after a report, released today, found systemic gender discrimination in the family courts is putting children at risk.
The report, from the charity Women’s Aid and Queen Mary University London, found that harmful attitudes towards domestic abuse survivors from lawyers, the judiciary, and employees of the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) are leading to women being discriminated against in the family court, which in turn is putting children at risk.
One-quarter of survivors who responded to the survey said that they had been cross-examined by their abusive ex-partner during the court hearings; more than 60% said that there were no special measures in place at the court – such as separate waiting rooms, different entry and exit times, or a screen or video link – to prevent them from having to come into contact with their abuser.
Almost 70% of the women surveyed said that their abusive ex-partner had also been emotionally abusive towards their child or children, while almost two in five said their abusive ex-partner had also been physically abusive to the children.
Survivors said they were seen as unstable by judges, barristers, and Cafcass officers, or were blamed for their abuse, or disbelieved.
Rachael, whose real name is also not being used, was taken to court by her ex-partner, who wanted access to their child. He has a string of previous convictions for violence against women and men, and had served time in prison for attacking her while she was pregnant. She also had a restraining order against him and had reported him to the police several times since his release from prison.
“I thought, I don’t have a criminal record, the justice system in this country is amazing. They will see him for what he is,” she said. “I had evidence, police statements. I thought, There’s no way he’ll get access to my child. I went in there confident that no one else would allow him access, but it didn’t go that way.”
The court ruled in her ex’s favour, which Rachael said put both her and her child’s safety at risk. The judge insisted that her ex-partner knew which school their child was attending after she moved house to protect herself, and granted her violent former partner supervised contact, which would then lead to unsupervised contact.
Rachael was also cross-examined by her former partner in court for three hours, which she said was “the worst experience of my life”.
Katie Ghose, chief executive of Women’s Aid, said: “We know that perpetrators of domestic abuse are using the family courts to continue to control and abuse victims, and that the sexist attitudes entrenched within the family courts are enabling that abuse.”
https://www.buzzfeed.com/hannahalothman/this-woman-lost-custody-of-her-children-after-the-courts?utm_term=.kq2dB72YW#.enBL5KxWn
Men kill women in four of five domestic violence homicides | Society | The Guardian
A new report has found that women are overwhelmingly the victims in fatal domestic violence cases, with the first three months after they leave their male partner the most dangerous.
Men killed women in 80% of domestic violence murders in Australia between 2010 and 2014, and about one in three killed a former partner.
A report, published on Thursday by the Australian Domestic and Family Violence Death Review Network, found almost half of those homicides of former female partners occurred within three months of the relationship ending. According to the Domestic Violence Prevention Centre, women attempt to leave an abusive relationship on average between five and seven times before successfully and permanently doing so, and the time when a woman leaves her abusive partner is also when she is in most danger of being harmed.
The report found that almost a quarter of men (24%) who killed their current or former female partner were named as respondents in Domestic Violence Orders that were supposed to protect their victim.
“In some cases where a female homicide offender killed a male partner there was evidence that domestic violence went both ways prior to the fatal episode, meaning that the female offender had both abused and been victimised by the male she killed,” the report found. “In fewer cases, the male homicide offender killed a female partner in circumstances where he had been both victimised and abused by that female partner.”
Three men (2% of offenders) killed their male partner. There were no instances of a woman killing her female partner.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/may/31/men-kill-women-in-four-of-five-domestic-violence-homicides
Why Swedish girls are hiding spoon in underpants at airports.
It is of course impossible to know the number of women and girls being taken abroad and forced into marriage, but we do know it’s happening all over the world. And we know one in five girls worldwide will be married before their 18th birthday.
A number of cases have emerged in Sweden in the last four years.
Idegard’s message is simple: If a girl slips a spoon into her underwear, it will trigger the metal detectors at the airport.
“You will be taken aside and you can talk to staff in private,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
“It is a last chance to sound the alarm,” she said.
Airport staff have been alerted to this new tactic, and instructed on how to best respond
https://www.mamamia.com.au/spoon-in-underpants/?
Churches Can No Longer Hide Domestic Violence
We spoke to more than 250 counselors, church workers, psychologists, clergy members, theologians, social workers, sociologists and survivors. We discovered aspects of the culture that allow abuse to occur and continue: the teaching of male “headship” and the domination of women, a dearth of female leadership, the church’s emphasis on forgiveness, stigma surrounding divorce, the lack of understanding of domestic abuse, and a covering-up of women’s experiences.
We found that many local pastors did not believe women who came forward with stories of abuse. Church leaders often told women to submit to their husbands, to endure and stay.
We cited Steven Tracy, a professor of theology and ethics at Phoenix Seminary in Arizona, who wrote in 2007: “It is widely accepted by abuse experts (and validated by numerous studies) that one-fourth to one-third of North American women will be assaulted by an intimate partner in their life time and that evangelical men who sporadically attend church are more likely than men of any other religious group (and more likely than secular men) to assault their wives.”
Since our reports were published, some Australian churches have taken action, including apologies to victims from the Australian Anglican (Episcopalian), the Sydney Anglican Diocese and the Uniting Church in Victoria and Tasmania. Some individual leaders have vowed to listen to women. But the work is slow.
The church took decades to reckon with the sexual abuse of its children. Now, surely it is time to reckon with the abuse of women.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/10/opinion/churches-can-no-longer-hide-domestic-violence.html?
