Abuse survivors 'retraumatised' by family law system, says Women's Aid

RTÉ News​

2 days ago

Child and adult survivors of domestic abuse say that going through the Irish family law system is traumatic and causes "secondary victimisation" and "increased vulnerability", new research has shown.
The report, commissioned by Women's Aid, showed that the family law system is "completely inadequate" when it is not attuned to the tactics and impacts of domestic abuse post-separation, Chief Executive Sarah Benson said.
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Ms Benson said the research was a 360 degree examination of the experiences of abuse survivors, with the focus particularly in the context of guardianship and custody and access proceedings.
She said it showed that unfortunately the feedback from those "who have navigated that system whilst also experiencing post separation abuse, found that [the actual experience] was tantamount to secondary victimisation".
Ms Benson said international research shows that between 49% and 62% of all family law proceedings will have a component of domestic violence.
However, she said, this is not being addressed in custody and access proceedings in the same way as it might be in domestic violence hearings and this is causing risk.
She said everyone in the legal system must be trained to understand domestic violence and in particular coercive control as the research is "telling us overwhelmingly" that coercive control is "something that abuses will use in the courts".
Women's Aid said the research "reveals the urgent need" for the law system to develop a holistic response to domestic violence and abuse (DVA).
The national charity said that the system is not sufficiently informed or aware of DVA and this undermines rights and comprises the safety of victim-survivors.
Although individual workers such as legal practitioners and judges within the courts system were mentioned positively by victim survivors, respondents felt that the system as a whole was a negative and traumatic experience.
Two-thirds of adult victim survivors reported that judges failed to take their experiences of domestic violence and abuse into account when making decisions about guardianship, custody, and access involving the perpetrator.
"We have witnessed how complex, disjointed and arbitrary the system is."
Other issues brought up in the report included lack of access to legal representation, lack of time to consult and prepare for cases, significant financial burdens, and a generally overwhelmed system.
Ms Benson said the family law system often assumes that when a couple separates, if domestic violence or abuse was taking place, it has now ended.
However, Ms Benson said sometimes the abuse takes other forms, for example, economic abuse or using children to denigrate the non-abusing parent.
"Participants in the research spoke of having to adhere to court ordered access to avoid being charged with violating a court order, requiring them to regularly engage with their abuser," Ms Benson said.
"This frequently provided court-sanctioned opportunities for further abuse to occur," she added.
Some participants in the research said their experience of the family justice system was even worse than the abuse.
Ms Benson said this was a "shocking situation, but sadly, not a surprising one".
"Women's Aid are in the family law courts daily with women who must navigate an unforgiving system while still being subjected to devastating abuse from their partners or ex-partners.
"We have witnessed how complex, disjointed and arbitrary the system is," she said.
Ms Benson added: "We are really concerned about the lack of comprehensive training and understanding of domestic violence and the impact of abuse on victim-survivors at every level of the family law system.
"This was especially evident in the reported experiences of court-appointed assessors.
"In many instances when women raised legitimate safety concerns for their children, they were often inappropriately accused of engaging in the highly contested concept of 'parental alienation' while the possibility of DVA as a reasonable concern was not meaningfully considered."
The research examined how adult and child survivors of domestic violence and abuse access and navigate the family law system.
It comprised a research team from both Trinity College Dublin and University College Cork and involved court observations, surveys, interviews and focus groups with children, aged-out minors, adults, domestic violence practitioners, health, social care and legal professionals and judges.
The researchers spoke to both adult and child victim survivors of their experience of guardianship, custody and access proceedings in Ireland.
Adults who took part in the research described their experiences as "relentless, overwhelmingly negative and retraumatising," the report found.
Children and young people reported that the family law system failed to listen or respect their independent views.
Women's Aid is calling on the Government to reform the family law system as part of the family justice strategy in a way that is informed by domestic violence and abuse.
This would include compulsory domestic abuse training for all professionals in the system and improved access to legal representation.
In a statement, the Department of Justice said that tackling domestic violence and supporting victims of crime are "central priorities" for the minister.
The department said the family justice strategy 2022-2025 and the Family Courts Act 2024 aim to make family courts work better for those engaged with it.