The best possible laws

Domestic violence is a crisis.

There’s little dispute about that. One in three Trinbagonian women will experience physical, emotional or economic violence. Children, men, elders, those with disabilities, are each susceptible in particular ways.

Domestic violence happens through relationships. Either when people share intimacy or a family tie – where gender often plays a role. Or when people have a relationship because they live under the same roof.

When domestic violence killings of women spiked at the turn of this year, a few dozen groups came together in an Alliance for State Action to End Gender Based Violence, to rally attention from the media, police and Parliament.

The Commissioner of Police announced the creation of (un-budgeted) Gender-Based Violence and Sexual Offences special victims’ units.

We asked the Attorney General to address long-standing weaknesses in our badly ageing, 20-year-old domestic violence laws (enacted as part of the UNC’s turn-of-the-century suite of social legislation). In February, Angelique Nixon and others shepherded the delivery of 1,700 signatures to Whitehall.

The AG committed to putting amending the Domestic Violence Act on 2020’s legislative calendar. He has.

Week before last, a Senate bill drafted with successive consultations with the Alliance, Law Association and Equal Opportunity Commission (EOC) was introduced, and should be able to make it into law before Parliament goes on break in July – perhaps for good before the election.

Senators begin debating it at tomorrow’s 10 am sitting.

There’s much in the bill for advocates to cheer. And we’ve been saying so in drivetime public-service radio announcements on Power102 and BoomChampions.

Reporting abuse of the elderly and vulnerable would become mandatory. Police could get emergency protection orders by telephone; and interim protection could be granted even if a defendant doesn’t show up. People in some visiting and dating relationships would now be recognised. Children victims or witnesses would have increased protection.

Modernising the 1999 act is important for the protection of everyone at risk of domestic violence – without discrimination. The Law Association, EOC and NGOs produced a joint analysis of the June 3rd bill. Read it at: bit.ly/2020DVbillBrief.

With TriniGoodMedia’s support, EOC chair Lynette Seebaran-Suite, Caribbean Male Action Network administrator Kevin Liverpool, Womantra founder Stephanie Leitch, Conflict Women CEO Asiya Mohammed, domestic violence survivor Onika Mars, Women of Substance, Tobago, president and I are all on air, voicing the importance of changes the legislation would make.

And three key gaps.

Try to listen.

Collaboration among the NGOs has been powerful, deepening relationships forged through last year’s efforts to reshape the sex-offender registry bill, and roll back the troublesome provisions in the non-profit bill. Strategic partnerships between the civil society groups and two institutional entities and healthy dialogue with drafters in the Attorney General’s Ministry in making good law have been even more encouraging.

We’re currently engaging Independent and Opposition benches on the importance of the bill and the simple changes we’re asking for.

And why shouldn’t we be a grown-up nation that enacts the best possible laws we can for domestic violence?

The bill could easily generate a media sensation sideshow. (I recall chemical castration headlines when senators debated the Sexual Offences Bill.) I hope that won’t be the case.

Three very concrete amendments to the AG’s bill would get us much further to the legislation victims of domestic violence deserve; and I trust they’ll be where the other senate benches will focus their weight.

One’s really easy. For some uncanny reason, the new bill retains a 1999 provision limiting protection of people living under the same roof – and by definition in a domestic relationship – to those also related by blood, marriage or adoption. Literally making the definition of “member of the same household” not the plain English it should be.

That leaves unprotected quite a few Caribbean family forms like, say, adult godchildren. More importantly, people at risk of violence because they are under the same roof are excluded from protections focused on that very vulnerability.

Fortunately, changing an "and" for an "or"; a semicolon; and an (a) fix that, protecting anyone who “ordinarily or periodically resides in the same dwelling house as the applicant or respondent.”

How police respond to domestic violence can be a matter of life or death. The AG’s bill gives police several new tools to protect people at risk. A second, simple amendment would go further, giving police instructions on using those tools, adding clause 21A(ii):

“Where a police officer has reasonable cause to believe that a person has engaged in or attempted or threatened physical violence, the police must investigate, and decide whether to arrest, charge and/or refer to social services for intervention. In investigating reports of domestic violence, a police officer should also undertake a risk assessment.”

Our third amendment expands mandatory reporting options, adding Children’s Authority and Family Services. Not everyone will tell police. Follow the bill debate online: youtu.be/TPWkcscz8tw.