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1.9 million domestic abuse victims last year

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March 28, 2024

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March 28, 2024

Around 1.9 million people were victims of domestic abuse in the last year the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has revealed.

These latest figures include 1.3 million women and 600,000 men across England and Wales were affected by emotional and financial abuse, as well as sexual abuse and violence. These numbers represent 8.2 per cent of women and four per cent of men in the country.

In total, more than a quarter of women – 27.1 per cent – and 13.2 per cent of men have experienced some form of domestic violence or abuse since they turned 16. This means that as many as 4.5 million women and 2.2 million men have been victims.

Women are far more likely to be victims of all types of family violence, the ONS reports. In the last year 2.7 per cent experienced some kind of sexual violence from their partner. By contrast, only 0.7 per cent of men suffered the same type of abuse.

The figures were published in the ONS’ annual crime statistics report.

Last month, a women’s charity insisted that family courts are currently failing to adequately protect the partners and children of domestic abusers. Victims continue to suffer because of a “misguided belief … among judges that, because a relationship has ended, so has the domestic abuse” the group’s chief executive claimed.

Read the ONS report here.

The blog team at Stowe is a group of writers based across our family law offices who share their advice on the wellbeing and emotional aspects of divorce or separation from personal experience. As well as pieces from our family law solicitors, guest contributors also regularly contribute to share their knowledge.

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Comments(4)

  1. Andrew says:

    In how many cases were there findings of abuse or violence in judicial proceedings in which both parties could be heard and (subject to means) be legally aided?
    .
    The others are merely unsubstantiated allegations.

  2. Otla says:

    Crime of any kind, whether it is theft or violence or perjury or what have you, is nothing more than a symptom of how bad a country or region is run, and how criminal the political leadership is. I suspect if people weren’t increasingly subject to job insecurity, foreclosure, starvation, lack of access to justice, slavery, depression or what have you, you would dramatically reduce crime. But we don’t want to do that, because crime is good for business.

    I’m confused about what crime has to do with family law though. Crimes should be tried in the criminal courts. The fact that one can make allegations about crimes in the family courts simply exposes how incompetent and idiotic the British justice system is. Blurring family law and criminal law for the sake of the divorce industry increasing enmity and maximising profit is the bigger form of violence in society. Separating family law and criminal law would I suppose be too sophisticated an idea for British lawmakers.

    • Paul Apreda says:

      Excellent analysis, particularly around the issues of the blurring of criminal and family law. When Orders are made they are often broken or ignored. MoJ statistics show that only 2.1% of applications for Enforcement end in an Order for enforcement. So, what we now advise is to consider applications for Non-Molestation Orders under the Family Law Act 1996. Part of the rationale is that breach of this civil order is a criminal offence – and we know that, unlike dealing with perjury or breaches of Child Arrangements Orders, Courts send offenders to prison for breach of a Non-Mol.

    • stitchedup says:

      The blurring of criminal and family law is deliberate. Non molestation orders provide a back door into the criminal justice system and a means of convicting perfectly decent men/fathers for non violent acts which on normal circumstances would not be criminal behaviour.

      Paul, please be careful here… Your motive maybe to highlight the failings of the current system by putting judges etc in a position where they find themselves having to convict more women and sending them to prison but two wrongs do not make a right. Ex-parte non mols lead to massive acrimony between separating/divorcing parents and the consequences to any children involved of seeing a parent imprisoned for something trivial are massive. That parent may well loose their livelihood and ability to support those children and the acrimony between the parents will quite possibly become insurmountable meaning that the children will experience constant conflict and perhaps long term estrangement. We have to better than those that apply for and issue these non mols not let ourselves be drawn to their depths of immorality.

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