Promoting Safety and Accountability: Clarity, Consistency and Interconnected Laws

Abstract

In their complex journey through IPV, an individual woman may connect with a number of legal systems including the DVO system, criminal law, family law, child protection system, immigration law, social security law and so on. One of the problems underpinning the legal response to IPV in Australia is that these separate legal systems operate with different understandings of IPV. Despite the recommendations of the Australian and NSW Law Reform Commissions Report of 2010, that there should be a shared definition of family violence that includes coercive control and is applicable across systems, this is yet to eventuate. To date, not all systems and jurisdictions in Australia have embraced the c..