FAMILY LAW Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words - 1

FAMILY LAW - Essay Example Prior to this act, domestic violence was dealt under the provisions of several different acts. This act supplanted them and integrated them into one act3. The previous provisions had been ambiguous, confusing and were unable to deal with all the aspects of domestic violence. They had prescribed different norms for dealing with domestic violence and were applied to a very narrow range of relationships. Different courts had delivered significantly different decisions; and there was considerable variation in the remedies applied by different courts for similar types of domestic violence. The new act did away with this confusion and disparity to a great extent4. The present situation in the UK is that an individual can be prosecuted on charges of domestic violence, through several criminal justice provisions. However, the victims of domestic violence can only invoke the family law act for remedies and civil initiatives, to get protection against such violence. The family law act is preferred by most of the women to initiate civil action against offenders5. There are two reasons for this; first, victims of domestic violence do not want to invoke criminal proceedings against such violence, because once the prosecution is under way, they will be unable to control or stop the process, which will be controlled by the police authorities, who will take decisions regarding the subsequent steps in the process6. These authorities decide whether the matter is to be brought before the Crown Prosecution Service. At this juncture, the victim cannot stop the process and there is risk of subsequent retaliation by the offender against the victim. Secondly, victims of domestic violence are generally women; and many women do not want the offender to obtain a criminal record7. Thus, most women seek non – molestation orders, which imposes restrictive measures on the perpetrator and restrain him from committing such acts in future; and