Government Adopts Umbrella Domestic Violence Bill
The government adopted on Thursday an umbrella domestic violence bill as the first document of its kind to define domestic violence, Labour, the Family Social Affairs Minister Marjeta Cotman told the press after the session.
The bill identifies five forms of violence - physical, sexual, psychological and economic violence as well as neglect - and provides a definition of each form. It is applicable to all victim groups, including children, men, women, elderly and disabled persons, said Cotman.
The definitions of economic violence and neglect as a form of violence have been drafted with the consideration of modern criminal and sociological research, the ministry said in a press release. According to Cotman, the bill is aimed at securing a long-term protection for the victims of domestic violence by defining their right to free legal assistance. Victims also have the right to choose an assistant and legal representative, she added.
The bill defines tasks, roles, networks and cooperation between different state institutions, authorised bodies, self-governing associations and NGOs. It also envisages the protection of victim's identity, primarily if the victim is a minor, said Cotman. Problems of domestic violence have so far been dealt with by individual institutions, which resulted in one institution passing responsibility on to others. The new legislation dictates that these institutions will have to cooperate.
Research shows that the number of reported cases of domestic violence is increasing: in 2000 there were 3,000 instances of domestic violence, while the number increased to 5,000 in 2005. In 88% of the cases, offenders were men, while the rest were women who were violent against children.
According to research carried out at the international level, one women out of five has been at least once a victim of domestic violence, while research on violence of parents against their children provide similar figures.
In Slovenia, statistics on domestic violence is officially kept only by the police. If both cases of domestic violence classified as crime and those classified as an offence are considered, the number of domestic violence cases in the last ten years has increased by as much as 73%.
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