Those who have so far voted for this proposed law have good intentions; it is very important to help the small number of persons, mostly women, who are brutalized by their partners and need to end the relationship with a maximum of safety. But a law which will produce more wrongs than it treats, and which may be counterproductive even in many of the wrongs which it treats, is seriously misguided¾ there are better solutions already in place.

Most couples suffer through serious conflicts at times; and in all likelihood, in most cases both are at fault to some degree. (Roughly half of all cases of physical assault between spouses are mutual fighting, and one-way attacks on partners are committed about equally often by men and by women¾ though in the tiny minority of instances where serious harm is done, women are much more often the victims. More serious battering of children is done by mothers.) Since most family fighting and abuse are not extreme, however, most conflicted families can be saved. And many more should be saved; the terrible harm to children (depression, low achievement, crime, suicide, etc.) that is caused by family breakup and fatherlessness has reached intolerable levels.

· Bill 214, in multiple ways, threatens to make this problem even worse. (1) It provides hair-trigger mechanisms to escalate family conflicts through the intrusive action of the police and judiciary. (2) It calls for such governmental intervention in even minor matters such as careless accidents, name-calling and breaking dishes. (3) It contains no requirements for mediation or couple counselling¾ just the punitive power of the state, based on a black-and-white, victim-vs.-victimizer approach to complex human problems.

False claims of physical and sexual abuse within the family have become epidemic in Canada in recent years. Because of untrue allegations of this kind, thousands upon thousands of innocent individuals¾ mostly men¾ have permanently or for extended periods lost their children, their life savings and their liberty. (Even, in a few cases, their very lives.) Many of these false charges, like many acts of physical abuse, are made in the heat of anger and later regretted. Even now, however, political pressures on the justice system make it difficult or impossible for an accusing woman in sober second thought to withdraw them. Many other such charges are laid in divorce situations, out of rage over failure of the relationship or as a tactic for winning control of the children and the financial assets. It is quite possible that a majority of abuse-accusations being made to authorities in divorces today are false. Such malicious falsehoods are themselves a serious form of abuse of the partner¾ and of the children, who are often used as tools of the accusation. Yet this kind of domestic assault¾ using the power of the state to harm another person¾ is almost never punished in law, let alone punished to the degree its seriousness warrants.

· Bill 214 would increase the level of these false charges even more, by making it easier to lay them with officials, by providing more incentives for doing so, and by putting still more pressure on police and judges to accept the charges. And yet this proposed law takes no cognizance of all the terrible harms done by false accusations; it offers no protections against the abuses it will encourage.

The above evils are already being turned into massive tragedies by the way in which the justice system frequently responds to them. In particular, there is the profligate use of ex parte orders¾ court orders issued without the accused person knowing about it and hence having no chance to defend himself (or herself) against it. Historically, such drastic measures were intended to be used only in serious emergencies, and to be very temporary. But litigation tactics and other legal realities being as they are, the "temporary" provisions can be extended greatly¾ especially when used against an individual with few financial or personal resources. Worse yet, in the prejudiced climate of recent years, many judges have come to dispense ex parte orders against husbands and fathers almost automatically¾ so much so that many legal authorities have expressed alarm at the massive injustice resulting.

· Bill 214 would encourage even greater use of ex parte orders and other unjust tactics by an accusing spouse. Worse yet, it dictates that the circumstances need not be serious or urgent in order for an ex parte protection order to be issued. The bill also enjoins employment of such tactics to deprive the accused of home, children and financial assets. One is to be given no chance to defend oneself before being thrown out in the street and ripped away from one’s children. And one’s capacity to defend oneself after that will be very much compromised.