The Home Affairs Minister said she is “confident” that a legal “oversight” that left authorities’ ability to enforce restraining orders in question “will not happen again”.
During yesterday’s States Assembly meeting, Deputy Mary Le Hegarat put forward what she described as a “simple” amendment to close a legal loophole which created “uncertainty” around the enforcement of 160 restraining orders – and the move was unanimously approved by politicians.
The loophole was first exposed during a recent court trial, where it emerged that a new law which was introduced to bring the island in line with UK legislation in many areas could not be used to enforce restraining orders made under the old law.
A restraining order is a court-issued order against the perpetrator of a crime aimed at safeguarding their victim or others who may be vulnerable, typically in cases involving allegations of domestic violence, child abuse or neglect, assault, harassment, stalking, or sexual assault.
In this States Assembly yesterday afternoon, the Home Affairs Minister explained that “there is no explicit read-across between the laws saying that 2008 orders can be enforced by the 2024 law”.
Deputy Le Hegarat said: “This amendment will resolve any uncertainty by putting an explicit provision in the 2024 law to allow the older 2008 restraining orders to be enforced as though they had been made under the new law.
“This is a simple change that will have no other effects on the legislation.”
Deputy Philip Ozouf asked the Minister how the “mistake” had been made, and what lessons had been learned as a result.
Deputy Le Hegarat responded: “I understand that this is an unusual situation in which an oversight has passed through the usual exhaustive checking processes without being picked up.
“The need to ensure that the interactions between legislation are properly understood is now at the forefront of everybody’s mind, and I’m confident that this will not happen again.”
Politicians unanimously voted to pass the amendment.