Activities of Margarita DE LA PISA CARRIÓN related to 2019/2166(INI)
Plenary speeches (1)
The impact of intimate partner violence and custody rights on women and children (debate)
Amendments (41)
Amendment 14 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 8
Citation 8
Amendment 16 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 10
Citation 10
Amendment 20 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 15
Citation 15
Amendment 27 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 18
Citation 18
Amendment 28 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 19
Citation 19
Amendment 29 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 20
Citation 20
Amendment 30 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 21
Citation 21
Amendment 31 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 22
Citation 22
Amendment 33 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 24
Citation 24
Amendment 34 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 25
Citation 25
Amendment 38 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital A
Recital A
A. whereas gender equality is a fundamental value and an objective of the EU; whereas gender-based violence is an extreme form of discrimination against women and one of the biggest obstacles to achieving gender equalitybetween men and women is a fundamental right and an objective of the EU;
Amendment 48 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital B
Recital B
B. whereas, in spite of numerous instances of formal recognition and progress having been made on gender equality, women and men do not enjoy the same rights in practice and men and women have the same rights and therefore further progress should be made on shared participation in social, economic and cultural inequalities persistaspects;
Amendment 56 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital C
Recital C
C. whereas intimate partner violence refers to any act of physical, sexual, psychological or economic violence that occurs between former or current spouses or partners, whether or not the perpetrator shares or has shared a residence with the victim; whereas intimate partner violence is one of the most prevalent forms of gender-based violence, with an estimated 22 % of women having experienced physical and/or sexual violence, and 43 % having experienced psychological violence by their partner6; whereas women and children are disproportionately affected by this type of violence; whereas domestic violence is a serious and often hidden social problem that can cause systematic physical and psychological trauma with serious consequences for the victims, as the perpetrator is a person the victim should be able to trust; _________________ 6FRA report of 3 March 2014 entitled ‘Violence against women: an EU-wide survey’.can be a social problem with serious consequences for the victims, as it is a form of abuse of a trust-based relationship;
Amendment 61 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital C a (new)
Recital C a (new)
Ca. whereas the principle of subsidiarity needs to be upheld in cases of intimate partner violence in connection with the settlement of joint custody and the decision reached by the courts;
Amendment 68 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital D
Recital D
Amendment 86 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E
Recital E
E. whereas children may suffer ‘witnessed violence’ or direct violence in the familyhome environment, through experiencing any form of ill-treatment, carried out through acts of physical, verbal, psychological, sexual and economic violence against reference figures or other affectively significant figures; whereas such violence has very serious consequences for the psychological and emotional development of the child, and whereas it is therefore essential to pay due attention to this type of violence in separations and parental custody arrangements, taking the best interests of the child into account, in particular in order to determine custody and visitation rights in separation cases;
Amendment 92 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital F
Recital F
F. whereas, in order to address the issue of the eradication of gender-based violenceviolence between a man and a woman, it is necessary to rely on consistent and comparable administrative data, based on a robust and coordinated framework of data collection; whereas the current available data collected by the Member States’ law enforcement and justice authorities fail to reflect the full extent of intimate partner violence, as most Member States neither collect gender-segregated comparable data on gender-based violence nor do they recognise intimate partner violence as a specific offencecollected by the Member States’ law enforcement and justice authorities;
Amendment 103 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital G
Recital G
G. whereas in some Member States intimate partner violence against women is often neglected and the default rule of joint custody appears to prevail in cases of child custody, access, contact and visitation arrangements and decisions; whereas disregarding suchintimate partner violence can lead to dire consequences for women and childrenthe victims, which may escalate into femicide and/or infanthomicide; whereas victims of intimate partner violence need special protection measures; whereas the victims’ situation is likely to worsen if they are economically or socially dependent on the perpetrator;
Amendment 110 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital H
Recital H
H. whereas the right of every child to maintain contact with both parents and relatives, particularly grandparents, implied in Article 8 of the ECHR and Article 9 of the CRC, may be restricted byshould protect the best interests of the child;
Amendment 117 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital I
Recital I
I. whereas criminal proceedings arising from a complaint of domestic violence are often dealt with completely separately fromshould be connected with the family court in separation proceedings; and whereas this can mean that shared custody of the children is ordered and/or visitation rights imposed that endanger the rights andconfirmation of findings of fact in this case should be used to establish shared custody of the children, while upholding the human right to the presumption of the innocence of the person against whom allegations have been made and visitation arrangements with a view to guaranteeing the safety of the victim and/or the children;
Amendment 125 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital J
Recital J
J. whereas it is preferable to avoid all mediation in cases of violence against women, either before or during the judicial process, where the safety of the victim needs to be the primary considerationmediation may be beneficial in cases that are not deemed to be particularly serious in a police risk assessment, as the safety of the victim is the key criterion to follow;
Amendment 128 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital K
Recital K
K. whereas the Istanbul Convention calls on states to protect all victims of intimate partner violence regardless of sex or age, requires the Parties to adopt legislative or other necessary measures to ensure that incidents of domestic violence, while upholding the principle of presumption of innocence, are taken into account when determining custody and visitation rights in relation to children, and that the exercise of any visitation or custody rights does not jeopardise the rights and safety of the victim or their children;
Amendment 132 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital L
Recital L
L. whereas shared custody in situations of intimate partner violence exposes women to a continuum of preventable violence, by forcing them to stay in geographical proximity to their abusers, and subjecting them to further exposure to physical and psychological violence, as well as emotional abuse; whereas, in cases of intimate partner violence, the right of women to be protected and live a life free of physical and psychological violence should take precedence over the preference for shared custodys desirable for both spouses and the children themselves, provided that a judge establishes that the circumstances allow it and conditions with their appropriate supervision are upheld;
Amendment 143 #
M. whereas intimate partner violence is inherentlymay be interlinked with violence against children and child abuse; whereas children who are exposed to domestic violence are likely to suffer negative mental and physical health consequences that could be acute and chronic in nature; whereas child victimisation in situations of violence against wome, and whereas child victimisation may continue and escalate in the context of parental disputes over custody and care;
Amendment 163 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Strongly condemns all forms of violence against women and men and deplores the fact that women continue to be exposed to intimate partner violence which, as it constitutes a serious violation of their human rights and dignity;
Amendment 186 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2
Paragraph 2
2. Notes that, in principle, shared custody and unsupervised visits are desirable in order to ensure that parents enjoy equal rights and responsibilities, as well as to safeguard the best interests of the child; underlines, however, that intimate partner violence is clearly incompatible with shared custody and care, owing to its severe consequences for women and children, including the risk of extreme acts of femicide and infanticide; stresses that when establishing the arrangements for custody allocation and visitation rights, the protection of women and children from violence and uphold the right of the child to maintain contact withe best interests of the child must be paramount and should take precedence over other criteria; stresses, therefore, that awarding exclusive custody to the non-violent partner, most frequently the mother, represents the best alternative in order to prevent further violence and secondary victimisation of the victimoth parents;
Amendment 194 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2 a (new)
Paragraph 2 a (new)
2a. Suggests that criminal proceedings arising from a domestic violence complaint be connected with family courts in separation proceedings; and whereas confirmation of findings of fact in this case should be used to decide on shared custody of the children, while upholding the human right to the presumption of the inoccence of the person against whom allegations have been made and visitation arrangements with a view to guaranteeing the safety of the victim and/or the children;
Amendment 198 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Calls for mandatory targeted training for judicial and law enforcement officers about domestic violence and its mechanisms, including coercion, manipulation and psychological violence, and about the relevance of intimate partner violence to children’s rights, and to their protection and well-being, as well as to provide adequate skills to enable the officersto make it possible to assess the situation using reliable risk assessment tools;
Amendment 208 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Strongly rRecommends that Member States do not establish specialised courts and judicial offices, as well as appropriate laws, training, procedures and guidelines for all professionals dealing with the victims, including raising awareness of gender-based violence, in order to avoid discrepancies between judicial decisions and discrimination or secondary victimisation during judicial, medical and police proceedings, ensuring that children and women are duly heard and their protection is given priority; emphasises the need to strengthen dedicated judicial offices and child and female victim- friendly justice, limiting the excessive discretionary powers of practitioners and establishing checks on child custody procedures by qualified professional figuresbecause in practice they can be emergency courts, taking into account that the Treaty on European Union is founded on the value of due regard for equality between women and men;
Amendment 223 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5
Paragraph 5
5. Stresses the importance, in these procedures, of the role of the doctor providing forensic expertise in caring not only for womenfor victims of domestic abuse or violence, but also for the children involved, in particular when the environment in which they live is not suitable to protect their health, dignity and quality of life; recalls, therefore, the need for the forensic practitioners and professionals involved to be able to benefit, inter alia, from guidelines drawn from a set of data, practice and best practices at European level;
Amendment 231 #
Amendment 240 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 7
Paragraph 7
Amendment 258 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 8
Paragraph 8
Amendment 268 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 8 a (new)
Paragraph 8 a (new)
8a. Expresses concern about domestic violence allegations that do not end in convictions and may be a reflection of the use of the justice system as a political tool that breaches the presumption of innocence principle in favour of a party that may benefit from custody systems;
Amendment 275 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
9. Highlights that perpetrators often use litigation to extend their power andlitigation is often used as a control, and to continue to intimidate and incite fear in their victims; stresses that perpetrators often abuse, or threaten to harm or to take the children, intimidation mechanism, with the aim of manipulating order to harmne of their partners and ex-partneries;
Amendment 281 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 a (new)
Paragraph 9 a (new)
9a. Calls for the criminalisation of 'parental alienation' to prevent either parent from turning their children against the other parent and going unpunished for it;
Amendment 287 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10
Paragraph 10
10. Calls on the Member States to promote better access to legal protection, effective hearings and restraining orders, counselling and victim funds for women victims of intimate partner violence, and to apply particular procedures and give support to mothers who are victims of domestic violence, in order to prevent them from becoming victims again as a result of losing custody of their children for all victims of intimate partner violence;
Amendment 317 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Calls on the Commission to promote EU-wide public awareness campaigns as a necessary measure in the prevention of domestic violence and the creation of a climate of zero tolerance towards violenceclosely monitor the use of EU funds to ensure that they are used to protect the actual victims in an effective manner;
Amendment 336 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12
Paragraph 12
12. Emphasises that hearing from the child is important to establish what is infor the best interestsgood of the child while examining custody cases; points out nevertheless that in every case, but crucially in cases where intimate partnership violence is suspected, such hearings should be conducted in a child- friendly environment, with no pressure or influence from parents or relatives, by trained professionals, including those qualified in child neuropsychiatry, to avoid deepening the trauma and victimisationwhere a forensic team attached to the court should be involved;
Amendment 348 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 13
Paragraph 13
13. Underlines the importance of the exchange of information between courts, the central authorities of Member States and police bodies, especially in relation to cross-border custody cases; hopes that the revised rules under Council Regulation (EU) 2019/1111 of 25 June 2019 on jurisdiction, the recognition and enforcement of decisions in matrimonial matters and the matters of parental responsibility, and on international child abduction7will enhance the cooperation between judicial systems to effectively determine the best interests of the child; calls, in this context, on the Commission and the Member States to implement the Brussels IIa Regulation effectively; _________________ 7 OJ L 178, 2.7.2019, p. 1.
Amendment 359 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 14
Paragraph 14
14. Stresses the need to recognise the interconnectedness of criminal, civil and other legal proceedings in order to coordinate the judicial responses to intimate partner violence and to avoid discrepancies between judicial decisions that are harmful to children and women and men victims;