Family violence - Policy and legal definitions

Note: This page was created as pre-reading for the Auckland Regional Networking Meeting, Family and Sexual Violence held at Western Springs in September 2012.

Policy

Te Rito, New Zealand Family Violence Prevention Strategy (Ministry of Social Development, 2002) provides the following definition of family violence:

“Family violence covers a broad range of controlling behaviours, commonly of a physical, sexual, and/or psychological nature which typically involve fear, intimidation and emotional deprivation. It occurs within a variety of close interpersonal relationships, such as between partners, parents and children, siblings, and in other relationships where significant others are not part of the physical household but are part of the family and/or are fulfilling the function of family. Common forms of violence in families/whānau include:

 • spouse/partner abuse (violence among adult partners);
• child abuse/neglect (abuse/neglect of children by an adult);
• elder abuse/neglect (abuse/neglect of older people aged approximately 65 years and over, by a person with whom they have a relationship of trust);
• parental abuse (violence perpetrated by a child against their parent); and
• sibling abuse (violence among siblings).”

Legal

Please consult the legislation for current definitions.

 The legal definition of “domestic violence” can be found in the Domestic Violence Act 1995, sections 3 and 4:

 3 Meaning of domestic violence

(1) In this Act, domestic violence, in relation to any person, means violence against that person by any other person with whom that person is, or has been, in a domestic relationship.

(2) In this section, violence means—

• (a) physical abuse:
• (b) sexual abuse:
• (c) psychological abuse, including, but not limited to,—
  • (i) intimidation:
  • (ii) harassment:
  • (iii) damage to property:
  • (iv) threats of physical abuse, sexual abuse, or psychological abuse:
  • (iva) financial or economic abuse (for example, denying or limiting access to financial resources, or preventing or restricting employment opportunities or access to education):
  • (v) in relation to a child, abuse of the kind set out in subsection (3).

(3) Without limiting subsection (2)(c), a person psychologically abuses a child if that person—

• (a) causes or allows the child to see or hear the physical, sexual, or psychological abuse of a person with whom the child has a domestic relationship; or
• (b) puts the child, or allows the child to be put, at real risk of seeing or hearing that abuse occurring;—

but the person who suffers that abuse is not regarded, for the purposes of this subsection, as having caused or allowed the child to see or hear the abuse, or, as the case may be, as having put the child, or allowed the child to be put, at risk of seeing or hearing the abuse.

(4) Without limiting subsection (2),—

• (a) a single act may amount to abuse for the purposes of that subsection:
• (b) a number of acts that form part of a pattern of behaviour may amount to abuse for that purpose, even though some or all of those acts, when viewed in isolation, may appear to be minor or trivial.

(5) Behaviour may be psychological abuse for the purposes of subsection (2)(c) which does not involve actual or threatened physical or sexual abuse.

4 Meaning of domestic relationship

(1) For the purposes of this Act, a person is in a domestic relationship with another person if the person—

• (a) is a spouse or partner of the other person; or
• (b) is a family member of the other person; or
• (c) ordinarily shares a household with the other person; or
• (d) has a close personal relationship with the other person.

 (2) For the purposes of subsection (1)(c), a person is not regarded as sharing a household with another person by reason only of the fact that—

• (a) the person has—
  • (i) a landlord-tenant relationship; or
  • (ii) an employer-employee relationship; or
  • (iii) an employee-employee relationship—

with that other person; and

• (b) they occupy a common dwellinghouse (whether or not other people also occupy that dwellinghouse).

(3) For the purposes of subsection (1)(d), a person is not regarded as having a close personal relationship with another person by reason only of the fact that the person has—

• (a) an employer-employee relationship; or
• (b) an employee-employee relationship—

with that other person.

(4) Without limiting the matters to which a court may have regard in determining, for the purposes of subsection (1)(d), whether a person has a close personal relationship with another person, the court must have regard to—

• (a) the nature and intensity of the relationship, and in particular—
  • (i) the amount of time the persons spend together:
  • (ii) the place or places where that time is ordinarily spent:
  • (iii) the manner in which that time is ordinarily spent;—

but it is not necessary for there to be a sexual relationship between the persons:

• (b) the duration of the relationship.