Protection from Harassment Act 1997: The ‘New’ Stalking Offences
| Author | Judith Gowland |
| DOI | 10.1350/jcla.2013.77.5.865 |
| Published date | 01 October 2013 |
| Date | 01 October 2013 |
| Subject Matter | Comment |
COMMENT
Protection from Harassment Act 1997: The
‘New’ Stalking Offences
Judith Gowland*
Keywords Stalkers; Prosecuting stalking as assault; Prosecuting stalking
as harassment; Stalking behaviour; Victims of stalking
On 25 November 2012 yet another amendment to the much maligned
Protection from Harassment Act 1997 came into force in that ‘stalking’
was, for the first time ever, explicitly criminalised. This followed various
amendments that have been made over the years to a piece of legislation
that has long been criticised for its shortcomings.1The Protection from
Harassment Act 1997, which took effect on 16 June 1997, shortly after
the Labour Party swept to victory in the General Election, had been
introduced at great speed by a Conservative government desperate to
win a General Election where all parties knew it was important to be
seen as being ‘tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime’.2Many
of the drafting problems may be attributable to the speed at which the
Act was rushed through, but the decision to avoid using the word
‘stalking’ in an Act designed chiefly to deal with this particular problem
was quite deliberate. This decision has since given rise to various cam-
paigns either to legislate specifically against stalking or, alternatively, to
bring stalking within the ambit of the anti-harassment legislation. Some
15 years on, the latter has finally occurred with the enactment of the
Protection of Freedoms Act 2012. Stalking is now expressly said to be a
form of behaviour that can form a course of conduct that gives rise to
alarm or distress, thereby falling within the ambit of the Protection from
Harassment Act. Before assessing the value of this recent legislative
amendment, it is necessary to examine why it was felt necessary to
make this change, and in so doing, consider the background to the
Protection from Harassment Act 1997 and its strengths and limitations.
It should be noted that although this Act also provides for civil proceed-
ings, this commentary will focus purely on the extent to which the
criminal law in relation to stalking has been affected.
Stalking prior to the Protection from Harassment Act
1997
Prior to the Protection from Harassment Act, stalking victims had to seek
redress by persuading the Crown Prosecution Service to prosecute a
* Senior Lecturer, Northumbria University; e-mail: judith.gowland@northumbria.
ac.uk.
1 Significant amendments were made by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act
2001 and the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005, which expanded the
remit of the offence and the police powers respectively.
2 Labour Party General Election Manifesto 1997.
387The Journal of Criminal Law (2013) 77 JCL 387–398
doi:10.1350/jcla.2013.77.5.865
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