The efficacy of Clare’s Law in domestic violence law reform in England and Wales
| Author | Sandra Walklate,Kate Fitz-Gibbon |
| DOI | 10.1177/1748895816671383 |
| Published date | 01 July 2017 |
| Date | 01 July 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/1748895816671383
Criminology & Criminal Justice
2017, Vol. 17(3) 284 –300
© The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/1748895816671383
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The efficacy of Clare’s Law in
domestic violence law reform
in England and Wales
Kate Fitz-Gibbon
Monash University, Australia
Sandra Walklate
University of Liverpool, UK
Abstract
In 2011 the high profile murder of Clare Wood led to the introduction of the national domestic
violence disclosure scheme (‘Clare’s Law’) in England and Wales. The scheme aims to prevent
the perpetration of violence between intimate partners through the sharing of information about
prior histories of violence. Despite already spreading to comparable jurisdictions in the UK and
Australia, to date the merits of a domestic violence disclosure scheme have been the subject of
limited scholarly review and analysis. This article provides a timely critical analysis of the need for
and merits of Clare’s Law. It examines the data impediments to the scheme, the need to balance
the right to protection with the right to privacy and the question of victim empowerment versus
responsibilization and victim blaming. The article concludes that there is a need to heed caution
in adopting this policy elsewhere.
Keywords
Abuse histories, Clare’s Law, domestic abuse, domestic violence, domestic violence disclosure
scheme, law reform
On average two women are killed each week in England and Wales by a current or for-
mer partner (Office for National Statistics, 2015). In the 12-month period from 2014 to
2015 it is estimated that in England and Wales alone there were 943,628 cases of
Corresponding author:
Kate Fitz-Gibbon, Criminology, School of Social Sciences, Monash University, Clayton Campus, Wellington
Road, Clayton, Melbourne, Victoria, 3800, Australia.
Email: kate.fitzgibbon@monash.edu
671383CRJ0010.1177/1748895816671383Criminology & Criminal JusticeFitz-Gibbon and Walklate
research-article2016
Article
Fitz-Gibbon and Walklate 285
domestic violence recorded by police (Woodhouse and Dempsey, 2016; see also Walby
et al., 2016). A 2014 investigation into the serial perpetration of domestic violence found
that between 4 and 20 per cent of domestic violence offending is serial in nature
(Robinson et al., 2014). Increasing awareness of the extent and nature of domestic vio-
lence in England and Wales has led to significant law and public policy reform over the
last two decades including the 2004 Domestic Violence Crime and Victims Act, as well
as the Home Office (2011c) cross-government strategy, Call to end violence against
women and girls. More recently, the high profile killing of Clare Wood and the subse-
quent campaign led by Wood’s father has prompted calls for greater information sharing
about histories of abuse among potential victims. In England and Wales this campaign
resulted in the 2011 introduction of the domestic violence disclosure scheme (Clare’s
Law), a scheme aimed at preventing the perpetration (and escalation) of violence between
intimate partners through the sharing of information about prior histories of violence
(Grace, 2015).
The introduction of a disclosure scheme for domestic violence in England and Wales
builds on previous disclosure schemes introduced for sex offenders in several interna-
tional jurisdictions. Disclosure schemes for sex offenders, known as community notifica-
tion laws, first emerged in the United States in the 1990s (Hinds and Daly, 2001). Such
laws ‘authorise the public disclosure of a convicted sex offender’s personal information’
to individuals and organizations in the residing community (Hinds and Daly, 2001: 264).
The introduction of such laws was largely driven by public fears and a political percep-
tion that the public desired ready access to advice and information about sex offenders
living in the community (Kemshall and Weaver, 2012; Sample et al., 2011). Following
the USA, sex offender disclosure schemes were first introduced in the UK in 2009 first
piloted in England and Scotland (Kemshall and Weaver, 2012). Research examining the
effectiveness of sex offender disclosure schemes and laws has considered the symbolic
versus instrumental effect of such schemes (Sample et al., 2011), and found in the UK
that such schemes have limited ‘take-up’ in practice (Kemshall and Weaver, 2012: 549).
Parallels can be drawn between these two types of disclosure schemes, however,
there are also important differences. Namely, sex offender schemes are community
focused, while the domestic violence disclosure scheme is individual focused. To date
the merits of a domestic violence disclosure scheme, such as Clare’s Law in England
and Wales, has been the subject of limited scholarly review and analysis. This dearth of
analysis is particularly concerning since not only has the scheme already been piloted
and introduced in England and Wales, it has also spread to other jurisdictions, such as
Scotland, and been introduced in some Australian states with others considering similar
developments. To address this gap in current knowledge, this article draws on a docu-
mentary analysis of submissions presented to the Home Office during the Clare’s Law
consultation period, government documents, political statements and media releases as
well as relevant media articles. All documents were identified using online searches,
including university library databases, national and international journals as well as
internet search engines, including google scholar. This multi-faceted search allowed the
research to capture relevant academic research as well as grey and relevant media litera-
ture. Key terms used to identify documents included Clare’s Law, Clare Wood, domes-
tic violence policy, disclosure scheme, victim centred reform. Once identified, all
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