By: Kelly Winsa

Kelly Winsa — Sat, 09 Nov 2019 10:20:21 +0000

N. D. A. Additionally judges must look at historical documents such as restraining orders and reports of family violence. This is much better than the idea of keeping silent. This means that the first time is the time to report.
In the past it was not safe to report because then you could lose your children, you could become the one targeted. I believe that if this act is strongly defended by lawyers who have studied it, there will be a decrease in family violence because we will have a tipping point. It will not only be the women involved, it will become a societal responsibility.
The report which talks about the changes made by the new divorce act specify that violent men cannot differentiate between women and children. It is an intelligently written document which is right in our hands.
An old paradigm needs to be left. I do believe that lawyers wish for this to change. No one can be happy practicing in this milieu.
K. Winsa

By: Kelly Winsa

Kelly Winsa — Sat, 09 Nov 2019 10:08:02 +0000

While I think it is important to be positive in life, I think that to represent the family court as an impartial one, with a majority of lawyers willing to help is not realistic.
In my experience in both the United States and Ontario the reports are overwhelmingly against good legal care. There is simply not protection for women. In too many cases, legal care has become about winning and this has engendered false reporting by lawyers.
Even after substantial court orders that are difficult to effect, the character structures of violent parties and the lawyers they choose is to overturn the good orders which have protected.
The new Divorce Act is a powerful tool to protect women and children. It specifically has; criminally acknowledge child abduction, the right to defend oneself, and the inability of the violent parent to differentiate between the former partner and the child.
This law needs to be widely read as it comes into effect in June, 2020.
Women report not trusting their own lawyers and very often the lawyers are being paid so much to go to trial that only those who have taken money that doesn’t belong to them, financial abuse, also a statute of the new Divorce Act, can afford to hire lawyers.
Lawyers firms can have several partners and profit can become the benchmark. This is left over from the past decades.
Again, the new Divorce Act has received almost no press. The only article in the Globe and Mail gives lawyers comments, not women’s comment, not men’s comments, for the exaggeration of claims against parents is also done to men in order to ‘win’. It is simply the work of a team working to ‘win’.
Only in being outspoken will we bring the new focus on safety and health of women and children, working on having violent partners going to rehab and not voicing their rage in the home.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/401889/barbershop-movement-urges-abusive-men-to-tackle-traumatic-pasts?fbclid=IwAR1LHG-pBtvlRbsuW0B1RBqMuqw-UCTh750eB_IqxrZb8JWvQelCbhlxoYc
There are models in the world where action is moving towards change and Canada has a crisis on its hands. It is imperative that the legal channels are made wide open to safety.

Comments on: Learning for lawyers

By: Kelly Winsa

By: Kelly Winsa