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Winner of the Inner Temple Book Prize 2008: Main Prize
Whilst there may be universal agreement that 'something must be done' about child abuse, there is much less clarity about what qualifies as child abuse and what should be done about it. Policy makers often invoke the law at times of crisis which are seen to demand a societal response. The presence of legislation on the statute book or the creation of rules and protocols which professionals must follow is one socially acceptable sign that the problem has been recognised and that an effective response has been implemented.
In the last two decades of the twentieth century, the numerous controversies about the response of public agencies and the courts to allegations of child abuse, as well as campaigns to reform the treatment of child witnesses in adversarial trial systems, provided the impetus for legal reform in both criminal and civil proceedings in England and Wales. These legal initiatives were ad hoc responses to specific problems, and not part of a coherent and integrated programme of reform across the criminal and civil systems. Legislators and the courts in family, criminal, and tort proceedings have constructed different liability and evidential rules in parallel rather than in tandem with the other courts adjudicating the same issues, and often regarding the same child. Similarly reforms in other common law jurisdictions have often been only partially understood by lawmakers in England and Wales.
This book looks across the legal and geographical boundaries within which the legal discussion of child abuse is usually confined. It considers the themes and policy considerations driving each form of legal response to the problem of child abuse. It also provides a detailed discussion of the law governing the trial of allegations of child abuse in the key areas of family, criminal and tort law in English law, and compares this with the approaches in other common law jurisdictions using the adversarial mode of trial, in particular in Canada, the United States, New Zealand and Australia. In its breadth and depth, Child Abuse Law and Policy Across Boundaries marks a significant contribution to the rapidly evolving field of child protection law.
- Questions the assumption that 'black letter' law developments are always an appropriate response to child abuse
- Charts legal initiatives and ad hoc developments to specific problems of child abuse
- Comparative analysis of evidentiary and liability rules across other common law jurisdictions eg: Canada, US, New Zealand, and Australia
- Discusses forms of legal response to child abuse beyond conventional legal and geographical boundaries
- Interdisciplinary perspectives from family law, tort, criminal law, and rules of evidence
- Contains diagrams mapping the complex evidential and liability rules in English statutes and case law, including the Special Measures Directions and sexual history provisions of the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999, and the character and hearsay provisions of the Criminal Justice Act 2003.
AN OVERVIEW OF THIS BOOK Part I: THEMES & QUESTIONS 1. INTRODUCTION Part II: THE LEGAL FRAMEWORK FOR ADJUDICATING ALLEGATIONS 2. FAMILY LAW 3. LIABILITY IN CRIMINAL LAW 4. LIABILITY IN TORT AND HUMAN RIGHTS LAW Part III : THE INQUIRY PROCESS 5. INVESTIGATING AND EVALUATING ALLEGATIONS OF ABUSE Part IV: ADJUDICATION OF THE ALLEGATION 6. INTRODUCTION: THEMES AND INFLUENCES 7. ACCESS TO EVIDENCE 8. THE CHILD WITNESS 9. TESTING THE CREDIBILITY OF THE CHILD COMPLAINANT 10. TESTING THE CREDIBILITY OF THE ALLEGED ABUSER 11. EXPERT EVIDENCE Part V: CHILD ABUSE LAW AND POLICY: EVALUATION 12. THEMES AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS ;
Laura Hoyano, Fellow & Tutor in Law, Wadham College, Oxford, and Caroline Keenan, Visiting Research Fellow in law at the University of Bristol and a member of the Senior Common Room at Wadham College, Oxford.
Laura Hoyano holds three degrees from the University of Alberta in Canada in medieval history and law, and the BCL (Balliol College Oxford). In 1994 she accepted an academic appointment at the Law Faculty of the University of Bristol. In 1999 she became a Tutorial Fellow and CUF Lecturer at Wadham College, Oxford University, where she teaches Evidence, Criminal and Tort Law. Together with colleagues at Bristol University, Caroline Keenan and Laura Hoyano were co-directors of a major empirical and comparative law study funded by the Home Office, An Assessment of the Admissibility and Sufficiency of Evidence in Child Abuse Prosecutions (HMSO 1999), which contributed to the eventual enactment of Special Measures Directions in the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999. Laura Hoyano has published and lectured extensively about litigating child abuse in different fields of law, in England and North America.
Caroline Keenan graduated in law from the University of Sheffield, where she also completed her PhD on the investigation of cases of child abuse. She then lectured in Criminal and Family Law and Criminology at the University of Bristol and the University of Durham, then subsequently at the University of Bristol. In addition to the empirical study on the prosecution of child abuse, An Assessment of the Admissibility and Sufficiency of Evidence in Child Abuse Prosecutions, she was commissioned by the Home Office to conduct a review of the law on sexual offences against children and vulnerable adults which contributed to the law reform enacted by the Sexual Offences Act 2003. She has published widely in the field of child protection law, focusing on family and criminal law and the law relating to the investigation of abuse. Caroline Keenan is currently a visiting Research Fellow in law at the University of Bristol and a member of the Senior Common Room at Wadham College, Oxford.
"This book will be invaluable for anyone working in any area of academic law related to child abuse, but will also be of interest to those in practice in this tricky area. Hoyano and Keenan have made a truly outstanding contribution to the literature on this important topic, and I truly recommend their book most warmly." - Robert H. George, International Journal of Law, Policy and the Family 23, 2009
"Judges have described this as a "masterly book on a hugely important subject", "an inspiring achievement" and "an invaluable source of ideas and law, theory and practice", not only for practitioner and academic but for policy makers and indeed for all concerned with reform and administration of the law. The panel of judges believes that the book will indeed make an outstanding contribution to the formation and understanding of legal policy and thus to the administration of law in this country. They unanimously agree that, of all the fine entries, this book most clearly satisfies the criteria laid down for the award of the prize.' " - Judges of the Inner Temple Book Prize 2008
