The justice minister says that the delay in passing a law has to do with finding the right balance between privacy and safety
The justice minister of Newfoundland and Labrador says that Clare’s Law, which lets people who are worried about their safety ask in private about their partners’ criminal history, will soon go into effect.
“We did the last consultations with stakeholders at the beginning of this year, which are now done,” Hogan said on Wednesday.
Hogan said that the province is working on rules and a website to teach people how to use Clare’s Law, which is also called “domestic violence disclosure.”
“We now know what it is going to look like. So, we expect to have that settled sometime this summer. I know people have been waiting for a while,” Hogan said.
The law was passed in 2019, but the House of Assembly hasn’t said anything about it yet.
Newfoundland and Labrador is one of four provinces that have passed or are in the process of passing laws that give women and men more information about their risk with their current partner by allowing a police service to tell a current or former intimate partner certain information.
Other places have shown that the law is not perfect. For example, in Alberta, advocates have complained about big backlogs, and some people have had to wait more than three months for information about their partners to be released.
Hogan admits that Clare’s Law is “not the be all and end all,” but he says it will give women more information so they can make a decision that is best for them.
Hogan said that balancing a person’s right to privacy with their partner’s right to know was the hardest part of getting the law passed.
“That’s why consultations took some time and involved very specific questions about what can be shared, how it can be shared, and through what channels, the RNC, the RCMP, with people who make that request,” he said, adding that the province did ask the privacy commissioner for advice.
“It was a bit of a tightrope walk, but we think we’re in a good spot now.”
Gives police more freedo
Malin Enstrom, the associate executive director of the Iris Kirby House in St. John’s, said that the law also gives police a chance to talk to a person before they become one of the many statistics about domestic violence.
“It gives [police] a lot more freedom and chance to actually reach the victim before it gets very bad,” said Enstrom. “We can say, ‘This is how this person has behaved in the past, and we can see that you could be getting into a very dangerous situation.'”
Enstrom used to be an analyst with the Royal Newfoundland Constabulary’s unit for dealing with intimate partner violence. Before she started working at the St. John’s shelter, she thought she had seen everything.
She said that there are worries that the law might make people feel too safe. Most of the time, violence between people who live together is never reported. And if there is no report on file, a person applying through Clare’s Law may think they are safe.
But Enstrom said she is sure it will help the women she works with every day.
“We hear a lot of the same stories from our residents about the same abusive partner. We see a lot of things like that. So, I think this will be very helpful, and I think we’ll fill out one of these forms every week.”
Hogan did not say how the law will work in the province because “we do have to go through the final government processes before the regulations are made public.”
Call 911 if you need help right away and are in danger. Visit sheltersafe.ca or endingviolencecanada.org to find help in your area.
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