Christmas spells danger for many women

Between now and New Year, 2000 New Zealand women will be so terrified of their partners they will flee to a women's refuge.

Bags of clothing are stored in hiding places, emergency money is stashed away, personal documents are in their handbags and the nearest pay phone has been identified.

They know the quickest exit from where they are staying and tell their children by code when they must flee.

The next two months is the most dangerous time of year in their lives - most ending up battered and bruised by the end of it.

This is the worst time of year for domestic abuse, says Women's Refuge chief executive Heather Henare; 2209 women sought help from Women's Refuge over Christmas last year.

Christmas is a stressful time for families, she says.

"There's a lot of pressure to provide and to perform, to provide a good Christmas for your family, provide food. Money pressures are the greatest problem."

Refuge workers around the country began contacting at-risk women at the start of the month, making sure they had a safety plan for the holidays.

Women were told to know where the nearest phone box was, the number for a women's refuge in their area, to make sure they had money, clothing and documents stashed away in case they needed to leave, and to come up with a special sentence for their children so they knew when it was time to escape.

Many women already had protection orders against their violent partners, she said, but they were only as good as the paper they were written on, with women choosing not to follow through on breaches and police often becoming despondent when women continued to return to violent relationships.

The Ministry of Women's Affairs is working on research into women's experiences of protection orders.

It said in a publication this month that initial research showed people working in the area believe there are inconsistencies in approaches to men who breach the orders.

"For example some areas are more likely to prosecute respondents who violate protection orders than others," its article says.

Research team member Ruth Busch says another message emerging from domestic violence practitioners is the approach in cases of physical abuse as opposed to psychological abuse.

"There seems to be a minimisation virtually of all breaches that involve psychological abuse," she says.

The project is expected to be finished in the second half of next year.

Counties Manukau Police family violence co-ordinator Sergeant Marty Parker said his area expected to deal with at least 2000 callouts for domestic violence between now and January, brought on by the stress of providing at Christmas and alcohol.

His is the busiest area in the country for domestic violence at this time of year.

By comparison North Shore, Waitakere and Rodney Police District dealt with 512 incidents over the same period last year.

The arguments are the same though: money, relationships ending, access to children or relatives visiting.

Mr Parker said he was aware many women would have protection orders out against their partners but he believed a lot of domestic violence was still going unreported. He said there had also been a drop in the number of women applying for protection orders.

"We don't know whether it's financial or they're getting undertakings instead."

Initial research from the Ministry of Women's Affairs also suggests more women are opting to have undertakings because they can be cheaper and easier to get than protection orders.

A violent partner can sign an undertaking saying he will stop being violent, but Mr Parker said it gave police no powers if he reoffended. 


Domestic violence

* December 2003 to January 2004: 1760 women, with 1018 children, sought help from Women's Refuge.
* December 2004 to January 2005: 2209 women, with 1102 children, sought help from refuges.
* Counties Manukau Police say they expect to deal with 2000 domestic violence incidents between now and the end of January.
* In the year to date they have dealt with 9500 domestic incidents. The average for places such as Christchurch or the North Shore is about 5000.