Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the policy paper published on 9 November by the Bar Council, Tackling violence against women and girls – why family courts are key.

The Government has read the Bar Council’s policy paper with interest and agrees that the family courts play a key role in our commitment to halve incidences of violence against women and girls over the next decade.

We agree with the Bar Council that proper data and analysis is an essential first step. The Government funded the recently published Family Court Review and Reporting Mechanism pilot, led by the Domestic Abuse Commissioner and will publish a response to the report by the end of the year.

This Government also recognises that legal aid is a vital part of the justice system, supporting the ability of individuals to access publicly funded legal assistance to uphold their legal rights. Legal aid is available for certain private family matters such as child arrangements if an individual is a victim of domestic abuse or at risk of being abused, subject to providing the required evidence of domestic abuse and passing the means and merits tests. Last year we spent £854 million on the provision of family legal aid and we continue to keep the policy under review.

With our partners across the family justice system, we are committed to long-term reform of the family courts to better support and protect victims of domestic abuse and serious violence and their children. Central to this is our new Pathfinder model, which uses a more investigative and less adversarial approach for private law proceedings relating to children and is now operating in nine court areas, with expansion to a tenth in January 2026.

The Government will be publishing our new, cross-government Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy as soon as possible.