Report recommends gender-sensitive training for judges in family law cases

The review also says significant reform of the Family Court will be needed to meet our obligations under the convention and recommends that the State "funds and provides compulsory and systematic gender-sensitive training to members of the judiciary and Court experts to identify signs of abuse in judging matters of custody and visitation rights." File photo: Joe Raedle

Judges should be made to take part in gender-sensitive training to ensure the court system identifies domestic, sexual, and other abuse when adjudicating on custody and visitation cases, a new report has found.

The National Observatory on Violence Against Women has also recommended that the ethos clause be removed from the rules for primary schools, to allow for the rollout of a comprehensive, continuous, age-appropriate sex education programme to pupils.