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Anti-violence alliance launched

A new alliance of children's and women's groups yesterday called for changes in the way the nation handles sexual abuse, urging both politicians and the public to keep these issues in mind during the year-end legislative elections.

The Violence Prevention Legislative Change Alliance, launched at a press conference yesterday by 11 different civic groups dealing in family issues, is pushing for changes to the nation's domestic abuse act for the establishment of a comprehensive sexual harassment law and for strengthening punishment procedures for sex offenders.

The alliance pointed to national crime statistics stating that over 10 percent of murder and serious injury cases in the past four years listed a household member as an offender.

As part of its proposed reforms, the alliance called yesterday for legal provisions for the establishment of government shelters and halfway homes for battered wives and an increase in the physical boundaries separating batterers from their victims set by protective orders under the nation's five-year old Domestic Violence Prevention Act (家庭暴力防治法).

The alliance is also pushing for a comprehensive sexual harassment law.

There are currently two main laws that govern sexual harassment cases, the alliance said: the Gender Equality Education Law (性別平等教育法) and the Gender Equality in Employment Law (兩性工作平等法). While the laws detail procedures for handling sexual assault cases, they only govern incidents within narrow areas of jurisdiction, the alliance said.

"For example, the employment law covers harassment between employees," Garden of Hope CEO Chi Hui-jung (紀惠容) said. "But what if a client harasses an employee or the other way around? There is no provision in the law for this, so the victim has nowhere to go for help. We are trying to push for a central law that would cover all types of sexual harassment, not just harassment that occurs in schools or in the workplace."

Heavier punishments for serial sexual assault offenders are also necessary, said the alliance, which proposes that offenders receive a separate sentence for each crime, as opposed to one compound sentence for multiple offenses.

None of the alliance's goals are new; all have been introduced in the legislature by alliance members within the past two years.

Despite the strong backing of women's and children's groups, however, scant progress has been made, Chi said.

"We have had some legislators that have stood by us throughout our fight," Chi said. "However, the fact is that most legislators are male, and don't care too much about domestic violence."

The groups' limited success when working separately was the impetus for joining forces in the alliance, group representatives said.

Hoping to capitalize on the increased political consciousness generated by the year-end legislative elections, the alliance is planning a series of actions to focus the attention of legislative candidates and voters on the proposed reforms.

The alliance said that it will be paying a visit to all political parties and alliances in the near future to advocate its goals. It plans to conduct an Internet survey on the issues in October.

Survey results will be announced in November, and the alliance will also then release to the public a list of legislative candidates supporting the reforms.
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