Final Reports on National Campaign action carried out within the framework of
the Council of Europe Campaign to Combat Violence against Women,
including Domestic Violence

1. Legal and policy measures

National Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia adopted Family Violence Prevention Act (February 2008). The Act defines the notion of violence in families, the role and tasks of state authorities, holders of public authority, public service contractors, authorities of self-governing local communities, as well as non-government organizations taking part in consideration of family violence, and determines the actions for protecting the victims of family violence.

2. Support and protection for victims

Family Violence Prevention Act envisaged the following measures to protect and support the victim:

- Victim’s assistant (victims can choose a person who can represent them in all violence-related proceedings. This can be any adult person that is not considered in the proceedings as the perpetrator of violence.)
- Victim’s Aid Plan (the Social Work Centre assesses whether it is required to draw up an aid plan for the victim. The plan is drawn up with the victim.)
- Multidisciplinary teams (formed at the Social Work Centres to deal with the instances of family violence)
- Regional Services for coordination and aid to victims (Services provide aid to victims, carry out the intervention service, coordinate activities of authorities and organizations, monitor and analyze)
- Prohibitions in case of acts of violence (the victim proposes to the court to determine measures for averting further damage. The court can issue an order to prohibit the perpetrator:

- entering to the accommodation premises where the victim lives;
- to come at a specified distance within the proximity of the accommodation where the victim lives;
- to come near to places which the victim frequents regularly (workplace, school, preschool facility, etc.).
- to establish contact with the victim in any way whatsoever, including by way of the means for distance communication;
- to establish any kind of meeting with the victim.

- Transfer of the accommodation in common use (the victim can propose to the court to pass a decision on transfer of accommodation that is in common use).

- Free legal assistance (for cases defined in the Act)

3. Data collection

To provide aid to the victim, and to consider the perpetrator of violence, to create an aid plan for the victim together with is implementation and monitoring as well as for use in the scientific research purposes and for statistical purposes, the Social Work Centres process personal information and manage databases of persons that were according to the Family Violence Prevention Act treated as victims and those treated as perpetrators of violence.

Governmental Office for Equal Opportunities proposed national survey on domestic violence as priority theme of national research programme. The survey shall be carried out from 2008 – 2010.

4. Awareness Raising

In the framework of CoE campaign Office for Equal Opportunities carried out the following activities:

- Domestic violence poster (distributed with the help of CoE Information Office Slovenia)
- The priority theme of 2007 Office for Equal Opportunities’ public tender for co-financing NGO’s projects was violence against women
- Office for Equal Opportunities organized (May 2007) round table where representatives of NGO’s, Police, Social Work Centres, Ministry for Family, Labour and Social Affairs, and education discussed the coordinated approach and the legislation gaps
- Office for Equal Opportunities also co-financed special supplement to daily newspaper on violence against women “Violence! What can I do?” – also distributed to Police, schools, centers for social work, and other professionals
- A leaflet Stop violence against women – distributed with the help of Nurses and Midwives Association of Slovenia (also published in Association’s monthly magazine Utrip)
- T-shirts Stop violence against women – distributed to parliamentarians, ministers, Police, NGOs, general public
- Press releases – during the CoE campaign Office for Equal Opportunities prepared several press releases on domestic violence against women

National Plans of Action

According to the Family Violence Prevention Act National Programme for preventing family violence for the period of the next five years. The Programme shall in particular contain the following:
- an overview of the situation and an assessment of the crucial issues in the field of preventing family violence,
- essential objectives, policies and tasks in the field of family violence prevention for the period contained in the national programme,
- holders of action plans in specific fields for executing policies and tasks from the national programme,
- prevention activities,
- Data which shall be in the framework of activities of the national statistics collected, processed, linked, stored, analyzed and shown.
- policies for education and training,
- ensuring financial and other assets for nongovernmental organizations activities.

As implementing acts of the national programme Action plans will be adopted to determine for a specific field the required activities over the period of two years. The government reports on a two-year basis to the National Assembly on the implementation of the national programme. There are actions specified in the report as well as activities that had been carried out in the previous two-year period.

Assessment of the impact of the Council of Europe Campaign

1. Is any and every act of violence against women criminalised in your country?

YES x NO q

Domestic violence is criminalised according to the Penal Code (Art. 299).

2. Is violence committed by a partner or former partner punished more severely than violence among strangers (eg. gender based violence as such or the abuse of power will be considered an aggravating circumstance)?

YES q NO q

No data on court decisions available.

3. Are victims enabled to seek justice in a human manner (eg. specialised courts on domestic violence, specialised units within the police, the public prosecutor or the judiciary)?

YES q NO q

No specialised courts or prosecutors. The police trains police officers in the field of violence against women.

4. Does a national emergency 24/7 help-line exist free of charge for victims of domestic violence in your country?

YES x NO q

Crisis centre for women, victims of violence, who have just experienced violence or a danger of violence, exists. Crisis centre offers help, support, and a safe place for a limited period of time. The centre is run by NGO – Women’s Counselling Service.

5. Have safe shelters been set up for victims of domestic violence in an adequate ratio in your member state? ¹

YES q NO x

There are 11 shelters (178 places) and 7 homes for mothers (88) places Ratio: 1 place per 7.558 inhabitants

6. Is administrative data being collected on victims of domestic violence?

YES x NO q

Currently, the data is collected by Police. Shelters (both, NGO and state run) also collect data on their clients.

7. Is domestic violence considered as a human rights violation to be addressed in your legal system?

YES x NO q

Note 1 The Blueprint of the Council of Europe Campaign recommends a ratio for one place in a woman’s shelter per 7.500 inhabitants.