Claire Throssell gave evidence.

We will now hear oral evidence from Claire Throssell. We have until 3.20 pm for this panel. Claire, will you briefly introduce yourself?

Claire Throssell:

My name is Claire Throssell MBE, and I am a campaigner, an advocate, an author, an educator and an ambassador for two domestic abuse charities, Women’s Aid and IDAS. I am at the forefront of the child-first campaign, and I am the one pushing for the repeal of presumption in the Bill.

Sitting suspended for Divisions in the House.

On resuming—

Ordered,

That the Order of the Committee of 25 March 2026 be varied by as follows—

Leave out rows 22 to 29 of the table in paragraph (2), and insert—

“

Wednesday 25 March

Until no later than 3.40 pm

Hon Doug Downey KC MPP, Attorney General of Ontario

Wednesday 25 March

Until no later than 3.55 pm

Chief Constable of Lancashire Constabulary

Wednesday 25 March

Until no later than 4.10 pm

HM Courts and Tribunals Service

Wednesday 25 March

Until no later than 4.40 pm

JUSTICE; Centre for Criminal Appeals (APPEAL); Institute for Government

”—(Sarah Sackman.)

Following the Divisions in the Chamber, the timings for this afternoon will be adjusted. I will announce at the start of each panel when the questioning will start and end. We already heard your introduction before the votes, Claire. If you do not mind, we will jump straight into the questions.

Q Thanks ever so much for coming, and for your patience with the parliamentary procedure. I know that these things are really challenging sometimes, so I want to thank you in advance for talking about difficult things. Also, rather than being dependent on what we may ask you, I want to give you the opportunity to lay out two or three points that you really want to get across to us today.

Claire Throssell:

Thank you for the question, and I have four points that I really want to get across this afternoon. First, I want to make it clear that presumption has no place when it comes to children’s safety. Presumption has no place when it comes to children’s lives. Presumption has no place when it comes to our lives.

What happened to Jack and Paul was based on a series of presumptions under practice direction 12J, and you have to ask the question: why did a professional working for CAFCASS, after being barricaded in her office, presume that Jack and Paul were safe to go on a visit? Why did she presume that I was exaggerating, despite me telling her and a court—let us be clear that I did—that he was capable of killing? Why was it presumed that it was okay to ignore my voice? Why did they presume that two children would be safe when they had clear evidence in front of them that they would not be?

We are talking about presumption, and people say, “Yes, the practice direction is there in the Children Act 1989.” Let us be clear: there are 68 children who have died under that Act. There are 68 children who have died under practice direction 12J. I say again: presumption has no place when it comes to children’s safety.

I am going to show some evidence now, and I show these pictures not to shock or upset people, but to show the reality of presumption of contact. I would like to show you two photographs, the first of which shows Jack and Paul. They were never child A and child B in a serious case review. They are child 18 and child 19 in a Women’s Aid report that looked into how many children have died at the hands of known perpetrators of domestic abuse.

This 12-year-old boy, Jack, died believing that he had saved the life of his younger brother, because I never told him differently—I held both my sons in my arms as they died. Jack’s voice was never heard; the day he was supposed to have his interview with CAFCASS was the day that he died in my arms. The only time this boy’s voice was heard was on a landing, when he spoke to a fireman and a doctor. Although he was dying, he used as much of his strength as he could to tell as many people in that property, “My dad did this, and he did it on purpose.” This was taken by the police as a dying testimony. Why did they not take his words in life? Why did they take his words in death?

This second photograph of Jack is again evidence of what happens with presumption of contact. The first photograph of Jack was taken in the July, and this second photograph shows Jack in the October. CAFCASS and a court presumed that this boy would be safe. Social services presumed that this boy would be safe. This boy died believing that he had saved the life of his brother, and more importantly, he thought of everybody else but himself. When people should have protected him, he went back for his brother. He gave his brother his hand. He gave his brother his strength. He was there for his brother, but who was there for him at 12 years old? Not the court that ordered contact because of the culture in the family courts that contact is in the best interests of the child—that they should see both parents.

Jack had nobody, and he thought about me—he made sure that everybody in the property knew that I was not to blame. As a parent, I am ashamed of that, because it was my role to protect them. Let us be clear that I have to live with the fact that they died only because a domestic abuser wanted to punish me. A family court allowed him to do that, but these two beautiful boys only lost their lives because of me.

When we talk about repealing presumption of contact, let us look at it: over 30 years, children have died. In 2014, Jack and Paul were child 18 and child 19. Let us face the fact that, in 2026, we are at 68 children. That is not good enough, because every child deserves to live. Every child deserves to have a childhood, and their childhood should not be allowed to be torn apart piece by piece by seeing a perpetrator of domestic abuse—by seeing a person who just wants to hurt them, humiliate them and punish an ex-partner.

Children have one childhood. Children at risk of harm only have today; they do not have tomorrow. You have a chance—a lifesaving opportunity—right here, right now to make a difference to children’s lives, not just today, not just tomorrow, but for generations of children to come. It is no surprise that there are many people in their 20s with mental health issues. Mental health has never been as bad as it is right now in young people. And why is that? It is because they are made to see a parent who is hurting them. They are made to see a parent who is harming them. It might not be physical, and it might not be the ultimate act, like it was for Jack and Paul, but if a child comes back from a visit and they are different from how they were when they went on the visit, let us be clear: that is child abuse.

Children are supposed to have a voice. Children are supposed to have opinions. But all too often there are too many other voices in this complex system that are louder than the child. We hear about parental rights all the time, but around children’s rights there is a deafening silence. We have an Act that protects them: the Domestic Abuse Act 2021. They are supposed to be seen as victims in their own right, and yet, up and down our country, their rights are still being walked over—not only their rights under the Domestic Abuse Act, but their human rights too. They have the same rights as we do. They are people; they are humans; they are themselves. Their basic rights—to live, to thrive, to live in privacy, to live in peace—are being broken in courts up and down the country. That is not good enough. They are the future of this country, and if we get this wrong, what does the future of our country look like? What have we got for the future? They are not being allowed to live as they want to live. They are not being allowed to be free. They are certainly not allowed to thrive. If you go to school, college or university and you have suffered that morning, how are you going to learn? How is that conducive to achieving in life and being who you could be?

I used to tell the boys, “Be the best that you can be today.” They only had today. Right now, with this Bill repealing presumption of contact, we can give every child in this country the tomorrow that not just Jack and Paul, but 66 other children will never see. This issue is bigger than Jack and Paul, but they were my reality. They were my children. They were the better parts of me.

But 66 children are anonymous. Successive Governments have made them a child A or a child B in a serious case review, to gather dust in a file in Whitehall or around here, just brushed under the carpet. Serious case reviews—lessons must be learnt. I can ask everybody in here, “What lessons have we learnt?”, because every year we are losing more children, and we are losing more children because of practice direction 12J, because of presumption of contact. There should never be presumption—not in law, not when it comes to safety, not when it comes to lives. You would not go in a court and presume that somebody is guilty.

Thank you so much for that; thank you for sharing.

I know that these words will not necessarily shift your view, but I do not think anybody in this room would think that any of that was your fault, or that you should share any of the blame for what happened to your children. Your testimony is really powerful.

Thank you, Claire, for sharing such a powerful testimony. I think I first met you during a Westminster Hall debate, which was called by your tireless and fearless MP Marie Tidball, the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge. Your testimony is compelling and it is why we are bringing forward the provision in Clause 17 of the Bill to repeal the presumption of parental contact. We know that will not protect every single child, but it does send quite an important message about what we in Parliament say, which is that the courts should always have at the forefront of their minds the best interests of the child, and that alone. I just want to say thank you.

Q Thank you, Claire. Can I just acknowledge that children who are yet to go through the family courts are safer because of you and your tireless campaigning over many years? I hope you can hold that close as you go on. I believe that all campaigners like you, who never fight for themselves, are fighting for the next generation—the job is never done. My question to you is: what is the next step? What would you like to see in legislation going forward, especially in our family courts, to protect more children from harm?

Claire Throssell:

What I would like to see moving forward is an understanding of what it looks like without presumption of contact; what good practice looks like; understanding trauma; understanding what coercive control is; understanding emotional abuse. We all understand physical abuse—it is there; we see it. What we do not understand is the emotional abuse and the scars that we carry. We must always look from the position of actually seeing a child, hearing a child, believing a child, protecting a child, and we must go from this basis. We must use the legislation that we have in the Domestic Abuse Act. We know that it is not being used in courts. We must see children as victims in their own right of this crime. We must accept children as victims in their own right of this crime, and we must take away the fact that we are always trying to prove the crime that has been committed against us.

Domestic abuse is a crime, so why is it that when we go into family courts we are ripped apart by barristers? Why is it that a crime has been committed against us, but we are always the ones who have to prove it has been committed, and by whom? Why do we have to go into a court, when we have committed no crime, and stand up and be humiliated in order to fight for our children? Why do we have to do that alone?

With any other crime, the onus is on the police to prove that a crime has been committed and by whom, and then sentencing is carried out accordingly, but in a family court, the person who has had the crime committed against them time and again has to prove that that has happened. We are not believed automatically, and we are not supported automatically. There should be special measures in family courts to help see the child, like in the Pathfinder courts, but it is not just about seeing the child; it is about hearing them, believing them, supporting them, and letting perpetrators of abuse know that it will not be accepted and that we are going to take action, protect that child and always presume the unthinkable.

Q It is good to see you again, Claire. I echo everyone else’s comments about your very powerful evidence. You will remember that the last time you attended a debate in the Chamber, certain Opposition Members commented—we have heard comments and suggestions even today—that sometimes mistakes happen and both parents should have the right to their children at all times, but do you agree that this is an opportunity, and that the Government and, in fact, all parliamentarians should be doing everything we can to make sure that the 68 does not go to 69? I would rather that we make a mistake and the child survives than make a mistake where a child dies. Do you agree?

Claire Throssell:

Absolutely—I agree with that 100%. It comes back to the fact that we must not presume that children are safe. We must not presume that children are not going to lose their lives, because perpetrators of abuse manipulate, they lie, they turn it around and they use DARVO—everything is always everybody else’s fault, and their voice is always louder than the child’s. You have an opportunity now to change that. You have the opportunity to make sure that no other child has to use their voice and say to a fireman, a police officer or a doctor, “My dad did this, and he did it on purpose.” No other boy should have to have a dying testimony and believe that he saved the life of his brother, because I never told him differently. Mistakes are not good enough. Sixty-eight mistakes is a national disgrace, and in 2026, there should be no more.

Q Thank you so much, Claire; it has been really powerful to hear from you. I have heard from a constituent who has a close family member going through all of this, and she has been advised by solicitors to avoid the family court at all costs, describing the potential outcomes as a “lottery” and talking about very patchy training and understanding. Would you back my constituent up on those conclusions?

Claire Throssell:

Yes, I do back that up. Judges do need training. They are hiding behind the fact that they are independent. They should be independent—they are the law of the land—but they should not be above the Laws that they serve, and they do need training. They do need understanding. Like I say, the court is another arena; it is a secondary abuser. We go through the abuse, we take the courage to leave—that is not easy—and we enter a court system where we think, “This is going to be fair; this is going to be just.” We go into these arenas, and there are no guarantees that we can protect our children. We are ripped apart, and our personalities—we go through trauma. We tell people the same thing again and again, but we are not seen, heard, believed or supported.

Order. Thank you, Claire. I am sorry, but we have reached the end of the time allotted for your evidence. Thank you so much for sharing with us today. We really appreciate it and your campaigning.

Examination of Witness

Doug Downey gave evidence.

We will now hear oral evidence from Doug Downey. We have until 4.54 pm for this session. Thank you for joining us today. Will you please briefly introduce yourself?

Doug Downey:

My name is Doug Downey. I am the Ontario Attorney General. I have the privilege of overseeing the administration of justice in Ontario, Canada. I look forward to being able to talk with you a little about our experience with juries, and the lack of juries in certain cases, and how that relates to efficiencies and otherwise.

Wonderful. Thank you very much.

Q Hello, Mr Downey. I am Dr Kieran Mullan, the Shadow Justice Minister. I want to begin by asking you about what read-over we might get in relation to challenges you have had with court backlogs. Do you have experience of waiting times and backlogs that increased from an ordinary level and were brought back down again? What did you do to secure that?

Doug Downey:

Absolutely. As we went into covid, we were developing backlogs, and then of course through covid we had more. I can share some specific numbers with you if you wish. For a sense of scale, we have about 250,000 cases a year that come into the system, and the backlog made that grow quite significantly. We are chunking our way through it, if I can put it that way, and employing technology processes and increasing capacity across the system.

Q Has there been any change over that period in the use of jury trials? Have you used them more or less?

Doug Downey:

We have not made changes to the jury trials, but we have made changes to compensation for jurors and how we get responses from jurors electronically versus in paper, and we changed our jury rolls. But in terms of what juries apply to, we have not made changes during that period.

Q Would it be fair to say that you had an increase in the backlog and then a decrease, without making any changes to the extent of the use of jury trials?

Doug Downey:

We have not used that as one of the levers. To give a sense of scale, about 96% of our trials are judge-alone, so in terms of making a change, it would be to add more juries, which I would suggest, based on the data and experience we have, would move us in the wrong direction on the backlog.

Q We have covered jury trials and changes around that, but if you were going to pick one or two other things that you did that you think had the biggest impact on reducing your backlog, what would they be?

Doug Downey:

Increasing capacity across the system. We have different levels of court: the Ontario court and the superior court. The Ontario court has a complement of approximately 300 judges. We have added 52 to that complement. In addition, when we add a judge, we add seven full-time staff, whether it be Crown prosecutors, victim service workers or whatnot. In total, we added about 700 full-time staff over that period. Building that capacity has helped. The challenge we have is the increasing rate of intake. There are theories on why that is, but it is a fact that we are dealing with.

Q It was very good to have the chance to meet not just you, Mr Downey, but many of the judges at the superior court of Ontario on my recent visit to Canada. I am glad that you are able to join us. I want to ask you about two things: the efficiency and the pace with which judge-alone trials are conducted, as compared with jury trials, within your system, and your perceptions of the fairness and integrity of those judge-alone trials. As you just explained in response to the Shadow Minister, judge-alone trials in the criminal court have been a feature of the Canadian system for decades, I understand.

Doug Downey:

Absolutely. They have been in place for quite some time. They produce a number of benefits for the system. It is not just the length of trials; it is the expertise that can be brought to bear by an experienced judge. To become a judge, you have to have a minimum of 10 years’ experience at the Bar. It can also create scheduling advantages, because you do not have to schedule contiguously; you can have a break in a trial and come back a few days later, and not have to manage the jury in that sense. There are cost consequences, but there are also scheduling and efficiency consequences that we harness. More than 95% of our cases are judge-alone, but there is a mechanism by which the individuals can choose judge or jury. We put that in the hands of the accused. By and large, they choose judge.

Q I am aware of that distinction. Distinguished academics such as Professor Hoyano have made the point about the distinction with the system that we are bringing forward, where we are removing the right to elect. I understand that in your system, it is the defendant who elects. It is right, is it not, that many defendants actually elect for judge-alone?

Doug Downey:

Absolutely true—they do elect for that. There are different advantages for them, including the speed of the matter. There are advantages for our system in terms of the cost of the matter and getting people to a just outcome. It is more than an academic exercise in terms of what is fair, but people do choose that. I can tell you that we track the court of appeal pieces, and more often the appeal is because a jury has been misinstructed. Judges, trained properly, when they come to the bench, can segregate out things that need to be segregated out, but you cannot always do that with a jury.

Q The point about the pace at which the trial moves is an issue of contention. Some people say that having judge-alone for the same type of case will not save time compared with a jury trial. In your experience, once the election has been made by the defendant within the Canadian system, how much time is saved for the same sort of case with a judge-alone trial as opposed to a full jury trial?

Doug Downey:

At a minimum, months. There is no question but that it is faster, from the data and anecdotally. It is not just our jurisdiction; other jurisdictions in Canada have similar experiences; British Columbia, on our west coast, is a good example. There is absolutely no question. You can move through motions in the middle of trials without disrupting, and you can do preliminary hearings beforehand and not have to redo something in front of a jury, because the judge has already heard that part. There are systemic advantages for time.

Q Other Committee members want to come in, but I want to ask you about fairness and, importantly, the perceived fairness and confidence that communities have in the system. On my visit to Toronto, it struck me what a diverse city it is. I believe that 50% of the residents of greater Toronto were born outside Canada. Is that something that you measure? Can you help the Committee understand the confidence that the public has in judge-alone trials?

Doug Downey:

There are two parts to that. First, clearly, people are choosing judge-alone. On its own, the fact that the accused are choosing judge-alone speaks to the confidence they have in that system. There have been studies, such as the national justice survey in 2023 and 2025. Half the respondents to those studies indicated that they are moderately to very confident that our criminal justice system is fair to all people, and more than half—59%, to be exact—reported being moderately to very confident that the criminal justice system is accessible to all people. That is a fairly high number for people who are experiencing the system or know people who are experiencing the system.

Q Thank you, Mr Downey, for your time today. I profess my ignorance of the Canadian justice system—it will stay with me forever that I do not know exactly how it works. Is the lay element in your criminal courts just 5% of all criminal cases?

Doug Downey:

Are you talking about the non-lawyers who are hearing—

Yes.

Doug Downey:

We have in the Ontario Court of Justice what we call a lay bench—the justices of the peace. They do a lot of the bail hearings and a lot of the provincial offences—traffic and that sort of thing. That is where the lay bench resides, but the trials are not done by the justices of the peace when it comes to criminal matters; they are done by judges who are appointed, with a minimum of 10 years’ experience and quite often more than that.

Q That is helpful. What sentence can a judge sitting alone give, and are there particular cases that will be heard with a jury?

Doug Downey:

It is a great range. Let me answer that in reverse, if I may. The most significant matters, such as murder and treason, will default to a jury, but if the Crown agrees with the accused, they can move it to judge-alone. That generally is not the case—it generally stays where it is—but they can. For the balance of matters, such as serious sexual assaults, it is not directly based on what the consequence might be; it is a class of cases that we call hybrid and I think you call either-way cases, where an individual can make an election to move into the superior court and, by consequence, get a jury, but generally they do not do that.

Q I have a quick follow-up question, based on your earlier comments. Do you believe that a large part of the confidence in the Canadian model is the right to elect?

Doug Downey:

I think so. The right to elect is a feature, but I do not think there would be any less confidence if they were not given that right, simply because the default would probably be with jury, but that would become very inefficient for us.

Q My question concerns the potential issue of judges being identified and targeted because they are dealing with cases at a high level. Clearly, in your situation, judges are dealing with high-level cases and sentences. Have you seen any evidence that judges are particularly targeted if they hand down higher sentences?

Doug Downey:

I think we are seeing, around the world, a heightened level of concern about individuals taking things into their own hands, so court security is very important to me. Judicial security is something that we have put a lot of effort into.

As for whether it happens because of a sentence, I cannot say with confidence that that is the driver. I think our societies are becoming more vitriolic, and that is what we need to guard against in protecting individuals. But if an individual judge is presiding anyway, I am not sure that they are going to attract more attention as a result of whether or not there is a jury.

To be honest, the nice thing about judges is that we get written reasons why things happen. In Canada it is very different from the United States: the jurors are not allowed to be debriefed afterwards in a public way. I do not know whether that is the case in Britain, but that provides a little bit of anonymity and protection against people drawing attention to themselves.

Q In Canada, 96% of your criminal trials are without a jury. In this country, 97% of our criminal trials are without a jury. Would you support reducing the percentage of jury trials even more in Canada?

Doug Downey:

It is a complicated piece in Canada, because the criminal code is governed by the federal Government. We are a provincial Government, so although I am tasked with running the Administration, I do not get to set all the rules. If I can be a politician for a second, I think that it is healthy that you are having this vigorous debate. I am certainly not comfortable telling you what you should do, but in our experience, from the perspective of running the system, it is definitely having a positive impact.

But would you support reducing the percentage even more in Canada?

Doug Downey:

We have an anachronism here in Canada with civil juries, which you got rid of quite some time ago. I am supportive of dealing with those civil juries, largely for the same reason.

Q What about in the criminal context?

Doug Downey:

In the criminal context, it is not something that we have broached. I would have to have that conversation with my federal counterpart.

Q I am interested in your data. Do you see any differences in different groups electing for a judge-only trial? If you do see a difference—I am talking about age and various other protected characteristics—why do you think that there is one?

Doug Downey:

That is a great question. I do not have data on the different groups electing, but we often see high-profile matters trying to move towards a jury. We know that individuals with very technical defences or very technical legal approaches will sometimes go to a judge, so that they can have that expressed. It really depends on the facts of the case, as opposed to the kind of case. I do not have running data on that, so I hesitate to be categorical. The motivation for going to jury, or not, can change with the theory of the case, the approach of the lawyer and, ultimately, the client.

We have two minutes left.

Good afternoon, Doug. I have a really quick question. I am just going to be brutally honest. I am a woman of colour—a black woman. Within our communities in the UK, there is a fear that if we move towards a judge-only trial, it would create major problems. How has the Canadian system ensured that defendants from such diversity are receiving a fair hearing in judge-only trials?Q

Doug Downey:

Again, that is a wonderful question. One of the dynamics is cultural sensitivity. Whether a jury can be walked through what they are dealing with, with the proper lenses, is open for debate. I can tell you that we have a lot of effort going into judicial education, by the judges for the judges, on First Nations perspectives, with everything from body language to lived experience. That knowledge resides with the judge; it may or may not reside with the community of peers. That is the goal. That issue can go both ways, but we have some confidence that judges are exposed to things that juries may not be.

Mr Downey, thank you very much for joining us today from Canada.

Doug Downey:

It was such a pleasure. Thank you.

That brings us to the end of the time allotted for the Committee to ask questions.