CYBER-flashing, deepfake pornography and non-fatal strangulation are among a series of abuses that will now be explicitly criminalised under sweeping new laws approved by the States Assembly yesterday.
In a landmark package of legislation aimed at tackling violence against women and girls, politicians unanimously backed new offences covering intimate-image abuse, stalking, sexual threats and emergency powers to remove alleged perpetrators from victims’ homes.
But, although support for the five new laws brought to the States Assembly by Home Affairs Minister Mary Le Hegarat, was unanimous across a series of votes, there were concerns raised over funding, structures in place around enforcement and the need for a continued emphasis on the topic by the next government.
Cost concerns
Introducing the package of new laws, Deputy Le Hegarat said she believed it was important to be transparent about the cost, especially given the strain that parts of the justice system were already under, with no capacity to absorb further increases in case-loads.
The Home Affairs Minister estimated there would be a total cost of between £3 million and £5m per year, comparing this with the costs associated with the Misuse of Drugs Law, which she estimated to be £2.5m annually.
But Deputy Helen Miles, the previous incumbent at Home Affairs, said a recent report had given a cost of between £3m and £7.9m to cope with a predicted surge in reported crimes of between 169 and 369 per year.
Insufficient regard was being shown, she argued, to the pressures on Jersey’s prison, already at 92% capacity, as well as the impact on the police, courts, probation service and support organisations.
“I am very uncomfortable about this ‘legislate now and worry about the cost later’ approach,” she said.
Ministers moved to answer Deputy Miles’s concerns. Treasury Minister Elaine Millar said there had already been additional funding for the police in 2026, and that moving forward there would be a demand-led funding model, with money available as required from the government’s central reserves.
Chief Minister Lyndon Farnham said he was disappointed by Deputy Miles’s comments. Action on VAWG had been a priority for the current government, he added, expressing the hope that the next administration would take a similar approach.
Intimate image abuse
The first of the five laws to be debated was the Draft Sexual Offences (Jersey) Amendment Law, introducing seven new offences targeting intimate-image abuse, including the non-consensual taking or sharing of sexual images, threats to share such material, cyber-flashing and the creation of sexually explicit deepfake images.
Jersey had fallen behind other jurisdictions, Deputy Le Hegarat warned, with a reliance on seeking prosecutions under the “outdated” legislation covering improper use of telecom systems.
“It’s time we modernised our legislation to protect Islanders against the new sexual harms that have emerged in the digital world,” she said.
Children’s Minister Richard Vibert said the new law “sent a very clear message that these forms of abuse will not be tolerated and the perpetrators will be brought to justice”.
Constable Karen Stone, who was responsible for the initial move to secure funding for work focused on violence against women and girls in 2022, hailed a “significant legislative improvement that is a vital part of making Jersey safer”.
Stalking
Attention then switched to legislation that has established stalking as a standalone offence for the first time, replacing the existing catch-all harassment law.
Deputy Le Hegarat said the intention was to make perpetrators think twice and enable action to be taken at an earlier stage, rather than waiting for serious physical harm to be inflicted on victims.
“The criminal justice system will be better able to respond and law enforcement can offer victims the protection they need,” she added.
Deputy Kirsten Morel said it was imperative that work focused on violence against women and girls continued in the future. This was not just the matter for the next government, or for one particular minister or Scrutiny panel, he added, but for the community as a whole, with particular focus needed on ensuring mental health services were available to help Islanders through the challenges that often resulted from the regular use of mobile devices and from artificial intelligence.
The new law creates four offences – harassment, aggravated harassment, stalking and aggravated stalking – and explicitly covers cyber-stalking, including misuse of smart technology.
Stalking is defined as behaviour involving surveillance, intrusion or interference in a person’s life, recognising the cumulative harm caused by persistent obsession.
Emergency powers
Emergency powers for the tackling of domestic abuse were also passed into law.
Deputy Le Hegarat said emergency barring notices would be able to be brought in by police officers that would mean alleged perpetrators could be prevented from having contact with victims, and that such notices, valid for 72 hours, could be followed by a longer-lasting emergency barring order that could be imposed by a court.
Victims were too often left having to move out of their homes, along with their children, she added, whereas the new arrangements would increase the probability of the perpetrator being the party required to leave.
Deputy Catherine Curtis, chair of the Children, Education and Home Affairs Scrutiny Panel, said she was supportive of the legislation but had concerns about whether the police had adequate resources to utilise the new powers when necessary.
Strangulation
The fourth component of the package introduced a new standalone offence regarding non-fatal strangulation, which has previously been prosecuted under general assault laws.
Strangulation was a common feature of domestic abuse, Deputy Le Hegarat said, citing “disturbing” statistics which showed that someone who had subjected their partner to strangulation was seven times more likely to go on to kill them.
The severity and danger posed by strangulation was underestimated, Deputy Le Hegarat added, and she lamented that pornography had played a part in many people considering it to be a normal sexual practice.
Deputy Philip Bailhache said he has reservations about the measures, because it was already covered in existing legislation covering assaults, while Deputy Max Andrews expressed concerns about the potential for perpetrators to claim that strangulation was consensual.
Deputy Le Hegarat said the standalone offence would allow more appropriate action to be taken than was currently the case, with potential jail terms of up to ten years in the worst cases, and explained to Deputy Andrews that the “consensual” clause was necessary in order to recognise the right to a private life enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights.
Threats
Finally, the Draft Crime (Public Order) (Jersey) Amendment Law expanded the offence of making threats to include threats of serious sexual violence beyond rape, threats against children, and threats of female genital mutilation.
This move followed a mismatch between international definitions of violence against women and Jersey law, which previously failed to criminalise some sexual threats unless serious physical injury was involved.
Summarising the package as the fifth and final element was passed, Deputy Le Hegarat hailed a significant moment.
She said: “We now have unprecedented protective measures available to victims and ensure that the criminal justice system is able to intervene earlier so that we can prevent violence against women and girls, not just respond to it.”
