YDO v YDP

Facts

Two cross-applications for personal protection orders (PPOs) under Part 7 of the Women's Charter 1961 were heard together in the Family Court. In SSP 643 of 2025, the Father applied on behalf of the couple's daughter, K, for a PPO against the Mother. In SSP 1007 of 2025, the Mother sought a PPO for herself and the two children, K and a son, against the Father. The Father was represented; the Mother discharged her counsel on the eve of trial and appeared in person.

The Father's case was that the Mother's conduct towards K amounted to emotional or psychological abuse under s 58B(4). He relied on audio recordings, including one made on 12 February 2025 in which the Mother, while helping K with spelling, shouted vulgarities and insults at her and K could be heard crying. The Mother's application relied on an incident in which she said the Father had thrown the son onto the floor, and on incidents in which she alleged the Father had pushed her on the stairs, yanked her bag on 30 December 2024 so that her spectacles cut her cheek, and punched her in September 2019 in the United Kingdom. Judgment was given on 11 November 2025, and these grounds followed.

Issues

1. Whether the Mother's verbal conduct towards K amounted to emotional or psychological abuse under s 58B(4) of the Women's Charter 1961.
2. Whether a PPO for K was necessary, and whether it should be limited in time given the parent-child relationship.
3. Whether the Mother proved that the Father committed family violence against her or the children, and whether her application was brought in good faith.

Holding

The court allowed the Father's application in SSP 643 in part: K was granted a PPO against the Mother limited to 3 years, until 11 November 2028, and both the Mother and the Father were ordered to attend counselling. The Mother's application in SSP 1007 was dismissed. There was no order as to costs.

Reasoning

On abuse, the court noted recent Family Court decisions favouring an objective approach that takes account of context, and observed that this test may be hard to apply where a child complains of harsh parental discipline, since the correction exception covers only physical abuse. It left that question open, holding that on any approach the Mother's conduct crossed the line. The recordings showed the intensity and duration of her tirades; K could be heard sobbing, and the court found she was tormented and distressed at being called useless and sworn at.

On necessity, the court found the Mother lacked a healthy way of coping with stress, especially from work, and had vented on K, so a PPO was needed. But it held that where a PPO is sought for a child against a parent, necessity should be weighed against the parent-child relationship and the rehabilitative aims Parliament stated when amending the Charter. The Mother recognised her conduct was out of bounds and was willing to change, and photographs showed a bond between her and K. An open-ended order would wrongly signal that she could not change, so a time-limited PPO with counselling for both parents struck the balance. The court stressed that breach of a PPO is an arrestable offence.

On the Mother's application, the court accepted the Father's submission that it was retaliatory: her own evidence showed she wanted to preserve the power dynamic and stop the Father using a PPO against her. In any event she did not prove her allegations. A throw of the kind she described would likely have caused serious injury, yet she sought no medical help, and the son's drawing was given no weight. The stairs incident was at most a quarrel, the injury on 30 December 2024 occurred in a scuffle over a bag holding the children's passports and was not physical abuse, and the 2019 incident was uncorroborated. Recordings of her berating the Father also undercut necessity.

From the judgment