When Family Justice Reform Recognises Economic Abuse but Fails to Remedy It
THE REFORM GAP™
When Family Justice Reform Recognises Economic Abuse but Fails to Remedy It
SAFECHAIN™ Intelligence Hub
By Samantha Avril-Andreassen
The Question Reform Failed to Answer
Domestic abuse is now widely recognised within family justice.
Economic abuse is increasingly recognised within family justice.
The problem is no longer recognition.
The problem is remedy.
The Domestic Abuse Commissioner's Everyday Business report raises a concern that should command the attention of policymakers, judges, practitioners, and reformers alike.
Despite growing evidence regarding the prevalence and long-term consequences of economic abuse, the Law Commission's Financial Remedies Scoping Report failed to propose reforms specifically designed to prevent economic abuse or address its continuing effects on survivors and their children.
That observation should concern anyone interested in the future of family justice.
Because recognition without remedy is not reform.
The Evolution of Understanding
Over the past decade there has been significant progress in recognising coercive control and economic abuse.
Research by Surviving Economic Abuse.
The Fair Shares Project.
The Domestic Abuse Commissioner.
Resolution.
Domestic abuse specialists.
Academic researchers.
All point toward a common conclusion:
Economic abuse is not a peripheral issue.
It is central to many survivors' experiences.
Yet recognition alone does not alter outcomes.
The critical question is whether legal frameworks have evolved sufficiently to address the realities now being documented.
The evidence increasingly suggests they have not.
The Missing Question
The Commissioner's report identifies a striking omission.
The reform debate has largely focused upon:
legal certainty;
procedural efficiency;
judicial discretion;
settlement structures;
financial remedy frameworks.
Far less attention has been paid to a fundamental safeguarding question:
How should financial remedy proceedings respond when economic abuse is present?
Not merely acknowledge it.
Respond to it.
The distinction matters.
A system may recognise abuse while continuing to produce outcomes that leave survivors vulnerable.
The Economic Abuse Legacy
One of the most important insights emerging from the Fair Shares research is that economic abuse does not end at separation.
Its consequences persist.
Survivors frequently face:
housing instability;
reduced earning capacity;
damaged credit histories;
depleted assets;
increased debt;
reduced access to representation;
long-term financial insecurity.
The consequences are often cumulative.
Years of abuse become years of disadvantage.
The legal process then evaluates parties as they appear at the point of separation, rather than examining the pathway that produced those inequalities.
This creates a profound risk.
The effects of abuse become normalised.
Children and Economic Abuse
Perhaps the most overlooked aspect of economic abuse is its impact upon children.
The Commissioner's report highlights an important reality.
Children are not merely witnesses to economic abuse.
They are often victims of its consequences.
When a survivor experiences:
poverty;
housing insecurity;
financial instability;
prolonged litigation;
reduced resources;
children experience those consequences too.
This means economic abuse is not solely a dispute between adults.
It is a safeguarding issue affecting entire families.
Family justice has traditionally viewed harm through the lens of child arrangements and contact.
The Everyday Business findings suggest that financial outcomes may also be a source of continuing harm.
That requires a broader safeguarding lens.
The Participation Gap™
Economic abuse and participation are inseparable.
A survivor who lacks resources may struggle to:
obtain legal advice;
gather evidence;
challenge disclosure failures;
commission valuations;
pursue appeals;
maintain litigation.
Participation becomes constrained long before a hearing begins.
SAFECHAIN™ describes this as The Participation Gap™.
The greater the financial disadvantage, the greater the risk that procedural fairness becomes theoretical rather than practical.
The system may offer equal process.
The parties may not possess equal capacity to use it.
The Shadow Ledger™
Economic abuse often leaves traces that conventional legal processes struggle to capture.
The visible financial position rarely tells the full story.
There may be:
concealed assets;
strategic non-disclosure;
manipulated liabilities;
coercive debt;
unequal access to information.
SAFECHAIN™ refers to this as The Shadow Ledger™.
The official record reflects what can be documented.
The lived reality often extends far beyond it.
The challenge for reform is determining how systems identify and respond to that gap.
The Reform Gap™
This brings us to the central issue.
The gap between recognising abuse and remedying abuse.
The gap between identifying vulnerability and correcting vulnerability.
The gap between procedural fairness and substantive fairness.
SAFECHAIN™ refers to this as The Reform Gap™.
A system may acknowledge economic abuse.
It may publish reports on economic abuse.
It may issue guidance on economic abuse.
Yet if outcomes continue to leave survivors financially disadvantaged, the underlying problem remains unresolved.
Recognition without remedy creates the appearance of progress without necessarily delivering it.
The SAFECHAIN™ Index
The SAFECHAIN™ Index asks five fundamental questions:
Institutional Coordination™
Do institutions recognise connected harms?
Documentation Continuity™
Does information follow the survivor?
Trauma-Informed Practice™
Can systems identify economic abuse effectively?
Participation Integrity™
Can survivors participate meaningfully?
Accountability™
Can institutions explain and justify outcomes?
These questions move reform beyond process.
They focus attention on impact.
The SAFECHAIN™ Conclusion
The Domestic Abuse Commissioner's observations expose a difficult truth.
Family justice increasingly recognises economic abuse.
Yet recognition alone does not repair harm.
The challenge facing future reform is no longer proving that economic abuse exists.
The evidence is overwhelming.
The challenge is ensuring that legal outcomes do not perpetuate the very vulnerabilities they are intended to resolve.
The question for policymakers is therefore simple:
If family justice now understands economic abuse, why does reform still struggle to remedy it?
Until that question is answered, recognition will continue to outpace protection.
SAFECHAIN™ Intelligence Hub
The future of safeguarding requires more than recognition.
It requires remedy.
© 2026 Samantha Avril-Andreassen. All rights reserved.
SAFECHAINN Ltd (Company No. 12038453).
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