Domestic Violence

The Cabildo and Canarian Government are working towards creating a new service to assist women affected by domestic violence.

The Cabildo and Canarian Government are working together with the aim of creating a new service, based in the south of the island, to assist women who have been the subject of violence. It will cater for the municipalities of Pájara, Betancuria and Tuineje.

The agreement to begin planning the implementation of this service was reached during a meeting between Natividad Cano, Cabildo Counsellor for Social, Health, Consumers and Immigration, and María Nieves director of the Canarian Women’s institute.

Natividad Cano explained that although the number of recorded cases of violence against women has fallen, the population increase in the south of the island means that there is a need for the south of the island to have its own service. The new service does not represent a splitting of the service based in Puerto Del Rosario, but rather a completely new set up, that will reduce the time spent in travelling.

She also said that this extension of the service represents a new means of cooperation with the Canarian Institute for women that will begin in 2007. Among the points discussed at the meeting were the putting into place of new ways of assisting women who had suffered general violence and ways ways of breaking the economic dependence that women often suffer. These two lines of assistance signify a a substantial improvement in the conditions for such women.

The meeting also included a technical evaluation of the materials resources and systems, which were considered as being very satisfactory, and also about actions to develop the coordination between the social services and security forces, such as the development of training for all Cabildo and ayuntamiento staff involved in these matters.

After the establishment of mechanism for assisting assaulted women set up in 2005 there has been a fall in the number of such cases recorded, whereas prior to its implementation the general trend was an increase.

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