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Performing female genital mutilation (FGM) is prohibited within the UK by the FGM Act of 2003. A mandatory reporting duty for FGM requires regulated health and social care professionals and teachers in England and Wales to report known cases of FGM in under 18-year-olds to the police. An application to the court for an FGM protection order (FGMPO) can be made to keep individual women and girls safe from FGM. This paper reveals the significant disconnect between the number of FGMPO applications and known recorded cases of FGM. The introduction of FGMPOs requires critical exploration as there is insufficient evidence to show that FGMPOs are effective in protecting women and girls from FGM. It is therefore unclear what impact, if any, FGMPOs are having upon the protection of women and girls at risk of FGM. The barriers to the implementation of FGMPOs and possible solutions are discussed.

Indonesia has enacted laws which provide mandatory protection for victims of human trafficking. It also has mandatory drug laws which, in some cases, lead to the death penalty. This legislative conflict together with investigative and prosecutorial failure risks the execution of human trafficked victims who are used as drug mules in organized crime. In countries where there is no statutory defence to criminal conduct, there is a need to approach criminal conduct in a way that protects victims. This includes mechanisms to ensure non-prosecution and non-punishment. The recent reprieve for Mary Jane Veloso, albeit temporary at the time of writing, is an opportunity for Indonesia to lead a new global approach to victim protection.

As at March 2016, 49 states had reformed their laws to clearly prohibit all corporal punishment of children (United Nations 1989) in all settings, including the home (Global Initiative to End All Corporal Punishment of Children, n.d.) By January 2017 this number had reached 52. As the trend moves towards abolition, it is not an acceptable position for the United Kingdom (uk), the United States of America (usa) and Australia (Poulsen, 2015) to remain missing from that list. Whilst they are, effectively, a child (a person aged under 18 years of age), is the only person in all three countries that it is legal to hit. This article seeks to restate arguments in this area in a simple way to restart the debate in a modern context where understanding of child abuse is perhaps more widespread than it ever was in the past. On 20 October 2014 a report, Living on a Railway Line, was launched in the uk to mark the 25th anniversary of the signing of the un Convention on the Rights of the Child, which took place on 20 November 1989 (Rowland, 2014). It recommended removing the defence of reasonable chastisement in relation to the punishment of children. This article seeks to build on that agenda in a comparative context taking a three way perspective from the uk, the usa and Australia. It concludes that moves to prevent family violence are progressive but the position of a society where physical punishment of children is permitted yet child abuse is forbidden is not a tenable one. Reducing the number of cases of child abuse must begin with a clear message from society that physical punishment of children, whatever the circumstances, is unacceptable. The situation is serious enough to introduce aspirational legislation to remove justifications for physical punishment of children with the aim of modifying behaviour within society.

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