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Gabriella Kent from Rothera Bray's Family Law team provides comment for legal teams following the publication of the President of the Family Law Division's new guidance.
A Non-Molestation Order ("NMO") is a protective injunction prohibiting a respondent from engaging in any behaviour that amounts to harassment, abuse or unwanted contact, whether direct or indirect.
An NMO can cover a wide range of conduct. This would include physical abuse, sexual abuse, verbal or emotional abuse, financial abuse, harassment, intimidation or threats, controlling and coercive behaviour or any contact (direct or indirect) that is abusive, distressing, or unwanted.
Breaching a Non-Molestation Order is a criminal offence, giving police a clear basis to take immediate action. This makes the clarity and drafting of Orders critically important for enforcement.
New guidance for legal practitioners
On 12 January 2026, Sir Andrew McFarlane's President Guidance concerning Non-Molestation Orders under the (Family Law Act 1996) came into effect. This guidance supersedes the earlier guidance from 2023 and introduces significant changes to improve and modernise the process of applying for a projective injunction.
The Family Courts have seen a significant rise in Non-Molestation Order applications, so the following initiatives have been implemented to ease up Court time and to improve the application experience for those who are victims of domestic abuse:
- Processes will be simplified to reduce the number and length of hearings
- Processes will be standardised to ensure clarity and national consistency
- Applications and standardised orders will be modernised to ensure they are easier to understand for all parties
- Best practice guidance for legal practitioners will be issued to improve the quality of applications, safeguard victims and promote effective use of resources
Family Justice Council Best Practice Guidance, published 17.12.2025
Legal practitioners are to now draft in accordance with a new template Order, found at Annex 1 of the President's guidance.
The guidance for the simplified Order refers to just two protective directions – forbidding any contact and forbidding the respondent to go to/enter a place that is relevant to the circumstances.
A – Forbidding contact
The guidance sets out that prohibiting direct and indirect contact is sufficient to protect the victim. It should, however, be proportionate to the circumstances; should the respondent be a parent, consideration needs to be given to communicating in respect of child arrangements only (via a parenting app or via solicitors, for example).
There is a new expectation that the Order need not include an express prohibition of physical abuse and/or other violence. This is because not only is such a criminal offence and thus already prohibitable in law, but it also falls within the scope of the "forbidding contact" direction.
B – Forbidding the respondent to go to/enter
As above, a more simplified approach is now to be taken. Practitioners should avoid measurement terminology, such as "100m from X", rather should list any relevant road names in the Order.
An Order may still exclude the respondent from places such as the victim's workplace, the child's school etc., but again, the road names/building names need to be made expressly clear.
The implementation of Annex 1 is much welcome. As a legal practitioner, the earlier terminology used when drafting Non-Molestation Orders often required extensive explanations and foreshadowing as to the types of conduct that could fall within the term "pester" or "molest".
Hand in hand with the above, victims often found that breaches to an Order were not effectively enforced due to ambiguity. Sending flowers to a victim in the post, for example, may not be deemed by the police as pestering behaviour, but does clearly constitute a breach to a "forbidding contact" direction.
It is hoped that the simplified content of the Order will afford better protection to the very victims that they seek to protect.
The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.
