Spain wants the EU to implement overarching legal protections for domestic violence victims, but the European Commission isn’t having it, reports EUobserver. 

Since the 2004 election of self-described feminist and “anti-machismo” Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Spain has placed itself at the forefront in stopping gender inequality and domestic violence. “We talk of slavery, feudalism, exploitation, but the most unjust domination is that of one half of the human race over the other half,” Zapatero told Time back in 2004.

As part of the battle, Spain has urged legislation to bring all 27 EU member states on par with its anti-gender violence policies, proposing a “European protection order” that would grant legal protection to women who’ve been the victims of domestic violence.

As it stands, individual EU member states vary widely in how they deal with domestic violence: For instance, in Spain, men under restraining orders are fitted with electronic tags, whereas in Austria, a woman can only be granted legal protection from her partner as part of a criminal investigation or if he’s a convicted felon.

But these discrepancies in legal customs aren’t among those that the European Union is willing to reconcile, as the Commission plainly refused to back Spain’s proposal last week. Why? It’s just too complicated, EU justice commissioner Vivian Reding said, citing the intersection of civil and criminal legislation as part of a legal “road to hell.”

It might be worth weighing the legal nightmares of the proposal against its potential benefits—Spain has shown that increasing protection of women who are already victims can bring down the number of acts of domestic violence, posting a 27 percent drop in the number of women killed by apartner or ex-partner in 2009.