Domestic Abuse Bill
Public Bill Committee, 29 October 2019.
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Before we begin, I have a few preliminary announcements. Please switch your electronic devices to silent. I would certainly like tea or coffee, but the rules are set in stone and we would have to agree that through the Chairman of Ways and Means, so I am afraid that, at the moment, you cannot have tea or coffee. I do not really want to tell anyone off; I am afraid you are just going to have to deal with water.
We will first consider the programme motion on the amendment paper. We will then consider a motion to enable the reporting of written evidence for publication, and a motion to allow us to deliberate in private about our questions before the oral evidence session. In view of the timetable, shall we just get on with it? I call the Minister to move the programme motion, which was discussed yesterday by the Programming Sub-Committee.
TABLE
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Copies of written evidence that the Committee receives will be made available in the Committee Room. If there are any complaints, please direct them to our wonderful Clerk.
Examination of Witness
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Q Before I call the first Member to ask a question, I remind all Members—I am sure they do not need reminding—that everything must be related to the Bill; we should not wander beyond its scope. We should also stick to our timings. For this session we have until 10.55 am. Secondly, I ask Members to declare any relevant interests before they ask their first question. I cannot think that any Member does have an interest.
Nicole, would you please tell the Committee—not in huge detail—something about yourself?
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Splendid. You are projecting your voice well—we can all hear you—so that is a good start.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. Before I start the questioning, for the sake of completeness, I will say that I used to practise as a criminal barrister and prosecuted for the Crown Prosecution Service and other prosecuting agencies.
Ms Jacobs, congratulations on being the designate Domestic Abuse Commissioner. You have explained your expertise and experience in this area. Could you please help us with your thoughts on how you see the role of the Domestic Abuse Commissioner? What do you hope to achieve?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q Thank you; that was most helpful. Your current title is designate Domestic Abuse Commissioner, because you will not possess statutory powers until the Bill becomes an Act. To help the Committee to put the framework in place—I suspect you may be asked questions about this—what are your thoughts on the statutory powers that you are given under the Bill?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Good morning and welcome. It is an absolute pleasure to have you here. I am interested to hear you say that you would welcome more powers. An issue for me, at this moment in time, is whether you need more time. I am really concerned about the fact that the role is part time, and there is definitely an opportunity for us to look at that. I am offering you a full-time jobQ here.
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q You have had an opportunity to look at the Bill. What are your thoughts on the gender definition within it?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
That is perfect.
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
It is a pleasure to see you here today, as it was to see you in the Gallery. I thought it was terrific that you sat through the whole debateQ .
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
You made a compelling description in your opening remarks about the landscape of community services and specialist services commissioned by the NHS, local authorities, children’s services, and police and crime commissioners. I am delighted that you have picked mapping this provision of services as a key priority. Are you also looking at prevention services? We know that, unfortunately, if children grow up in a home where they witness domestic abuse and violence, they are far more likely to become perpetrators or victims. Given the scale of the challenge—we have heard your reflections on time—will the budget of £1 million be enough to undertake such a mammoth mapping exercise? What role does sharing best practice have and how would you undertake that partnership working, given the range of agencies involved in providing services?
Diana Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull North)
WelcomeQ , and congratulations on your role. I want to ask you whether the fact that the advertised role was part time was one of the reasons you applied for it. I asked the Minister about this in the House of Commons yesterday, and she said that she had had advice from recruitment consultants that we would get a better breadth of applicants if we had a part-time post. Is that why you applied?
Diana Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull North)
Q You would like it to be full time.
Diana Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull North)
Q I wonder whether you have read the prelegislative scrutiny report on the draft Domestic Abuse Bill, because it was clear from its recommendations that there was unanimity that the issue of accountability was not properly addressed in the way the commissioner is accountable to the Secretary of State in the Home Office. Their budgets and staff are set by the Secretary of State in the Home Office. I wonder what your thoughts are on that.
Kevin Hyland, who was a commissioner with whom I am sure you are very familiar, gave evidence that the Secretary of State would have too much control over the commissioner’s budgets, the staff employed and the content of the commissioner’s reports. I note that you said at the beginning that you wanted to be a publicly independent commissioner and hold the Government to account. What is your view on what Kevin Hyland said?
Diana Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull North)
Q In terms of being able to be accountable, do you think it would be better for your role to sit within the Cabinet Office rather than the Home Office?
Diana Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull North)
Q I wanted to ask how you feel you will be accountable to Parliament. This is a parliamentary Committee, so how will you do that?
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
I, too, would like to congratulate you on your new role. There are such high expectations of this role. As the comments so far show, this is now the time to make sure that we set out the role so that it is set up to be successful.Q
I listened to what you said about mapping and co-ordinating support services to eliminate the postcode lottery across England and Wales, and to make sure that we have a clear idea about what services are there. We know that there are big gaps in services for survivors and children. It is a massive brief. Like many Committee members, I have concerns about whether this can be a part-time role or whether you will end up doing it three times over. This is going to take up a lot of time.
You have a staff of 13. Could you give us a bit more colour about what that staff looks like? How are you going to eat this elephant, in a way? It is a massive thing to do. What can we expect? Perhaps our expectations are too high. What can we expect in the first 100 days or so? Now is the time to say and to give us all the feeling about whether the role ought to be considered to be full time, whether the budget is sufficient and whether you have the right staff. We want to make sure that you are successful and that we get it right. We do not want something where we all come back later and think, “That’s disappointing.”
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
Q Could you give us a little more information on stakeholder engagement, as that will be a key part? How do you see that playing out and who are the key stakeholders?
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
Q Thank you; that was a helpful response. Will you tell me one last thing? In a lot of the discussion, there was clearly a great deal of difficulty with the children of survivors—in finding school places, in considering the children and with the support services for children, who are also survivors of domestic abuse. I am conscious that this role is massive, but how do you see it fitting in with them as stakeholders and with the provision of services for them?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Welcome, Nicole. I have just two things. To continue the theme of mapping, it has always seemed to me that there is a real challenge with refuge or accommodation-based support because a constituent of mine, for obvious reasons, is as likely to need somewhere outside Nottingham tonight as inside Nottingham. There is no connection between the commissioning decision made in, say, Birmingham and that individual back in Nottingham, in the way that there would be for another service commissioned through the local authority. I know you are in the early stages of this, but have you had much chance to consider that issue, perhaps drawing on your previous experience? How is the health of the national network of refuges at the moment? Do you intend to establish that in your roleQ ?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Q Pivoting to recruitment, the Home Affairs Committee heard from Kevin Hyland, just before he left his role as anti-slavery commissioner. We asked him about the challenges and what he knew then that he did not know at the beginning. He said that one challenge of being in the Home Office is that, quite rightly, it has exceptionally rigorous recruitment processes because of the access to exceptionally sensitive material, including on organised crime and counter-terrorism. All that makes abundant sense, but it means that recruitment of staff is difficult, and he was taking up to nine months to bring in members of staff. You are building a team of 13 people from scratch. How is that looking so far? Do you have any of those anxieties? Has anything changed? Is there a streamlined process specifically for you?
Wendy Morton (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills)
Q Good morning, Nicole, and congratulations on your new post. I want to focus on one particular group of stakeholders: victims and their children. I believe they are at the heart of the Bill; I wonder what your thoughts are on that. What do you feel are the right levers for improving the response to domestic abuse for victims and their children?
Wendy Morton (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills)
Q In terms of working with others, we obviously have the Victims’ Commissioner and the Children’s Commissioner, and we also have the Welsh Government national advisers’ role. How would you see your work linking in with them, or any collaboration with them? How do you see it all not just knitting together, but working together in this space?
Wendy Morton (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills)
Q Just one more quick question. You touched on the work of Jo Todd and we talked earlier about the definition of domestic abuse and about gender neutrality. How do you see your role in terms of supporting male victims of domestic abuse?
Eleanor Smith (Labour, Wolverhampton South West)
Good morning, Nicole, and congratulations on your role. How much importance do you place on diversity in your recruitment, and within your department and the work you are doing thereQ ?
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
You Q will be aware from listening to the Second Reading debate that there was discussion as to whether the definition should pay regard to the fact that women are much more likely to be victims or survivors of domestic abuse than men. I thought that was more a statement of fact, but I could see the argument that that would help to ensure that providers or funders would weight provision according to that same proportion. Will your office and powers allow you to investigate and ensure that providers are providing on a proportionate basis when it comes to gender?
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
Q May I ask a supplementary question? You talk about the guidance; excuse my ignorance—I should perhaps have known this—but in your role how much input will you have in writing the guidance?
Liz Saville-Roberts (Plaid Cymru, Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
Congratulations on your recent appointment. I have two questions on the jurisdictions of the United Kingdom and devolution divergence. I will start with Northern Ireland, although I appreciate that you are the commissioner for England and Wales. The Joint Committee report stated that it was unacceptable for people in Northern Ireland to be denied the same level of domestic abuse protection as those elsewhere in the UK because of the lack of a Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly. Do you believe the Government’s response as it stands to be satisfactory? In the present circumstances, do you have any role whatsoever in relation to Northern IrelandQ ?
Liz Saville-Roberts (Plaid Cymru, Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
Q That leads me seamlessly to my next question, which is about Wales. I appreciate that Wendy Morton mentioned the adviser to the Welsh Government, who is giving evidence to us this afternoon. The Joint Committee made a recommendation on reporting to the Senedd—Wales’s Parliament—and a duty to consult. Of course, Wales has the Violence against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Act 2015. Here we have an instance of devolution divergence, given that housing, education, health and local authorities are all devolved. How do you see your role interacting with Welsh Ministers as well as in accountability to the Senedd?
Liz Saville-Roberts (Plaid Cymru, Dwyfor Meirionnydd)
Q Justice is not devolved to Wales, yet many of these critical services are, and you are answerable to the Home Office. Do you feel that there should be answerability to Wales, given the critical nature of those services, which are devolved, and the fact that criminal justice over-straddles that?
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Welcome and congratulations. My questions will be a bit about Wales, but also Scotland and Northern Ireland. I do not want to put you in a constitutional hotspot, because most Ministers and MPs could not answer some of these questions, but hopefully they will help to clarify the position and provide a bit of guidance to us. You will be held accountable to Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, because there are Scottish, Welsh and Northern Ireland MPs who sit in this place and will, of course, hold you to account. One part of the Bill is the advisory board—clause 11, I think. As part of that, part 4 and subsections (a)(b)(c) and (d) specify certain participants who should be part of the advisory board. It is very specific about ensuring the representation of the interests of voluntary organisations that work with victims of domestic abuse in England, healthcare services in England and providers of social care in England. Given that, certainly for now, you cover England and Wales, do you think it would be helpful for us to specify the same stakeholders from Wales to ensure that they are on the advisory board and that England and Wales are represented at that levelQ ?
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Q That leads me to my next question. In your experience—obviously, you come from the United States, which is federal system with several different states and lots of different jurisdictions, but they come together as one country—do you find that domestic abuse or relationships stop at certain political jurisdictions?
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Q You have talked a lot about the mapping exercise that you want to undertake. Do you foresee problems in having a national network, when it is not actually national—it covers England and Wales only, which is not our country but only two parts of it? Do you foresee major problems with that, especially when many victims, as in my constituency, will be flipping between different parts of the UK or will have family the length and breadth of the UK?
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Q It does. I appreciate that. I have one final question, if the Chair does not mind. Unfortunately, in an area such as this, your role is so worthy and so wanted throughout the United Kingdom. I do not want to put you in a political hotspot with our constitution, whether it is Brexit or other movements where the UK can become a bit of an issue. However, I have a big concern. In my constituency I have Clackmannanshire, which has the highest instance per head of domestic abuse in Scotland. It is as much of a postcode lottery in Scotland as it is in other parts of the United Kingdom.
To be devolved does not mean to be separate. You come from a country with a federal system; the point about eminent domain still rests within this UK Parliament, as the sovereign Parliament. I do not see this as an either/or model. I would be very keen for a role such as yours to have a UK-wide remit, following a similar model to the Office for Veterans’ Affairs that was recently launched, which connects devolved and reserved matters and guarantees guidelines and standards throughout the United Kingdom, which I think is exceptionally important.
Do you foresee any problems? The Bill is quite specific about Wales. Paragraphs (c) to (g) of clause 6(2) talk about
“undertaking or supporting (financially or otherwise) the carrying out of research; providing information, education or training…to increase public awareness…consulting public authorities…co-operating with, or working…with, public authorities, voluntary organisations and other persons”.
At the moment, the Bill talks about
“co-operating with, or working jointly with, public authorities, voluntary organisations and other persons, whether in England and Wales or outside the United Kingdom.”
I find it bizarre that we are creating a Bill that says, “We want you to co-operate with England and Wales and other countries outside the UK, but not the two other constituent parts of the United Kingdom.” Do you foresee any problems for us in trying to extend your role in just paragraphs (c) to (g)—which currently apply to Wales—to Scotland and Northern Ireland? Obviously we might have to stagger that for Northern Ireland because we have no Assembly just now, but do you foresee any problems with extending your role for guidelines, consultation and research, so you can complete the mapping exercise and make sure that the service is provided to all citizens of the United Kingdom, rather than just two constituent parts of it? I will take away the political side for a minute—that is our job—but from a practical point of view, so long as you got a budget uplift to match, do you foresee any problems in your role being extended to Scotland and Northern Ireland?
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
May I intervene for a moment? We have less than 15 minutes left and we still have four colleagues who have been waiting patiently to ask their questions. I wonder whether we could just speed it up, please.
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Q There is no commissioner in Scotland. We have no equivalent. Currently, it falls between the courts and Police Scotland to pick up some of the activity. We have no commissioner, so this would not be a substitute; it would be a complement. The idea is that, just as in Wales, you would have a role in that consultation on the work. Obviously, a legislative consent motion could be passed in the Scottish Parliament so that this was done in consultation and agreement with different levels of government rather than being imposed with an iron fist. I just wonder whether you foresee problems on an operational level. I know about the political bits; those are for us to deal with. I am just interested in that operational point.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Welcome to the post. What should we say in the Bill about perpetrators? There is a lot about prevention orders and so on, but Q what should we say about that? Should we say anything about rehabilitation or should we just lock them all up? What should we do?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Did you say you had seen the draft of the framework document—that you have been talking to the Minister about a draft of the framework?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Did you say you have seen a draft?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Do you think it would be helpful for the Committee see that draft when we get to clause 10?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
It is in hand, Mr Coaker. That point is very well understood.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q That is very helpful. So we are going to see a draft before we get to clause 10 rather than at the end. That is helpful; thank you very much.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q That is fine. It is quite helpful. Just to say to you, Nicole, it is very helpful for us to see drafts before we discuss the clause, so we know what we are talking about, rather than appearing at the end of the Bill as a framework that we do not know anything about.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
It is therefore very helpful that the Minister has helped to support your remarks that we are going to see that before clause 10.
Paul Scully (Conservative, Sutton and Cheam)
Q Welcome to the role, Nicole. You mentioned your views on the gendered nature of domestic abuse at the beginning. Some people have been suggesting that we should have a violence against women and girls commissioner, rather than a Domestic Abuse Commissioner. What are your views on that?
Paul Scully (Conservative, Sutton and Cheam)
Q That is great. That is why I wanted to ask you about the awareness. One of your roles is to raise public awareness as well, but you rightly said at the beginning that you do not have the capacity to do all the public health campaigns and these kinds of things. How do you see your role and capacity to join the dots, whether from entry-level, early intervention for emotional abuse at that stage, through to members of the public and others who come into professional or personal contact with people in an emotional or domestic abuse scenario?
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
This will probably have to be the last question.
Christine Jardine (Liberal Democrat, Edinburgh West)
I will be brief, Chair. One of the significant things in the debate around the Domestic Abuse Bill has been the Istanbul convention. How significant is it to the work you do that we make sure that we ratify it and are in line with it?Q
Christine Jardine (Liberal Democrat, Edinburgh West)
Thank you. Apologies again for the combination of my sore throat and my accent.
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Q Nicole, before I end the session, is there anything you wanted to share with the Committee, in a couple of minutes?
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Nicole, on behalf of the Committee, I thank you for the time you have spent with us today. We wish you well in the challenge that lies ahead.
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Q We have until 11.25 for this session. Will our witness kindly introduce herself and say something about her role?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q For colleagues who are not familiar with the acronyms of the Home Office and policing, the National Police Chiefs’ Council is the collective of the most senior police officers in the country. It is fair to say that it is an influential and important body in the law enforcement world. Deputy Chief Constable, how do you rate the police response to domestic abuse?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q In terms of the national oversight committee, which you have already mentioned, that is a meeting at national level, chaired by the Home Secretary, with organisations ranging from you, for instance, representing the police, through to HMICFRS and the CPS but also charities and stakeholders, who are important members of the group as well. Through that committee, what challenge do our members give to you, representing the police, in terms of the police response to domestic abuse incidents?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q Just to give us an idea of the pressures that domestic abuse in all its forms places on the police, do you have any measure of how many phone calls or reports to the police there are each day or each year, for example?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q Will the introduction of 20,000 police officers over the next three years assist in your investigation of domestic abuse?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q It is a pleasure to meet you. I have been very happily married for 25 years, but I was married before and it was not so happy. I was a victim of domestic abuse—I have never said this before. I can remember the police coming to my house and saying, “It’s just a domestic”. The only person who was going to be able to do anything about that was me, the following day, but I did not do anything about it, because I was afraid. Needless to say, that marriage did not last very long. But I really worry about people of my generation and older, who believe that this is normal and quite acceptable. In the Welsh valleys, I have heard so many times the expression, “Just give it a clip across the ear-hole”. We are getting better but are not where we should be. That is down to the fact that the generations coming behind us are much stronger women, in the sense that they will not take the nonsense that we took. How many older people are we seeing who we know are victims of domestic abuse but are afraid to report it or to take that step to actually admit it?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q Police are under a huge amount of pressure, with lack of resources, lack of police officers and everything else that we talk about on a regular basis. With the DAPOs, I know that the victim will not be charged, but the police service will be charged for court cases. Will that prevent police forces that are already under pressure in terms of budget resources from going for DAPOs because of the financial implications?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q Where are you on a register for perpetrators?
Wendy Morton (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills)
Q I am really interested in hearing that you are sharing some of the work you are doing in the west midlands. You mentioned Domestic Abuse Matters training. In addition to that, could the police introduce any other measures to encourage victims to come forward to the police in the first instance?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
One of the real issues that has dogged us for years is the postcode lottery in dealing with domestic abuse and the different responses from agencies and police forces in different parts of the country. Some do it better than others, and prosecution rates vary, with some taking into account emotional abuse as well as physical abuse. Your role is to try to pull all that together and generate a national standard that everyone adheres to. Is it fair to say that there is still a lot of difference between forces? What are we doing to try to ensure that everyone is raising their standard to that level?
The National Police Chiefs’ Council will say, “As senior officers, we will adhere to these standards. It is absolutely right and we agree with all of it,” but we all know that sometimes it does not always work in practice. How big a challenge is that for each force? What will you do on that and what more could we do to help?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Is there anything more that we could do? We have the inspectorate later and could try to influence what they inspect, I guess. What you said is absolutely right and exactly what one would expect you to do, but we still know that there will be individual forces where this will not happen in the way that you or any of us would want. How do you drive that change?
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
Q I would like to start by saying to my colleague, the hon. Member for Swansea East how brave she was to share her experience. It reminds us all that every part of the country and every sort of woman is very much affected and how important this work is, so I am grateful to Carolyn. Talking about the Welsh valleys and traditional cultures resonates with me as I represent Cornwall. The point about older women being reluctant to come forward is very much borne out in the evidence.
I thank the deputy chief constable for being with and answering the questions so well. In the new definition in the Bill, we will extend domestic abuse to other family members—grown-up adults and older people—and the abuse that they commit, which is really important. You have described a long process of domestic abuse training—IRIS training, partnership working—to get the frontline police officers sufficiently trained to be able to recognise domestic abuse. This is another huge challenge you are now going to face in extending that definition and the training, so that people are looking out for a different group of victims and perpetrators. How will you go about doing that?
Diana Johnson (Labour, Kingston upon Hull North)
Q I just wanted to ask you a very straightforward question about the definition of domestic abuse and clause 1(2)(a), which gives an age for when domestic abuse will be investigated. What is your view, as a police officer, of having the cut-off at 16? The Joint Committee heard evidence about abusive relationships that were happening below 16, and young people were querying why 16 would be the time that it would be treated as domestic abuse. As I understand it, below that it is treated as child abuse. From a police perspective, what is your take on that?
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
If there are no further questions from Members, I thank our witness very much indeed for the time you have spent with us. We are very grateful for the evidence you have given us.
Colleagues, that brings us to the end of our morning sitting. The Committee will meet again at 2.30 pm in this room. The proceedings will be chaired by the right hon. Member for Delyn. It is quite safe to leave your possessions here—the room will be locked. In the event that there will be a general election, quite where we are going with the Bill I do not know.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
We are quorate, so we will commence. If anybody wishes to take off their jackets, they can. I welcome our first witness. Please introduce yourself.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
I am grateful for your attendance today. I call the Minister to commence questioning.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q 53 Hello, Ms Billingham. You have inspected the police response to domestic abuse for a number of years. What changes have you seen in that time?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
The acoustics in this room are not great. Some Members have indicated that they have difficulty hearing. If witnesses, both present and future, can boom, that would be very helpful.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q I forgot to say that it is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hanson; I apologise for that oversight.
Ms Billingham, you just mentioned that there are some areas that still require attention. Are you able to summarise those for us?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
The shadow Minister has only just arrived from the Division, so I call Gillian Keegan.
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
For those of us who are less familiar with your world, how do you use the domestic violence protection order today, and how will this new provision make a difference on the ground?Q
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
Q Clearly, if implementation has been patchy previously, it is going to be absolutely key. Do you think this point about training and the patchy response is at all linked to the fall in the number of prosecutions and the number of people coming forward?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
ThankQ you, Zoe, for coming along. Are there serial offenders among police forces in terms of variance? Are there forces that you go to that are not as good as they should be, and then you go back and they are still not as good as they should be? I think I know the answer. If that is the case, what can you do about it and why cannot we do anything about it? You identify the problem, but then it just carries on.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q But what if the public wanted to know that? If you want to know how good a school’s exam results are, it is quite easy to find out—it is quite easy to compare schools. That is not so true of police forces, is it? I mean, what you say is quite right, but we know that there are police forces that do not improve their way of tackling domestic abuse by their serious violence strategy going west—they do both, even with the same resources and difficulties, even rural forces compared with rural forces or city forces compared with city ones. Everything is the same, yet there is a difference in performance.
Would it not help if there was greater public awareness of that? How can the inspectorate publish that information so that people can look at it and say, “My police force is not as good as equivalent forces”? League tables?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q No—I just threw that out there. I am just trying. I do not agree with that either, but I am frustrated by the lack of that sort of thing.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q An 88% rise? When is the base year for that?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Sorry to interrupt; I am just trying to think. Was that 10% of crime that people have gone to?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
That is very helpful.
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
ClearlyQ , from the numbers that you are giving us, there has been a huge increase in the trust in police for the victims to come forward and report. The work that you have been doing with police forces is clearly moving in the right direction, so thank you.
The Bill seeks to simplify procedures for police officers, which hopefully will result in higher levels of prosecution. It also gives new powers or responsibilities to police officers, particularly for two groups of people: children and family members. We increasingly understand that when children in households are under exposure to domestic abuse and violence, it will make them more likely to be either a perpetrator or a victim. From your inspections of the constabulary, what steps are you seeing them take to identify those children and refer them?
The other type of domestic abuse now caught in the Bill, which I think is brilliant, is adult family members abusing elderly members or people with disabilities in their families. Again, that is a new area for the police to be tackling. Bearing in mind what you said about resource constraints, what evidence have you seen of the police tackling those particular issues?
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
The fact that you need to do that shows that that is an area of work, once the Bill goes through: police forces have to consider that as domestic abuse and violence. That is a whole new area for the police to be trained on and for you to inspect, ensuring that the new requirements are understood and the services are there to support victims. Clearly, there is some work to do there.
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
I wanted to talk about Operation Encompass; you raised it before I had an opportunity to ask. It is a wonderful scheme. I would like to see it rolled out across the UK as, I hope, a compulsory thing, so that all schools know what goes on.Q
You will be aware, as I am, that women’s prisons are full of women who have experienced domestic violence. When these women are convicted of criminal offences, it is very often through coercive control and behaviour. Are police forces aware of that and are resources stopping them from identifying that these women are victims of trauma?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q Me too. When you make recommendations, do they have to be taken up by the constabulary, or can they be ignored? What impact do your recommendations have?
Wendy Morton (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills)
Q Hello, Ms Billingham. You very kindly shared with us some statistics in answer to another question; I noted that 10% of all recorded crimes have a domestic abuse basis. I have heard concerns about the recent fall in the number of prosecutions for domestic abuse-related offences. Bearing in mind your figures and our concerns, what do you feel could be done to reverse that decline?
Wendy Morton (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills)
Q Just one more quick question, if I may: what difference do you think the 20,000 extra police officers will make in the domestic abuse area?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
We are into the last four minutes, so we must have short questions and short answers.
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Good afternoon, ZoeQ . You have been in your role at HMIC throughout the period of the domestic violence disclosure scheme—Clare’s law. How would you characterise its usage over the years and today?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Q Do you think there are tools or avenues open to us through the Bill to raise that tide?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Q To turn to the role of the commissioner, you mentioned that you can recommend that forces make those changes but you cannot command them. The commissioner will be a big ally for you in making similar public statements about the lack of satisfaction about certain local arrangements that will create significant public pressure for reform. Do you have any reflections on the commissioner’s role or ways that we could seek to improve it or its relationship with you through the Bill?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q On the point about independence, questions have been asked today about the commissioner reporting to the Home Office. You are appointed by the Home Office, or HMIC is. What are your thoughts on your independence?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
I am grateful for your evidence today, Ms Billingham. Thank you very much. We will move on to our next witness, Nazir Afzal.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Welcome to the evidence session this afternoon. For the record, please introduce yourself and state your job title.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q This witness was requested by Plaid Cymru, but I will step into the shoes of Ms Saville Roberts and ask a general question. How will you work together with the Domestic Abuse Commissioner to maximise the impact of the two roles across Wales?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Q When we looked at this in the Home Affairs Committee, we made the final judgment, after a lot of back and forth, to pursue a Welsh approach—to introduce an Act to deal with violence against women, domestic abuse and sexual violence, as was done in Wales. That is at the nub of the conversation about whether there needs to be a gendered definition. Whenever that is raised, there is the obvious reply about not missing out male victims and survivors. How does it work in Wales? What comfort can you give us that a gendered approach is practical but works for everybody?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Q What positives has it brought?
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
Q I am quite intrigued by this role. Will you give us some examples of how it has helped to improve the response to domestic abuse in Wales, and how that might be seen from the viewpoint of the victim or survivor?
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
Yes, the national advisor role.
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q I agree entirely that the Welsh Government have got it spot on: they are superb. I have long followed your career and admired your work and it was an excellent appointment by the Welsh Government—but then, it would be. We have got such a good structure in Wales. Will what is proposed in this Bill clash with what we have got, or will it link in with it? Are we doing things differently or better in the Welsh plan than is intended in this Bill? How can we make both of them the best that they can be?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Thank you very much. Diolch yn fawr.
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Thank you very much for coming to the Committee today, and for your time. You mentioned that you had communicated with the devolved Administration in Scotland as well. Could you just elaborate on some of the communication you had and on the sharing of best practice, if anyQ ?
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Q No, I appreciate that. The section of the Bill on the commissioner’s role talks about the establishment of an advisory board. The Bill mandates that the board must include representatives from voluntary organisations and healthcare professionals from England, but there is nothing about Wales. Given that Wales is a central part of the advisory board, would you like to be on the board?
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Q This is important, and I do not want to put you in a constitutional hotspot, but devolved does not mean separate. A lot of the Bill is meant to be set by the UK Parliament. Some Members will push for it to be extended in certain areas to Scotland. As I have experienced with my constituents, domestic abuse in relationships does not respect county or other political boundaries. Do you agree that—framed as the Bill is about sharing best practice, sharing standards, ensuring that certain standards are reinforced throughout the entire United Kingdom and ensuring that analysis is shared throughout the United Kingdom—this is a good space for the Bill to play in, and that it can respect devolution within the United Kingdom and the role of central Government?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q In your evidence to us just a few minutes ago, you said that there were some issues with the Bill and that you would be happy to share them with the Committee. Could you please do that?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Say that again. Four?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q How many are there altogether, do you know?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Do you know what the estimates are? How many marriages are there?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Do you know what it is for 16-year-olds? The Minister will be able to get that.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Was that figure of 200 for England and Wales?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Q Have the Government made an estimate of the number of non-registered marriages?
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Ten women—
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
The Minister wants to come in on this point.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
I just want to clarify that the latest year for which we have figures on marriage is 2016. Of the around 500,000 people who entered opposite-sex marriages in that year, 179 were aged 16 or 17 years old. I just wanted to clarify that for the record.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
I am going to bring in Carolyn Harris to ask some questions. If anybody else wishes to speak, please indicate now.
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q Let me pick up on two things you have said. First, is religious marriage a growing issue? Somebody came to see me last week who had been in what she thought was a marriage. When she went to get a divorce because of domestic violence, her marriage certificate was in Arabic. She had been married under sharia law and was not actually married.
Secondly, you talked about IDVAs; is there a programme in Wales for having IDVAs in hospitals, specifically for elderly people? I was in A&E with my son, who had pneumonia a couple of weeks ago, when I heard the nurse at the next bed asking a young girl if her problem was because of domestic violence. Can you tell us a bit more about that?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Thank you.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Are there any further questions from Members?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Q I will just see whether there are any further questions. No, there are not, so feel free to continue.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Do Members have any further questions? If not, we are grateful to you, Mr Afzal, for your contribution, and will bring your session to an end.
Examination of Witnesses
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Q I am grateful for your attendance at this evidence session. For the record, the maximum time we have for this session is until 4 o’clock. Please introduce yourselves for the benefit of the Committee.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q Welcome to the Committee. It would perhaps help the Committee if we could hear a little bit about your work in Newcastle, Ms Noden.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q Thank you very much, Ms Noden; Ms Briggs, please do not think I am going to leave you out. I am going to get straight to the point. The Committee is considering the definition, and at the moment the definition is limited to from the age of 16 onwards. What are your views on that age being in the definition? Perhaps you can go first, Ms Briggs.
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q For me, children who experience domestic violence are victims—there are no two ways about it—and we know that it can be a vicious circle. What more can we do to break the cycle of victims becoming perpetrators?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q So the work is being done in silos, without being all joined up. Are we not all aiming for the same thing, or are we working to different agendas?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q Are local authorities keen to support you financially or with services in kind, or is it a battle just to get the money to keep going?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
I am sold. Thank you.
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
Q We are all united in wanting to break the cycle. The evidence is overwhelming that young people who are exposed to domestic abuse, coercive control or violence are likely to be perpetrators or victims themselves. As the Government are investing a lot of money in schools on good relationship education, I am concerned that children will start to realise that what they are seeing at home is not a good relationship, but they will think that is what love looks like because that is what their mum and dad do with partners they see. In the context of what the commissioner and services are to do, what should we do to make sure that that part of the Government’s work in the Department for Education is linked to the sorts of the service you you provide and the possibilities in the Bill?
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
Q I was thinking along slightly different lines—sorry if I did not make myself clear. Again in my constituency, there is another Big Lottery-funded youth work-based project where young people are coming to realise that they are living in a home with domestic abuse and violence, whereas before they did not really understand that that was what was going on. The youth workers are there to make sure that the parents have a conversation and that they are being supported to address their relationship issues. That is more what I was thinking of. Is that something we should be looking at, so that rather than the child being identified as being in an abusive home, it is more that the child themselves identifies that they live in an abusive home? What support can we then give to the parents?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Q What do you think are the implications for children of a proposed legal duty on local authorities to provide accommodation-based support?
Alex Norris (Labour/Co-operative, Nottingham North)
Q Is anywhere doing it really well at the moment? Postcode lotteries have winners as well as losers. Does anywhere model the sort of thing that you are talking about?
Luke Graham (Conservative, Ochil and South Perthshire)
Q My question builds on those of some of my colleagues regarding how children who experience domestic abuse link with potential fostering services, the Department for Work and Pensions, and future education opportunities. Having had a number of constituents and some family go through a similar process, I know that there is a lot of opportunity to fall through gaps. What, in your view, are the elements of best practice? If they are not in the Bill already, we can try to add them. Certainly, we can share such best practice more widely, supporting an individual in an abusive situation and then connecting them with DWP services, education and other opportunities.
Nicholas Dakin (Labour, Scunthorpe)
It all sounds a bit precarious. A lot of excellent work is going on, but it is not certain that it will continue in a consistent way. You seem to be putting quite a lot of eggs in the basket of the wider duty, which will be a way to drive resource and underpin greater consistency, so that we are not just dependent on lottery funding that is falling. Can you explain how you think that will work?Q
Nicholas Dakin (Labour, Scunthorpe)
Q We heard from the earlier witness that these sorts of services are often seen as low-hanging fruit when pressures are on budgets.
Wendy Morton (Conservative, Aldridge-Brownhills)
Q Thank you for joining us today. I want to touch on the Children Act. You are probably aware that the Government are considering the pre-legislative scrutiny Joint Committee recommendation on the definition of harm in the Children Act and whether it should be amended to recognise the impact on children of coercive control. What are your thoughts on that? What do you think the impact of such an amendment will be? Also, do you foresee any unintended consequences of singling out one form of harm?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Three more Members wish to speak and we have just under 10 minutes, so questions and answers need to be relatively quick.
Eleanor Smith (Labour, Wolverhampton South West)
I want to expand on mental health issues. Do you work with child and adolescent mental health servicesQ ?
Eleanor Smith (Labour, Wolverhampton South West)
Q I know we have the NHS in the commissioning body, but do you think there should be something for people with mental health issues, particularly children, in the commissioning body?
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
Q It is fascinating to hear all about the services, and the people of Newcastle are obviously very lucky to have them. We heard in other evidence sessions that not having services such as these is often a barrier to women going further to seek out more services, because they do not think their children will get the services required. Do you have a view on how widely available they are across England and Wales? What difference will the role of the Domestic Abuse Commissioner make in ensuring that when she and her team are mapping all these services, it will help to improve the availability of such services across the country for children affected by domestic abuse?
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
Thank you very much for the interesting evidence. Can I just come back to your point on people under 16 being victims? The Bill states:Q
“Behaviour of a person (‘A’) towards another person (‘B’) is ‘domestic abuse’ if…A and B are each aged 16 or over”.
Are you suggesting it should be the case that, in that scenario, B does not have to be aged 16 or over? Is that what you were driving towards?
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
Sorry—I beg your pardon.
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
I have probably missed it—if so, my apologies—but, from a legal perspective, what would you be wanting to occur as a result of that addition at paragraph 5?
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
So it is a similar concept to the discussion we were having about recognising the gender imbalance and that being on the face, but there was also a feeling that that could be covered by the statutory guidance that comes out. Could that not be a place for what you just described there with regard to children, in terms of the guidance, and knock on to the providers of the services?
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
Thank you.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Do any Members wish to ask further questions? I thank both witnesses for their contributions today and discharge them from the Committee.
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Good afternoon, Emily and Jo, and thank you for your attendance at the Committee this afternoon. For the purposes of the record, could you introduce yourselves, starting with Emily?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
We are grateful for your attendance today.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Welcome. We are very interested to understand the impact that domestic abuse can have on older people. Ms McCarron, could you help us understand what action you would like to see the Domestic Abuse Commissioner take around older victims of domestic abuse?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Thank you. Ms Todd, will you explain what Respect does as an organisation, and then help us with the Drive project? I will then ask you about the lessons that can be learned from that programme in relation to the positive requirements in the domestic abuse protection orders.
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q Thank you. Will you give us an insight into the work, to add a bit of colour to the picture you paint? For example, I visited the Drive project in Croydon. What sort of cases will some of the workers in Croydon or elsewhere be working on, and how do they interact with those perpetrators? Also, what happens with the victims at the same time?
Victoria Atkins (Conservative, Louth and Horncastle)
Q Just a last question. Referring back to the domestic abuse protection orders and notices, but particularly the orders, in the Bill, what are your thoughts on the fact that judges can make negative requirements—for example, “Do not go within 100 metres of that address”—but also positive requirements, which may include attending a perpetrator programme?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q We know that victims change the way that they behave to stop a perpetrator abusing them. What can we put into legislation to put the emphasis on change on the perpetrator and not the victim?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q Yes, that is brilliant—I will give you a rest now. Ms McCarron, we have already discussed—something that came as a huge shock to me—that we do not keep stats for victims over 74 years of age, which is obviously something we have to look at remedying. How do we gather the data? What can we do to ensure that we have ways of identifying elderly people who are victims of domestic violence? Is it as simple as an IDVA—an independent domestic violence adviser—in a casualty unit? What can we do?
Carolyn Harris (Labour, Swansea East)
Q Do you know that in Wales there is quite a big training programme on domestic violence training? Is it better in Wales, because we have more people trained to identify victims?
Sarah Newton (Conservative, Truro and Falmouth)
Q Actually, I can answer your question, Carolyn. Yes, it is very good in Wales, because they have compulsory IRIS—Identification and Referral to Improve Safety—training in the NHS, which is definitely something we should do in the England NHS. That is why they have got the highest detection rates in the UK of domestic abuse among older people.
Emily, you gave us very good written evidence on a different type of domestic abuse for older people from what we have been talking about. We have very much been talking about intimate partners, and this is really about adult family members abusing the older members of their family, or people with disabilities in their family. Perhaps you could talk to us a bit about what you know about that and the prevalence of it. What more do we need to do to reflect on it? For the first time, that type of domestic abuse is being captured in legislation.
Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)
Emily, could you say a little about the difficulty with elderly people disclosing the fact that they are victims of this sort of abuse, and how difficult that must be? This morning, somebody raised the issue of older people, and I think this is a problem as you get older—hopefully, younger people have a different attitude, which is that you don’t suffer in silence. Have you made any estimate of the number of people that this affects? What initiatives have you found that have made a difference? What can we do about it, given that it is not only physical abuse and the economic abuse that Sarah was just talking about, but emotional abuse, control and those sorts of things?Q
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
Q Emily, may I take you back to your suggestion that the definition be widened to include carers? I can absolutely see the logic of that, but is there not a danger? Currently, “personally connected” effectively means being or having been in a relationship or being a relative. If you extended that to carers, why would you not extend it to people who provide paid services to the home, for example? There is a danger that you go from “personally connected” towards “comes into contact”. Where would you stop? I wonder if you have thought about that in terms of extending the definition.
Huw Merriman (Conservative, Bexhill and Battle)
Q Clearly, this is an area that you would think needs addressing. Did you consider whether there are other vehicles to address that point or is this neatly fitting?
Gillian Keegan (Conservative, Chichester)
Q There is no doubt that this is a very big area that is relatively new in terms of our considering it. As you say, older people are definitely much more vulnerable, particularly with regard to intimate care. They are much more isolated, and I guess they are more conscious and concerned about loneliness too, which could be the consequences of taking any action. I have encountered a number of distressing cases involving either carers and the abuse of elderly victims, or other residents abusing people’s relatives in care homes. Obviously, the Government want to ensure that we get this right and make domestic abuse everybody’s business in order to try to identify and help victims, and I suppose that is even more critical with elderly people. What do you think needs to change to ensure that the response to older victims is as good as it can be? How do you see the role of the Domestic Abuse Commissioner in helping us on that journey?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Q Are there any further Members who wish to ask questions of the witnesses? If not, is there anything you wish to add that the Committee has not covered?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
Q Any final word, Emily, before we conclude?
David Hanson (Labour, Delyn)
I am grateful to the two witnesses for their contributions, which brings us to the end of the proceedings for oral evidence today.