Domestic Abuse Bill

Debate between Baroness Burt of Solihull and Baroness Sherlock

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 27th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, first, I would like to add my thanks to the chorus of praise that is being heaped on the tremendously clear and cogent introduction by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister.

Many noble Lords and parties outside this place—charities, other groups, news media and so on—have expressed great concern that, at a time when victims are at their most vulnerable, they are being failed by our support systems, which were designed to come to their rescue. We need to know what effect government benefits and interventions are achieving.

I support all these amendments and would have added my name to all of them if there had been space. Amendment 34 calls for the commissioner to look at universal credit split payments. It is probably a deeper question than that, as some of the discussion we have had on this has already revealed. It is a knotty, complex problem, and it very much bears investigation by the domestic abuse commissioner to see what can be done to make the whole system fairer. I have been campaigning for split payments by default for some time. Perhaps we need more, but that would be a very good start.

Amendment 150 is a neat solution to a problem of the Government’s own making. Long delays in the payment of benefits when a victim could be destitute and in need of more financial support to replace belongings they have left behind, find somewhere to stay, et cetera, can lead to extra expense just to survive, so to claw back payments made in advance when they would not have been necessary in the first place if they had been paid promptly is surely adding insult to injury. In the grand scale of moneys paid out by the Government recently to help people disadvantaged by circumstances, it is a drop in the proverbial ocean.

Amendment 152, which would disapply the benefit cap for 12 months after a new claim following a new universal credit claim for a victim of domestic abuse makes a lot of sense. It would enable a victim, desperate for accommodation and some security, to not have to worry if there is one bedroom too many for 12 months while they find their feet. I was shocked to learn from the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, that a panic room could constitute an additional bedroom, and I very much look forward to the Minster’s response on this because, if that is the case, it really needs sorting out. Is this too much to ask? Perhaps the Minister will tell us what she believes about this cap.

Finally, Amendment 153 would require the Government to assess the impact of any social security reforms on victims or potential victims of abuse. The Government need to know the effect of government policies. If we do not measure the effectiveness of what we are spending, how can we spend taxpayers’ money most effectively to help our offer to these people, the most vulnerable and in need of help in our society? They are not huge measures in terms of cost, but they will give big relief for those who are already suffering.

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken, including my noble friend Lady Lister for a superb introduction, and for all the great speeches. I am grateful too to those who supplied briefings and to DWP Ministers for meeting us.

The amendments in this group cover four distinct issues, and I shall touch on each. The first is universal credit payments. As we have heard, single household payments actually facilitate financial abuse, because they allow perpetrators to control the entire household income. Claimants can ask for payments to be split but, as my noble friend Lady Lister said, simply asking puts them at risk. Refuge front-line staff say, “It is rarely, if ever, safe for a survivor to request splitting UC payments”. That may explain why it is so rare.

As we have heard, there have been widespread demands from various organisations and committees for Ministers to find a way to separate payments by default. I know that Ministers do not like the idea, partly for operational reasons and partly for the reason mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Chisholm, that the vast majority of couples keep and manage their finances together. But, as Refuge, points out, for those experiencing economic abuse, their finances are not managed jointly but controlled by their abuser. And this is not a tiny minority. We have heard today that research from Refuge and the Co-op Bank found that 16% of adults had experienced economic abuse from a partner. That research also found that 39% had experienced abusive behaviours, such as not being allowed access to a joint bank account, or being scared into allowing debt in their name. Given the high numbers flowing on to universal credit in the pandemic, this is urgent.

Amendment 34, to which I have added my name, would simply place a duty on the commissioner to investigate the payment of universal credit separately to members of a couple and lay a report before Parliament. The noble Baroness, Lady Chisholm, expressed concern that that would be putting an imposition on the commissioner, but I am sure she has noticed that the briefing sent to noble Lords from the office of the commissioner designate actually indicated support for this proposal from my noble friend Lady Lister. So I hope that, on that basis, the Minister will be able to accept it.

Amendment 150 would exempt domestic abuse survivors from having to repay a benefit advance that is made to mitigate the five-week waiting period for universal credit. As we have heard from many noble Lords, those who flee often take little money and few possessions with them. They normally have to make a fresh claim for universal credit, triggering the five-week wait all over again. My noble friend Lady Primarolo explained compellingly why that is such a problem. We have heard evidence that, on average, the survivors of economic abuse are over £3,000 in debt. In addition, a quarter have had their credit rating suffer as a result. There must be a real risk that survivors who want to flee could be deterred because they know it will be five weeks until the first UC payment. They may already be in debt and worried about getting into any more, and if they take an advance, not only does their monthly income fall below the survival limit, they will have other debts to service out of that. If Ministers do not want to accept this amendment, what do they propose to do to support survivors and enable them to flee abuse with enough money to do so?

European Union (Withdrawal) Bill

Debate between Baroness Burt of Solihull and Baroness Sherlock

Report: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 30th April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Burt of Solihull]

My Lords, Amendment 68 is in the names of the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy of The Shaws, the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, and myself. The amendment proposes a new, short clause which is similar in its intention to that proposed by Amendments 67 and 69, to which we also added our names and which have already been debated.

The clause relates to ensuring co-operation within the EU on child maintenance claims. The importance of cross-border co-operation between the EU and the UK on enforcing child maintenance claims is clear, and I will not detain the House at this hour by going into it. However, in post-Brexit times we need a mechanism to ensure that this cross-border co-operation is maintained.

The clause is very modest in its intention. It does not tell the Government how to do this; it merely requests a report showing how it is working, or not, as the case may be. This does not seem unreasonable to me, so I hope that the Minister will undertake at least to consider this modest request. Children and families who have already suffered the challenges of family break-up across the EU are depending on it. That is all I wish to say on this proposed new clause.

[Baroness Sherlock]

My Lords, EU family law provisions are tried and tested. There is a broad consensus that they work well, and with the advent of the Brussels II recast—as it is known in the trade—they will become more effective still. At earlier stages of the Bill, I set out in some detail the challenges for international family law post Brexit, so I will not rehearse those again. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, has said, this amendment is focused on what happens to child maintenance when we leave the EU.

Child maintenance matters because parents can separate or divorce but they do not cease being responsible for their children. Children have a right to support from both parents, even if one lives abroad. Maintenance plays a key role in lifting single-parent families out of poverty. Receipt of child support is also positively associated with single parents taking up work and with children maintaining contact with a non-resident parent.

This may be private law, but the need for it to work well and be enforceable is a matter of public policy importance. Even the UNCRC mandates, at Article 27, contracting states to take all appropriate measures to secure the recovery of child maintenance and, when a parent lives abroad, to promote accession to international agreements. So there are compelling reasons for Parliament to want to be assured that we will have a well-functioning system to enable the assessment and enforcement of child maintenance owed by a parent living in one of the EU 27. The Minister told the House that, during the implementation or transition period, the current reciprocal rules, including the key EU family law instruments and Hague conventions, will continue to apply as now. Beyond that, we do not yet know what the landscape will look like.

Ministers have signalled that they would like to continue to participate in the Lugano convention, but that is nothing like a substitute for the maintenance regulation, as that part of the EU family law provisions are known. The 2007 Hague convention would go some way towards assisting with the recognition and enforcement of maintenance obligations, but it too falls well short of the maintenance regulation. It has no general system of jurisdictional rules, and you cannot enforce spousal maintenance orders via the central authorities unless they are linked to enforcement of a child maintenance order. We are left hoping that the Government will be successful in negotiating a reciprocal deal that will serve our people well. Given the significant number of international divorces, these issues cannot be ignored.

Ministers are confident that comparable reciprocal arrangements can be achieved to replace the EU family law provisions. This amendment would simply require Ministers to tell us how. If Ministers do not smile on this amendment, perhaps they could tell the House how and when the Government will update us on progress. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.