Domestic Abuse Bill

Debate between Baroness Hamwee and Baroness Crawley

Report stage
Monday 15th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Crawley (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I will be supporting the noble Baronesses, Lady Meacher and Lady Hamwee, and my noble friend Lady Wilcox should they wish to press this amendment to a vote today. We all know that migrant women with no recourse to public funds face so many additional barriers to safety from violence. Abusers commonly use women’s fear of immigration enforcement and separation from their children to control them and stop them seeking the help that they need. Thanks must go to Elizabeth Jiménez-Yáñez, co-ordinator of Step Up Migrant Women, Janaya Walker of Southall Black Sisters, and all those organisations which work with migrant women and have kindly shared many heart-breaking testimonies with us.

We all, including the Minister, wish to ensure that safe pathways are established for migrant women to report abuse. To be honest, I am disappointed that our arguments for the Bill to play its part in achieving that have so far fallen on deaf ears. The Government are saying that the 2020 National Police Chiefs’ Council guidance simply needs better implementation. We are saying, however, that the super-complaint investigation, which several of us referred to in Committee, found that the guidance on data-sharing has been only inconsistently adopted by police forces in England and Wales; is discretionary, as the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, has said; and is therefore not fit for purpose.

If the guidance is not working adequately and there is no legal duty for the police to tell immigration enforcement if they know someone is in the country illegally, why are the Government not using this Bill to remedy the situation? Why also are the Government waiting until 21 June to respond to the super-complaint investigation by Liberty and Southall Black Sisters? Obviously, this will be too late for this Bill—and too late for so many women who are living in fear not only of abuse but of detection and of reporting that abuse.

Why are the Government also insisting that the police need to share the victim’s data to safeguard the victim? Surely, it is the role of the police to safeguard and investigate, and to refer the victim of abuse to specialist services, as the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, has said—and it is the role of immigration to enforce immigration policy and rules. These roles should not be conflated at the expense of the victim. The Stand Up Migrant Women campaign also insists that there is a distinct lack of data on any positive effects resulting from such information-sharing. I ask the Minister to think again about the importance of this amendment to so many migrant women who are trapped in the sinking sands of irregular identity and regular abuse.

[Baroness Hamwee (LD) [V]]

My Lords, this amendment is about victims of domestic abuse who have—or, crucially, believe that they have—insecure status. Believing or being told that you are insecure is part of control, as the noble Baroness, Lady Crawley, just said, and trust or lack of trust—indeed, fear of an authority figure—is a significant barrier to seeking help. In Committee, I quoted Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services, who said:

“Victims should have every confidence in approaching the police for protection”,


and should

“never be in a position where they fear the actions of the police could unintentionally but severely intensify their vulnerability”.

That was about organised crime but it applies precisely also to this situation.

The Government have, or will have, their pilot on the needs of migrant women. They are not a homogeneous group: there are different groups and communities, and so on, but the subjects of this amendment are characterised by the common factor of insecure status. The issue is about process. Without a firewall, quite a lot of women—and some men—will not even get to square one of “victims first and foremost”.

At the previous stage, the Minister spoke of the benefits to sharing information. I do not dispute that there are certain benefits in some situations but this is a matter for the individuals’ consent. I am very concerned that in Committee, in referring to victims’ needs being “put first”, she talked about there being a “clear position” on the police exchanging information about victims of immigration enforcement. There should indeed be a clear position, and the amendment provides it. She also said that the Government are

“equally … bound to maintain an effective immigration system”,

that

“individuals … should be subject to our laws”

and that if their status is irregular, they

“should be supported to come forward … and, where possible, to regularise their stay”.—[Official Report, 1/2/21; col. 1912.]

We could have a debate about safeguarding from exploitation, which I acknowledge that she mentioned, too, but that is not the issue here.

This sounds too much like “status first” and is not consistent with “victims first”, which is what we have heard throughout the debate, and rightly so. I support the amendment. We on our Benches will support it not only because of the Istanbul convention, as mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, but because of its intrinsic importance.