Domestic Abuse Bill

Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Alderdice

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 1st February 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has withdrawn, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I do not want to go over ground that has already been expressed by so many noble Lords in this important debate, but I emphasise a concern that noble Lords have. In welcoming the Bill and applauding the Government’s attempts to drive this forward in as consensual a way as possible, it could all fail if the funding is not available to enable local authorities in particular, but other services too, to provide the support that has been identified, in all the work leading up to the Bill and in noble Lords’ debates.

That is what makes the amendment of my noble friend so important: it tries to define the provision that local authorities are responsible for much more closely. I hope that the Government recognise that giving greater assurance to noble Lords that local authorities have the ability to deliver the kinds of services we want will be crucial to their response. This is not just about funding—we know that—but we cannot ignore funding. The evidence that has been put forward by noble Lords about issues with refuge bed spaces is convincing.

As I understand it, 64% of total refuge referrals in England were declined last year. We know from the outstanding work of Women’s Aid in its annual survey of support providers that, for most organisations that provide these essential services, the local authority commission did not cover all or most of the cost of running the service. We should think about this: over the last year, as they have had to cope with real issues in raising funds, increased demands on their services and the uncertainty of local government finance, those lifesaving services have been under huge strain. We took the experience of Refuge as an example. Since 2011, it has experienced cuts to 80% of its services. Funding for refuges has been cut by an average of 50% and, as Refuge says, it is far from alone in that experience. The Covid-19 emergency has put further strain on the specialist sector: obviously many providers have had to transform the way in which they deliver services while meeting additional demand.

We all sign up to the idea of a national network of refuges to grow and meet demand but, without much greater clarity over the commissioning and strategic responsibilities of local government and the funding made available by central government, we must be very concerned about whether the Bill, when enacted, will be implemented properly.

I have one other point to make. I endorse what the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, had to say about the importance of data collection. As he said, it seems that the police no longer collect data regarding the sex of victims. I think that is a mistake. It also emphasises the importance of new subsection (1B)(a) in Amendment 89 in relation to the information that a local authority is required to obtain. Obtaining the prevalence of trends in domestic abuse and other forms of violence against women and girls is vital to ensure that the full scale of the problem is known and the proper strategies can be adopted.

Overall, we want to hear tonight the Government recognise that in order to make sure that the Bill— a Bill that we really support—will actually work in practice, they are going to have to tackle the issue of local government responsibilities, direction and funding.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

I have received requests to speak after the Minister from the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, and the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I have listened very carefully to the Minister’s response, particularly on Amendment 176, for which I thank her. None the less, does she not accept that favouring accommodation-based services, as set out in Part 4, is bound to impact on local authorities’ spending decisions and make them move funding towards accommodation-based services at the expense of community-based services? How will the Government ensure that a proportion of the additional £125 million goes to community services? Will it not be possible for us to give Ministers regulation-making powers to bring in a duty on community services after the mapping exercise has been completed? That would at least give us some way to ensure that the Government have statutory provision in the light of the mapping exercise.