Arbitration and Mediation Services (Equality) Bill [HL]

Lord Rowe-Beddoe Excerpts

2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 27th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rowe-Beddoe (CB)]

My Lords, I am most pleased to support this Bill, which, as has already been said many times around the House, is another example of the indefatigable force that is my noble friend Lady Cox. As we have heard, she is interested not only in this, but in so many things worldwide.

I have been increasingly concerned, as I am sure many of your Lordships have, to learn of the abuses to which some Muslim women—I emphasise “some”—are being subjected while living in our country and, as such, subject to the supremacy of our law. As the noble Lord, Lord Dholakia, mentioned, I was with him this week at a meeting at which we were presented to three ladies who gave us oral statements of what had happened to them. They described the most appalling abuse—“appalling” is a rather mild word. One striking criticism that was left with me, which was inferred from what we heard, was the failure of our police in certain cases to deal properly with such incidents as reported by Muslim women. We can speculate as to why some police may have taken the decision, if indeed they did, not to deal with this properly, but I am sure that this should be investigated and addressed. We can all understand what the possible reasons for it may be, but we must take seriously this apparent disinclination of certain police or police forces to provide appropriate support when abuse is reported.

In most cases, the strength of the abused is enormous, even to make such a complaint. We have to understand that these people live in a different world from ours. To have the courage to come forward and even suggest that they have a complaint to make, and then for it not to be taken seriously, is very depressing. In the interests of time, I shall move on, but so many noble Lords have referred to certain things in this area that I clearly endorse. I want to focus on the fact that we must strengthen the duties of police and social services to ensure that women are made aware of their legal rights under our law. As has been said, so many of them do not even speak our language. It is therefore not an easy task, but it must be addressed. I urge the Government to support the Bill.