Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Hodge of Barking Excerpts

Thursday 28th October 2010 Commons Chamber

The Minister for Women and Equalities was asked—

[Margaret Hodge (Barking) (Lab)]

1. What recent representations she has received on the likely effect on women victims of domestic violence of reductions in funding to Supporting People programmes.

[The Secretary of State for the Home Department and Minister for Women and Equalities (Mrs Theresa May)]

We have received no such representations. However, we have been meeting a number of organisations that provide support to women who are victims of domestic violence, and most recently my hon. Friend the Minister for Equalities met the chief executive of Refuge to discuss exactly that issue. I am pleased to be able to tell the right hon. Lady that following widespread consultation with the voluntary sector, the Government have committed to providing £6.5 billion to the Supporting People programme over the next four years.

[Margaret Hodge]

That is, of course, a real-terms cut in the supported housing programme. Women’s refuges also get their money through housing benefit and, at present, they are allowed to charge rates above the local housing cap, and therefore access more benefit than the cap would allow. Will that exemption continue, given the decisions that have been taken to impose that housing cap across all areas of the country?

[Mrs May]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her concern in relation to support for refuges. We will consult on welfare reform proposals more widely, and that issue can certainly be considered. In relation to the support that refuges provide for victims of domestic violence, I am pleased to tell her that this Government have been able to extend until the end of this financial year the pilot period of the sojourner project dealing with victims who have no recourse to public funds. That is another matter on which we are considering longer-term solutions to ensure that refuges can provide support for the women who need their services.