Domestic Abuse Bill

Debate between Naz Shah and Peter Kyle

Wednesday 2nd October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Naz Shah]

I agree with my hon. Friend and thank her for that timely intervention.

Twenty-seven years ago, when Zoora Shah did not have the right services, she went to prison for 14 years. At the time, she did not tell her story. I am talking about this in this debate because I want to talk about specific services for BAME women, especially specialist services that understand domestic abuse, as my former colleague on the Home Affairs Committee mentioned.

It is more complicated for women of BAME heritage. My mother did not talk about being abused because of the concept of honour. I have talked about honour crimes before, and I shall give an example. Had Zoora Shah been arrested by an officer who was non-white, she might have had a different experience. Had she been arrested by a woman of colour, or even a woman of her background, they might have understood her experience of abuse, which drove her to kill. Had she been represented by a female solicitor from her cultural background, she might have had a different experience. Had her case been dealt with by a judge with an ethnic background or who understood her culture, the outcome for her might have been very different. The outcome of my life might have been very different, and that of my siblings and my family.

That is why it is important to have a reflective workforce. It is about having specialist services for women from black and minority ethnic backgrounds who understand the culture. When a lady called Tahmina rang me on a Saturday morning three years ago to say that a girl in Pakistan had been murdered, I could identify it straight away as an honour crime. That girl was not just murdered and buried: she became a campaign and a cause, ensuring that we talk about honour crime and about her rape, and continue to try to seek justice for her.

I have an understanding of honour and the impact of it on me. I will describe it in the words that my dear friend Sal used to me last week:

“Izzat”—

honour—

“is the shroud that covers me, weaved from the threads of my identity, integrity, values and the decisions that I make.”

I am emphasising honour because my mother served extra time in prison—she could not speak up because of the impact of honour. It is a code of conduct in my community by which we behave.

It is apt today that I talk about honour in a different context. Yesterday, The Guardian reported that in my election campaign in 2017 I had felt suicidal because I was dishonoured. My opponent, having a background from my community, knowingly ran a campaign in which a man in the community stood up and actually said, “When we buy a dog, we check its pedigree. Look at Naz Shah’s character, look at her demeanour, her chaal chalan”—as he put it—“and how she presents herself”. What The Guardian did not report was that in this email I equated that to honour abuse, and I do not say that lightly, as a daughter of a woman who at one point in giving evidence about her abuse referred to herself as having become a “mattress” to men. When someone who comes from that background ends up being a Member of Parliament and the shadow Minister for Women and Equalities, sitting on these Green Benches and able to represent the voices of those who are dead and buried thousands of miles away—

[Peter Kyle]

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for her speech, which is very wide ranging. She is cramming a huge amount into a short time, but we are learning a huge amount. She has mentioned the importance of having staff who are trained in issues relating to different ethnicities and BAME backgrounds and cultures. Does she agree that now that the Government are finally recruiting more police officers, it is essential that these issues are taken into account, as we have the opportunity to get more people into police enforcement?

[Naz Shah]

I thank my hon. Friend for his comment. I absolutely agree with it, which is why I am so passionate. I teach and deliver the diversity session at the national police strategic command course, because I want my experiences to influence that change so that we have a reflective workforce—the police officer, judge and solicitor I mentioned—for all these women.

Importantly, we must recognise that the experiences of women from BAME backgrounds are different. They impact upon us differently and they have ramifications for us. I was literally feeling suicidal during that campaign because my very fabric was being attacked publicly—honour really does play a part. When we talk about men who kill women because of “honour”, because they have been “shamed”, because it has impacted upon their izzat, I want this House to recognise the severity of that—of what it means. Even today, as a woman, I did not recognise my own forced marriage until I was in my 30s. I did not recognise that I was involved in marital rape until I was in my 40s. That is what domestic violence is.

As a proud survivor, I will say this to this House: we may be taking this into account and putting £300,000 into BAME specialist services, but that is not enough. We need much more for those women. We need that specialist service, in order to understand the experiences of migrant women—the experiences of women who do not have English as a first language. We need specialist services.