Baroness Burt of Solihull
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Solihull Murders
Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts(2 years ago)
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Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
I thank my noble friend for that question. Training includes those issues. I will quote the Minister in the other place yesterday, because she summed it up perfectly. She said:
“It is about time that people who work in this field do not look towards colour as being an excuse for non-activity. This Government take the matter very seriously. It does not matter what colour, creed or sex a person is; if they need the police’s help, they need the police’s help. I expect those themes to be included in proper police training.”—[Official Report, Commons, 22/11/22; col. 158.]
So do I.
Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)
My Lords, in her remarks yesterday, the Minister also said:
“We need thorough risk assessments, and they need to be followed with proper training.”—[Official Report, Commons, 22/11/22; col. 156.]
I am sure all noble Lords would agree. Can this Minister tell the House why some police forces have failed to carry out assessments and training of their officers? Can he give me any good reason why this training should not now become compulsory?
Lord Sharpe of Epsom (Con)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for that question. We agree: it is incredibly important that the training reflects the gravity of these sorts of situations. We are taking action to improve this. I am sure she will be aware that we are supporting and funding the National Police Chiefs’ Council’s Deputy Chief Constable Maggie Blyth in her role as full-time national policing lead on this sort of subject. We are committed to funding the continuing rollout of the College of Policing’s Domestic Abuse Matters programme for front-line responders, and to adding VAWG to the strategic policing requirement.
On the training that has been developed by Maggie Blyth, which I think was released last December, so far only two-thirds of police forces have adopted it. That is not good enough. The Minister in the other place said the same and I am happy to repeat it.