Domestic Abuse

Baroness Howarth of Breckland Excerpts

Wednesday 25th November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bates]

The noble Baroness is absolutely right, and I pay tribute to her work over many years in this area. She will recognise that the number of places in refuges, which is the subject of ring-fenced funding of £40 million—there through this Government—has increased so that there are now 3,472 places available. The number of rape advice centres—also funded by the Ministry of Justice—has also increased by 15. But again, it is a collective effort to make sure that we all tackle this most abhorrent of crimes.

[Baroness Howarth of Breckland (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister will be aware, as I have said this to him before, that where there is domestic abuse of women it is often also children who suffer. At this time when we are looking at the spending review and are aware of the pressure on local authorities, would he not acknowledge that much of the work in these families was carried out by social workers in local authorities? Will he not only commend the work that they do on behalf of society but hope to protect their budgets and the numbers in post?

[Lord Bates]

I will certainly do that. The noble Baroness will be as encouraged as I am to hear from the Chancellor that there will be new facilities in the social care budget to provide additional funding to that important area. The Government have also announced that we will give additional funding to an organisation called Behind Closed Doors, which works particularly with children to help and support them in those difficult times.