Stalking

Baroness Manzoor Excerpts

Monday 27th November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

On expanding the sex offenders register, someone has to be violent and a sex offender to go on to it. A stalker might be neither violent nor a sex offender. However, if someone becomes violent and a menace both to society and to their victim, they would be captured on the sex offenders register.

[Baroness Manzoor (Con)]

My Lords, some ethnic minority women have got married under the nikah ceremony and have subsequently found themselves in a domestic violence situation, but they have no redress because they have not had their marriage registered by a registry office. Will this be tackled in some sort of register too?

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

I am so glad my noble friend brought up this issue because it is one I have seen evidence of on many occasions: a woman thinks she is married—she may have come from another country to get married in this country—but she is not and her marriage is not recognised in law. If she is a victim of domestic violence she is in a very vulnerable position indeed. I hope my noble friend brings this up in the course of the consultation on the domestic abuse Bill.