Domestic Abuse Bill

Baroness Meacher Excerpts

Report stage & Lords Hansard
Monday 8th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Uddin (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, I begin by acknowledging my noble friend Lady Lister and her heroic persistence in seeking welfare reform. The staggering statistics which have just been shared by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, are shocking. In that light, I would argue that economic abuse is an integral part of coercive control that has been experienced by survivors. The Government’s recognition and inclusion of economic abuse in the new statutory definition of domestic violence is therefore welcome.

As has been said by all noble Lords, we know that financial control is a barrier to escaping violence and abuse, and therefore immediate access to financial assistance through welfare benefits is a lynchpin for women survivors if they choose or are forced to flee their homes. I am particularly concerned about women without secure immigration status, including those whose marriages have not been registered, and, of course, migrant women who find it impossible to access refuge accommodation and other welfare support, making it impossible for them to escape abuse.

Refuge and Women’s Aid, among other leading organisations, are seriously concerned about and are seeking changes to welfare benefits as regards all survivors of domestic violence, without which women will not be in a position to leave their abusive perpetrators. The single payment of universal credit, the five-week wait for payment, the two-child tax credit limit and the benefit cap all disproportionately impact single women and children. We are all too aware that the law detrimentally impacts them and other welfare support hinders women’s choices and decisions.

I therefore ask the Minister—I am sure these points have been made, but I want to reinforce them—if the Government will heed the call of women’s organisations and place a duty on the Government to assess all welfare reforms for their impact on women’s ability to escape abuse. Will the Government deliver separate payments of universal credit and ensure that they are safe for survivors of domestic abuse? Will they end the benefit cap for victims and survivors of violence and abuse which deters survivors from finding safe and secure homes as well as preventing some from being able to move on from secure refuge space?

I am very thankful to have been able to speak to these amendments, specifically highlighting Amendment 10. All noble Lords have spoken with a great deal of expertise, of which I profess I have none, so I am very grateful. I just wanted to stand in support of these amendments.

[Baroness Meacher (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I strongly support Amendments 10, 68 and 69, to which I have added my name. I also support the other amendments in this group, although I will not speak to them. The noble Baroness, Lady Lister, has, as always, introduced her amendments with great thoroughness and therefore I will try not to take too much of your Lordships’ time, although I do want to speak a little more on Amendment 10 than on the other two.

The proposed new subsection (7)(a) in Amendment 10 makes very good sense, requiring as it does that the commissioner within a year publishes a report on the impact of these universal credit single payments on victims of domestic abuse. Whether or not the amendment is accepted, I certainly hope that the commissioner will seek the resources from the Government to enable her to implement this recommendation.

Paragraph (b) is absolutely vital because, as organisations such as Refuge know perfectly well, action is urgently needed to resolve the problem for domestic abuse victims of the default position that universal credit is paid into a single bank account on behalf of a household. I applaud the announcement from the Department for Work and Pensions that it will “encourage” joint claimants to nominate the bank account of the main carer of any children in the household, but that simply does not go far enough at all. Too often, the abusing partner will make sure that the money goes into their account. The main carer of the children is then exposed to the perpetrator using money in a coercive and controlling way, adding economic abuse to any other forms used.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, said, a victim can ask for payments to be split between the two partners, but that is a dangerous thing to do when your partner is abusing you and is perhaps dangerous to be with. The ideal is the policy adopted in Scotland, where separate payments are the default. However, I remember the UK Government arguing strongly against such a policy when the universal credit legislation was being debated in this House all that time ago. To introduce it as the default option now would be a sharp change of direction but, in the domestic abuse context, I hope that the Minister is sympathetic.

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This is not just a case of receiving medical care for trauma or anything else. It is about having access to care in your local area, wherever you are moved to. I ask noble Lords to look at the amendment and realise how we so easily take our healthcare for granted. In the pandemic, we have seen what brave and heroic people we have in the NHS. I ask the Minister to look at this amendment and do the best she possibly can for a young child who is going through trauma and is being moved around, and for a mother who is trying to get the best possible treatment for their health.

[Baroness Meacher (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I whole-heartedly support Amendments 13 and 76, to which I have added my name. I applaud the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, for tabling these amendments and speaking so powerfully to them.

The key point about Amendment 13 is that a child in need of NHS care really must have that treatment in a timely way, even if the family have had to move to a different NHS trust area. Having worked in mental health for many years, I refer to the point made so powerfully by the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove. If a child needs psychological help—in this case because of the domestic abuse which they have witnessed or experienced—then the timeliness of that therapy is absolutely vital if the child is not to develop serious mental health problems that are going to be very difficult to remediate later on. I am focusing on mental health issues, but long delays are incredibly serious for a child in need of help with their physical health.

Amendment 13 is not onerous for the Government. It simply places a responsibility on the commissioner, within six months of the implementation of the Bill, to work with clinical commissioning groups and other NHS bodies to resolve the problem of rapid access to NHS treatment for these children. That is all the amendment is asking for. I hope that the Minister can accept the aims of the amendment; I am sure that she will. Maybe she can indicate how the Government plan to meet those aims if not by this amendment, although I hope that they will do so by accepting it.

On Amendment 76, to which I have added my name, the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, has cogently argued the case for it, so I shall be brief. I hope that the Minister will take note of the support of the commissioner for the amendment or similar actions to provide

“equivalent priority access to education for children who are victims of domestic abuse.”

While Amendment 13 relates to health, this amendment relates to education. Our aim here is to ensure that these seriously disadvantaged children, having experienced domestic abuse, do not have their disadvantage exaggerated through enforced non-attendance at school. My goodness, we have heard so much about the importance of children attending school when it comes to Covid, but it is even more important, I suggest, for children who have been affected by domestic abuse.

This modest amendment could transform the lives of those children, yet it would surely not impose unreasonable demands on schools. No doubt the commissioner will want to look at the impact on schools to make sure that there was not a problem, but the amendment leaves it to the Secretary of State to decide how the school admissions code should be amended to ensure that those vulnerable children can attend school. I hope that the Minister can respond positively to Amendment 76.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Garden of Frognal) (LD)]

The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, has withdrawn, so I now call the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins of Tavistock.