Claire Perry
Main Page: Claire Perry (Conservative - Devizes)Department Debates - View all Claire Perry's debates with the Home Office
(12 years, 8 months ago)
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Claire Perry (Devizes) (Con)
1. What steps she is taking to tackle violence against women.
The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mrs Theresa May)
A comprehensive cross-Government action plan on tackling violence against women and girls was published on 8 March this year. It includes 88 commitments from 12 Departments to improve the provision of services for victims of violence and to prevent violence from happening in the first place. We have already delivered 22 of those commitments.
Claire Perry
I thank the Home Secretary for that reply. Also part of this Government’s work is a pilot scheme running in Swindon and Wiltshire in which perpetrators of domestic violence are effectively banned from the family home, rather than the family and the women being forced to move out, as happened previously. My right hon. Friend will be pleased to know that, since July, under the terms of the scheme, 82 abusive perpetrators have been removed from family homes. The head of Wiltshire victim support unit said that the programme is reaching women who have never been helped before. Will my right hon. Friend please tell us when the pilot might be rolled out nationally?
Mrs May
I thank my hon. Friend for that question. She is absolutely right that domestic violence protection orders do what hon. Members across the House have always felt is right: ensure that when a domestic violence incident takes place it is the perpetrator who is not able to stay in the home, rather than the victim being forced out, as has happened so often in the past. We commenced a pilot in Greater Manchester, West Mercia and Wiltshire, and a second wave of pilot areas started in October in Grater Manchester and West Mercia, which we are looking to run for at least a year before we assess them properly.