Rape and Sexual Violence

David Johnston Excerpts

Tuesday 8th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[David Johnston (Wantage) (Con)]

I wish we did not have to debate a topic like this on International Women’s Day, but given how the system has been failing victims of rape, it is right that we do. I do not think that the country has ever had a good enough approach to the victims of violence and sexual violence towards women and girls—not successive Governments, not the police, not the Crown Prosecution Service and not wider society. I will return to that point.

I looked at the figures yesterday. In the year ending 2003, there were 11,445 rapes against females in this country. In 2020, there were close to 53,000 rapes against females in this country. I accept that, as with all crime, people will say that that is partly a result of better systems for reporting and recording, but that can only be part of it. In only two of the years between 2003 and 2020 was there a downward trend; in every other year the figures were up on the year before. They have gone up further still, and our conviction rate is much lower.

While preparing for this debate, I went back to some of the very powerful cases that I have heard about from constituents. Unfortunately, such is the nature of these crimes that there are too many for me to cite, but I have picked three. For one constituent, it was three years before their case reached court. During that time, they were told not to have therapy; they were then told that they could have therapy, as long as the therapist’s notes were made available for the defence lawyer of the person who had raped them. They were told that they should not apply for compensation; they were told that they should not talk about the trial; they were told that they might not be able to watch the trial.

I just cannot imagine going through that sort of process after having had this done to you—having justice denied for so long and all these obstacles put in your way. I can imagine why it is easier to let it go and think, “I don’t want to carry on with this, because it feels like the system works for the perpetrator rather than for the victim.”

I had another constituent who was raped by someone who had already had six “no further action” notices for six separate assaults against six different women. I had a third constituent who summed up the system pretty well: she said that the police do not feel that they can put forward a case that the CPS will not go for, and the CPS will not put forward a case that it thinks a jury will not go for. She felt strongly that when a case gets to the jury, it is in the hands of people’s prejudices. She quoted statistics from the findings of a 2018 attitudes survey. One in three people had said that they did not think rape as a result of coercion was actually rape, one in four had said that rape in a long-term relationship was not rape, and one in 10 had not been sure whether raping someone who was drunk or asleep constituted rape.

The system is undoubtedly failing victims, and I therefore welcome a number of measures that the Government are taking. I welcome the scorecards, because I think that the data will really help. I welcome the funding for rape support services, and—it is ridiculous even to have to say this—I welcome the increased emphasis that will be placed on the suspect’s behaviour rather than the victim’s credibility. I note what has been said about the proposal for a seven-year minimum sentence, and I note that in 2020 68% of people received sentences longer than seven years and the average was 10 years. I also think it right that the Government are considering the introduction of specialist rape offence courts.

We rightly talk about how to fix the system to ensure that perpetrators are given the punishment that they deserve, that this is a quick process, and that we have a high conviction rate. However, this is another area in which we should spend more time talking about prevention. It seems to me, as I am sure it does to everyone else, that a boy who grows up respecting girls and is taught about healthy relationships is unlikely to become a man who rapes women and keeps them in toxic relationships. When Ofsted conducted a review of sexual abuse in schools, it found that many children and young people did not bother to report such abuse because it was so common that they did not see the point of doing so.

I think that as well as dealing with the people who have committed these crimes, we should focus much more on how we control what children and young people can access on the internet, what they can see in video games, and how they observe men behaving in both private and public spheres. Teaching boys how to behave in the right way will give us the best chance of securing the society with zero tolerance for rape that the Government rightly say they want.

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[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Rachel Maclean)]

It is real privilege to be able to close this debate and, in particular, to follow the speech by the hon. Member for Cardiff North (Anna McMorrin). It is the first time that I have heard her story, but I am sure that she will have made an enormous difference by speaking out today in the way she has, and I commend her courage. She is absolutely right to say that she will be changing attitudes by addressing the stigma and breaking the bias, so I want to thank her, as will, I am sure, every Member of the House.

It is a real privilege to close the debate on International Women’s Day, and I associate myself with all the remarks that have been made paying tribute to President Zelensky and the incredible women and girls of that amazing country, Ukraine. We stand with them. I never thought when I entered Parliament that I would be addressing the House after a speech such as the one I heard today. None of us has been left unmoved by it.

It is right that we focus on how we support victims and bring perpetrators to justice. I thank everybody who has brought before us the experiences of their constituents and told their stories. Listening to those victims and their experiences is how we drive the change across the justice system that all of us in this House are passionate to achieve, in order to build a fairer society for women and make our streets safer.

Yesterday, many of us attended an event run by Women’s Aid—it was a pleasure to see so many Members there. The comments made at that event chimed with me and many others. One of the Spice Girls, Mel B, stood up and said that she had no problem at all standing on a stage at Wembley stadium, singing and performing in front of hundreds of thousands of people, but that was nothing compared with the trauma of having to tell her story about her abusive marriage and everything she has gone through. Continuing to allow these victims and these incredible survivors to come forward, supporting them, and working to achieve the change we all want is how we will change the system.

I thank all Members who have spoken in this debate. They have raised a number of points. Time does not allow me to address all of them in detail, but I will start with the issue of stalking, which has been mentioned by many Members. Stalking is a very serious matter that has a broad spectrum of manifestations. We are, of course, looking at this issue in the context of domestic abuse, and also of harassment. That is why we awarded £11.3 million to police and crime commissioners to fund programmes for domestic abuse perpetrators and perpetrators of stalking, whether or not it takes place in a domestic abuse context. A wide range of sentences are currently imposed for stalking offences, reflecting the broad spectrum of manifestations of this behaviour. The most serious offences could result in a maximum of 14 years’ imprisonment.

We have discussed extensively in this Chamber the issue of stalking protection orders. As hon. Members know, I recently wrote to all police forces making clear where they are not using those tools appropriately, and that they need to use the levers at their disposal in order to properly keep women and girls safe. The grant rate for those orders is very high, and where they are being granted, the police feel they are a very useful measure, but there is more we can do.

We have also discussed the issue of spiking. We have all become familiar with these new and concerning reports of needle spiking, which is a terrifying experience—something that I think we all find appalling, frightening and disgusting. It is a reasonably new phenomenon, which is why my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is working with the police to better understand the exact nature of spiking; what is actually happening with that crime? We are working to make sure we record these incidents through the crime recording framework, and are also urgently considering the case for a criminal offence targeting spiking directly. There are already a range of offences on the statute book that the police can use to prosecute this behaviour, but we are all concerned with making sure that those offences are used and we will not hesitate to legislate if necessary.

[David Johnston]

My constituent Sharon Gaffka is involved in a campaign on spiking, having been spiked twice herself. She now has more than 1,000 testimonies from people ranging from the age of 14 to 65. It is not always a sexual offence—sometimes friends do it to each other because they think it is a bit of a laugh to get a reaction—but I wonder whether I can get my constituent to share those testimonies with my hon. Friend to help inform the Government’s understanding of what is going on here.

[Rachel Maclean]

Of course. I thank my hon. Friend very much and I would be delighted to do that. I am working across Government with colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care, the Ministry of Justice, the Department for Education and so on to have a cross-Government response to this matter.

Members have raised the issue of sentencing in a range of contexts. It is important to note that the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, which is passing through the House, will ensure that serious sexual and violent offenders serve two thirds of their sentence in prison, instead of half. Indeed, a number of other measures in that Bill strengthen the management of sex offenders, including by enabling electronic monitoring requirements to be imposed on those who pose a risk through sexual harm prevention orders and sexual risk orders, if necessary.

It is important that our criminal justice system catches up from the impacts of the pandemic. Our decisive action in the courts has kept justice moving. That is why we invested a quarter of a billion pounds to support recovery in the last financial year, and 30 Nightingale courtrooms are to be extended until March next year as we work across Government to continue our efforts to tackle the impact of covid-19 on the justice system. The new victims Bill, which we are introducing as quickly as possible, will bring about a cultural shift so that victims’ experiences are central to how our society thinks about and responds to crime. We want to ensure that the Bill tackles the things that victims most care about.

Members have referenced health, which is a vital component of our strategy to provide the tailored support that victims of rape and other serious sexual offences need. Through the work being carried out by my colleagues in the Ministry of Justice, the victims Bill consultation is looking closely at the commissioning of community-based services, including the role of health bodies. That consultation is now being analysed and we will bring forward a draft Bill as soon as possible.

I will reference an important piece of work from my colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care through the women’s health strategy. The Department will appoint our first ever women’s health ambassador for England, whose role will be to focus on raising the profile of women’s health, increasing awareness and bringing in a range of collaborative voices. Members will know that I work closely with Women’s Aid, which is campaigning on better mental health support for victims of trauma and sexual offences. That forms another important component of the domestic abuse plan that we are bringing forward.

It is important to reference that we on the Government Benches fully accept that the current data shows that the system is not working as well as it could be. We have consistently been honest and transparent about that. It is only by doing that that we will be able to bring about the change that is desperately needed.