Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Alderdice Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 1st February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I support this amendment in the names of my noble friend Lord Rosser and the noble Lord, Lord Woolley of Woodford, as well as other amendments in this group in their names. I declare an interest as the chair of the National Housing Federation. I congratulate my noble friend on the comprehensive way in which he set out the large number of issues at stake if these amendments are not included in the Bill. I found it a very effective and moving speech.

Housing associations are in a unique position to help survivors of domestic abuse and have been at the forefront of innovative responses during the pandemic, when it has been so difficult to deliver normal services. They have prioritised domestic abuse survivors in new lettings and transfers and worked with refuges to support move-on as well working to keep survivors in their homes safely. It is a further tragedy of the pandemic that we have seen such a surge in instances of domestic abuse.

One of the most important things that the Bill can do is to ensure that all its provisions are underpinned by secure funding, so that no survivor is turned away from the specialist support that they need and there is fair, national distribution of resources. There must be an acknowledgement of the specific challenges faced by BME survivors and migrant women—this has come up so many times in our debates on the Bill. For example, many housing associations provide English classes and support for skills and employment as well as mental health and well-being support. I particularly thank Women’s Aid and Imkaan, together with Stonewater and other housing association providers of specialist support, for their invaluable briefing on these amendments.

I do not want to repeat the details and statistics already given by many noble Lords about the increasing level of need and the reality of the cuts in funding and the inevitable reduction in services and support that results. These amendments reflect what needs to be done to make the Bill the step change in provision that I know the Minister and, I believe, the Government want to see.

In that spirit, I hope the Minister will heed the call for a number of additions. I highlight the need for a tighter definition of “relevant accommodation”, the need to ensure that the support provided is specialist and sufficient to meet demand and the need to make arrangements for the provision of accommodation for all victims, regardless of their immigration status. I also highlight the need to ensure that local specialist services are adequately represented on partnership boards and that a national oversight group, involving all relevant interests, is recognised in the Bill to ensure robust evaluation of the delivery of these life-saving services.

My organisation, the NHF, wants to work together with government to build models that are cost-effective for local authorities to enable the safe removal of perpetrators of domestic abuse from the home, prevent the homelessness of survivors and enable them to live independent lives. In May 2020, the NHF asked the Government to implement a targeted approach to accommodation provision for rough sleepers and homeless people fleeing domestic abuse. Housing associations stand ready to help local authorities fulfil the new duty to provide support and accommodation for survivors.

Amendment 89 and others in this group seek to ensure that there is provision of a variety of housing options for people experiencing domestic abuse, based on choice. Some will certainly need and want a refuge space, and it is vital that these are funded and come with adequate support services to help survivors achieve better health, well-being, employment and housing options.

I echo my noble friend’s concluding remarks on funding: we need to ensure, together with other provision of supported housing for rough sleepers and older people, an annual £1.6 billion of ring-fenced funding, which is needed to allow local authorities to provide these life- saving services. I hope the Minister will be able to tell the Committee that there have been discussions with Treasury colleagues about a specific ring-fenced investment in supported housing in the upcoming Budget.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

The noble Lord, Lord Naseby, has withdrawn, so I call the next speaker, the noble Baroness, Lady Uddin.

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

My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Rosser and Lord Young, my noble friend Lord Woolley and the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, for their thorough detailing of this set of amendments and for explaining in detail—I particularly thank the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, for this—the need to get these amendments accepted by our Government. I will speak generally first, and then I will make specific comments about Amendment 108.

I begin with the general point that the statutory definition of domestic violence and abuse must not neglect the reality of this crime, which is that women are the overwhelming majority of victims and survivors and men are the greater number of perpetrators. It really does not matter whether information is being collected right now; the information exists to substantiate this point.

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A long-term sustainable package of funding may prevent further violence and deaths. The success of this legislation will inevitably be dependent on whether the Government intend this legislation to be backed up with fully-funded services to scrutinise implementation with a national and local oversight mechanism.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

The noble Lord, Lord Randall of Uxbridge, has withdrawn so I call the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

My Lords, I declare my position as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. I offer the full support of the Green group for this group of amendments collectively. We have already heard very powerful and important testimonies from all who have spoken, but particularly from the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, in introducing them and the noble Lord, Lord Woolley of Woodford, in making some powerful points about how BAME communities and other minority communities are affected. I have three or four points to make in general terms. It must be repeated, as all speakers up to now have stressed the importance of specialist support, that simple provision of accommodation will not meet the needs of victims of domestic abuse.

I make a point particularly about funding. As the noble Lord, Lord Woolley, said, competitive tendering for these services has often been—and he used an appropriate word—toxic. I do not think there is anything on this in this amendment, and it may be a matter of policy more than law, but the Government should consider moving away from the idea of regular competition as an appropriate way of seeing that these services are funded. We should move closer towards a system of having a good, ideally local, service that meets the needs of a community, with an appropriate check to see that that continues. The assumption should be that that funding continues, rather than seeing the huge waste of resources that are put in again and again into bidding to keep contracts. The risk is that you can lose a local service completely, if it loses just one round of contract bidding.

Another point worth making in this context is on the place of refuges in feminist history. From the early 1970s onwards, they were places where we saw the growth and coalescence of a movement. They continue to be a centre for advocacy and campaigning support for the essential services that domestic abuse victims need. If we lose those specialist services, we also lose a lot of that advocacy and campaigning, as well as a depth of knowledge.

I have a final reflection on how we are talking about increasing statutory provision. The Green Party very much believes in localism and decisions made locally, and referred upwards only when absolutely necessary. But we also need a foundation of rights and standards, which is appropriately provided at the national level. Those standards and that statutory provision is not enough; we now that, increasingly, local government is left with barely enough funds to meet its statutory requirements, let alone to provide the extra services and needs that each local community has. When talking about this, it is crucial that we also focus on ensuring that local communities and local government have the funding that they need to meet these statutory requirements—and not just that but to meet the extra, individual local community needs that each local government area has, to ensure that that we truly deliver what the local community asks for.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

The noble Lord, Lord Cormack, has withdrawn, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I do not want to go over ground that has already been expressed by so many noble Lords in this important debate, but I emphasise a concern that noble Lords have. In welcoming the Bill and applauding the Government’s attempts to drive this forward in as consensual a way as possible, it could all fail if the funding is not available to enable local authorities in particular, but other services too, to provide the support that has been identified, in all the work leading up to the Bill and in noble Lords’ debates.

That is what makes the amendment of my noble friend so important: it tries to define the provision that local authorities are responsible for much more closely. I hope that the Government recognise that giving greater assurance to noble Lords that local authorities have the ability to deliver the kinds of services we want will be crucial to their response. This is not just about funding—we know that—but we cannot ignore funding. The evidence that has been put forward by noble Lords about issues with refuge bed spaces is convincing.

As I understand it, 64% of total refuge referrals in England were declined last year. We know from the outstanding work of Women’s Aid in its annual survey of support providers that, for most organisations that provide these essential services, the local authority commission did not cover all or most of the cost of running the service. We should think about this: over the last year, as they have had to cope with real issues in raising funds, increased demands on their services and the uncertainty of local government finance, those lifesaving services have been under huge strain. We took the experience of Refuge as an example. Since 2011, it has experienced cuts to 80% of its services. Funding for refuges has been cut by an average of 50% and, as Refuge says, it is far from alone in that experience. The Covid-19 emergency has put further strain on the specialist sector: obviously many providers have had to transform the way in which they deliver services while meeting additional demand.

We all sign up to the idea of a national network of refuges to grow and meet demand but, without much greater clarity over the commissioning and strategic responsibilities of local government and the funding made available by central government, we must be very concerned about whether the Bill, when enacted, will be implemented properly.

I have one other point to make. I endorse what the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, had to say about the importance of data collection. As he said, it seems that the police no longer collect data regarding the sex of victims. I think that is a mistake. It also emphasises the importance of new subsection (1B)(a) in Amendment 89 in relation to the information that a local authority is required to obtain. Obtaining the prevalence of trends in domestic abuse and other forms of violence against women and girls is vital to ensure that the full scale of the problem is known and the proper strategies can be adopted.

Overall, we want to hear tonight the Government recognise that in order to make sure that the Bill— a Bill that we really support—will actually work in practice, they are going to have to tackle the issue of local government responsibilities, direction and funding.

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Now that I have explained the Government’s intentions regarding the implementation of the new duties in Part 4, I hope noble Lords will agree that there is little between us in practice. Many of the issues raised will be addressed through the statutory guidance and we agree with the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, that there needs to be effective national oversight of these new arrangements. Our national expert steering group will provide that. I hope that, with those words, he will be content to withdraw his amendment.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

I have received a request to speak after the Minister from the noble Lord, Lord Lucas.

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[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

We now come to the group consisting of Amendment 90. I remind noble Lords that anyone wishing to speak after the Minister should email the clerk during the debate, and that anyone wishing to press this amendment to a Division must make that clear in the debate.

Amendment 90

Moved by

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[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)]

The noble Baroness, Lady Burt, my noble friend Lord Polak, and all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate have spoken to one of the core aims of this Bill, which is the provision of support to victims of domestic abuse and their children and, in particular, the provision of community-based support.

I am going to start with Amendment 176, because it has been the most spoken about and most clearly addresses this objective. If there is one thing on which we are all united—the central tenet of this Bill—it is that domestic abuse victims receive the support they need. This can be seen in the new statutory duty, included in Part 4 of the Bill, to provide support to domestic abuse victims and their children within safe accommodation. However, extending the duty in Part 4 is not without its challenges, as my noble friend Lady Bertin said.

The duty as it stands applies to tier 1 local authorities in England, and as such there is no ambiguity in where responsibility and accountability lie. Amendment 176 proposes something rather wider, applying to local authorities in England, local policing bodies in England and Wales and clinical commissioning groups in England. The drafters of the amendment are to be commended for seeking to navigate the devolution settlement in Wales, and I suspect that Amendment 177 is intended to complement Amendment 176 by addressing the position in Wales.

In placing a duty across three categories of public authority, the amendment could risk creating uncertainty about where the responsibility for discharging the duty actually resides. To that extent it lacks the clarity of the Part 4 duty, although I note the provision in the new clause for conflict resolution. I do not suggest that this is an insurmountable problem with the amendment.

It is important to recognise that there are already significant community-based support services available to victims of domestic abuse and other crime. Since 2014, Ministry of Justice funding has helped police and crime commissioners to support victims of crime within their local areas, addressing the specific local needs identified within their communities. This funding totalled £68 million in 2019-20. The strong knowledge held by police and crime commissioners about demographics and crime in their local areas allows them to allocate funding to those victims in need.

Clearly, local authorities and clinical commissioning groups also have a role to play, as have others. I recognise, however, that the current commissioning landscape is complex. I understand the need to ensure that whatever arrangements are in place, they are delivering comprehensive service provision and that the needs of victims are being met. It is essential too that perpetrators are held to account for their actions and challenged to make long-term, meaningful changes to their behaviour.

However, I put it to noble Lords that Amendment 176 is putting the cart before the horse. We cannot and should not legislate before fully understanding the current landscape of provision, knowing where the gaps are, how best to fill those gaps and what it is going to cost, as my noble friend Lady Sanderson said. This is the methodical process we went through before introducing the provisions in Part 4, backed up by £125 million in new funding. We need to adopt a similar process to community-based support.

For this reason, I welcome the domestic abuse commissioner’s commitment to leading a detailed mapping exercise into the current community-based support landscape, the pilot of which has already commenced in four local authority areas. That work is due to be completed towards the end of this year. The Government are committed to addressing the findings of this review and, should we find that there is a need for legislative changes, it is right and proper that we should consult on those so we can consider the views of the affected public authorities. In answer to the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, there will be further opportunities to legislate in this area, including the upcoming victims’ law.

This exercise will do for community-based services what the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government did for accommodation-based services in significant depth before establishing the new duty in Part 4 of the Bill—I was a Minister in MHCLG when the whole process began. It held lengthy consultations with local authorities, the domestic abuse sector and victim support organisations before committing to the best course of action. Only through thorough engagement and investigation was it possible to understand whether legislative change was truly necessary and design a statutory duty that would appropriately address the needs of victims.

I recognise the concerns that the statutory duty in Part 4 may affect the existing provision of community-based services. As I have indicated, we are allocating £125 million to local authorities in 2021-22 to fund the new duty. As my noble friend Lord Polak said, the recent spending review has also secured an additional £40 million to victims of crime, including domestic abuse, in the community. Those details were announced today. This is on top of the additional funding we have provided to meet the immediate needs arising from the pandemic. I hope this provides reassurance that the Government take seriously their commitment to supporting all victims.

Of course, the argument can be made for more investment, but noble Lords will understand that we cannot make the case to the Treasury without the evidence to back it up. The commissioner’s mapping work is central to having that knowledge and understanding to enable us to make the case for more money. I know that Nicole Jacobs takes a different view, and it is an area where we will respectfully just have to agree to differ. It is her role to advise the Government and it is our clear responsibility to back up any new statutory duties with clear evidence of unmet need and a full understanding of the costs involved.

Additionally, the new domestic abuse strategy, complementing the refreshed violence against women and girls strategy, will further focus government attention on the needs of domestic abuse victims and perpetrators. Alongside this, the refresh of the national statement of expectations, due to be published later this year, will set out best practice for commissioning all violence against women and girls services. Finally, we are launching a victim funding strategy, to be published this year, to ensure that funding and commissioning practices for all victims are as effective as possible. I agree with my noble friend Lady Sanderson on the need for sustainable funding.

Amendment 101 seeks to ensure that all survivors of domestic abuse have access to a local welfare assistance scheme in any locality across England. We understand the importance of local welfare and assistance to provide an emergency safety net at times of unexpected need. Local authorities are best placed to understand the needs of the most vulnerable in their communities. That is why changes were introduced in 2013 to give local authorities the maximum flexibility to deliver emergency support as they see fit, according to local needs. The 2014 local welfare provision review found that local authorities were able to effectively target support at those who needed it most, joined up with wider social care.

The Government have provided local authorities with £131.7 million for local welfare assistance through the local government finance settlement in 2020-21. It is for local authorities to decide how best to use that funding, but in doing so they should ensure there is support for those most in need, including domestic abuse survivors.

We are committed to ensuring that people experiencing or fleeing domestic abuse have the local support they need. In particular, economic hardship should not be a barrier to someone leaving an abusive partner. In addition to local welfare support, those escaping domestic abuse can seek financial support through the welfare system.

Finally, on Amendment 177, I recognise the need for effective partnership working across the reserved-devolved demarcation line in Wales. I put it to my noble friend that the mechanisms are already in place to enable PCCs to co-operate with local authorities and health boards in Wales, including through community safety partnerships and the forthcoming new serious violence duty. While PCCs will not be subject to the serious violence duty, as with their existing functions in relation to community safety partnerships, PCCs may choose to collaborate with local partnerships and take a convening role to support the development and implementation of the local strategy.

Given these considerations, the amendments are, I suggest, premature. The Government recognise the importance of community-based services for those affected by domestic abuse. As I have said, we are committed to investigating, in collaboration with the domestic abuse commissioner, what needs to be done to ensure that victims who stay in their own home with their children are receiving the support they need. So that this work can go forward, I ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Alderdice) (LD)]

I have received requests to speak after the Minister from the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, and the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett.

[Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I have listened very carefully to the Minister’s response, particularly on Amendment 176, for which I thank her. None the less, does she not accept that favouring accommodation-based services, as set out in Part 4, is bound to impact on local authorities’ spending decisions and make them move funding towards accommodation-based services at the expense of community-based services? How will the Government ensure that a proportion of the additional £125 million goes to community services? Will it not be possible for us to give Ministers regulation-making powers to bring in a duty on community services after the mapping exercise has been completed? That would at least give us some way to ensure that the Government have statutory provision in the light of the mapping exercise.