Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 5th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, regrettably, the Bill is symptomatic of some of the more distressing features that we face in our rather challenging times. Although domestic abuse has existed for as long as sexual and familial relationships have been formed, certain aspects of modern life seem to act as an abuse accelerator, the most current and depressing accelerator being the pandemic lockdown.

The Bill is to be warmly welcomed and I am grateful to the Government for the many improvements that they made in another place, but because a series of events has conspired to delay its passage through Parliament, and because of the pressure-cooker atmosphere of lockdown, those of us who have received a wide range of briefing papers are presented with a wish list longer than all the arms in the Chamber at the moment put together.

I will briefly mention those issues where I intend to join forces with others in Committee and on Report. They are focused on attempts to try to prevent or mitigate domestic abuse as early as possible.

The first is the status of migrant women and children. What a painful dilemma is presented by unwittingly allowing an abuser to use a victim’s insecure status as a means of coercion and control. We do not know how many victims are suffering because, in part, many of them are unwilling to approach the authorities or even refuges.

Secondly, as the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, expressed so movingly, we will ask the Government to look seriously and carefully at the case for creating a specific offence of non-fatal strangulation. As the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, has just indicated, there is compelling international evidence that this could be an incisive and powerful means of enhancing the prevention of life-threatening domestic abuse behaviour.

Thirdly I will strongly support the case—articulated so clearly by the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, and others, including the domestic abuse commissioner-in-waiting—for criminalising threats to share intimate images. It is an insidious form of coercive control and a distressing symptom of our online parallel universe.

Fourthly, I will support the case for making misogyny a hate crime. I have had the privilege of working with this cause’s principal proponent in another place, Stella Creasy, as a colleague in the Council of Europe, and I agree with her that we should call out misogyny for what it is—a trigger for violence, coercion and a total lack of empathy for its victims. It is encouraging that seven police forces have already started recording offences which are explicitly motivated by misogyny. This recognises the motivation behind the crime and the very high incidence of repeat offending. In particular, I draw your Lordships’ attention to the article in the Times on Monday of this week describing how a woman called Kellie Sutton hanged herself after five months in an abusive relationship, leaving three children under the age of 15. Her abuser had been reported to police by three previous partners. I rest my case.

Lastly, I will support the case for giving the domestic abuse commissioner an extension of her powers to create an oversight mechanism to collate reviews into domestic homicides and suicides. The Minister and I have previously spoken and agreed about the importance of accurate and timely data in order to understand complex situations better. This data would be a powerful additional tool in aiding more effective prevention of domestic abuse.

Finally, the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, said that this debate is extremely gloomy and that the UK is not the worst offender. I think that that will be rather cold comfort to the victims of domestic abuse, whom we are all representing here today.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 27th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Gloucester]

My Lords, I am hugely encouraged by listening to all these debates around this Bill, because I know that every single one of us wants this Bill to be as good as it possibly can be. I will keep my comments brief.

In relation to Amendment 54, the issue of data is critical. We have to take time to remember that behind statistics are precious individuals—women and men. I support a duty on public authorities to notify the Home Office and the domestic abuse commissioner in cases of death where domestic abuse has been identified as a contributory factor.

In order to make good policy, we need good data. It is not enough that data are trustworthy; they must also be trusted, otherwise they will not be used. A key objective of the Bill is to raise awareness and understanding of domestic abuse and its impact on victims. That task can be effective only if the Home Office and commissioner are fully apprised of all reviews and investigations into deaths where domestic abuse is identified as a factor.

On Amendment 51, I wish to make a brief comment on communication between various bodies and the domestic abuse commissioner. We have already seen the fruits of the designate commissioner’s hard work. If this role is to be a success, it is essential to have join-up. Nicole Jacobs has been exemplary in her role already, and I am grateful for the many connections she has made and the strong relationships she has built, not least in the preparation of this Bill. But it is important to ensure that the list of public authorities that have a duty to co-operate with the commissioner is as extensive as possible on the face of legislation, so that we do not rely on relationship alone as we go forward.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I rise to speak briefly in support of Amendments 51 and 54, to which I was happy to add my name. I am grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Burt and Lady Bertin, for introducing the amendment so well.

We heard in the group starting with Amendment 23 about the critical role of better information. I know it is a theme the Minister is acutely aware of, not least because she has departmental responsibility for it in the Home Office. To restate the obvious, and it really cannot be restated often enough, more joined-up, accurate, timely and informative data would enable Nicole Jacobs, on our behalf, to understand the past and the present better, a point made very well just now by the right reverend Prelate.

This point was also made very forcefully earlier by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, on Amendment 23: the need not only to recognise but to try to predict future violent and abusive behaviour better, in order to prevent or mitigate injuries to abused partners and their children. What is the point of having a domestic abuse commissioner if we do not equip her with the right powers and authority, moral and statutory, to do her job as well as possible? As others have mentioned, these amendments have the active support of Nicole Jacobs and, if accepted, they will enable her, again on behalf of all of us, to understand the full gravity and texture of domestic abuse more clearly than we do today. We have to be more proactive and joined up. As was mentioned earlier, domestic homicide reviews are an improvement, but they are still not working as they should.

Amendment 54 will provide the commissioner and the Home Office with ready and immediate access to this vital data. Amendment 51 adds to the collation of vital data by drawing into the commissioner’s information hub all the investigations into domestic homicides by the five bodies named.

In summary, the commissioner has asked us not just on her behalf but on behalf of victims and their families to articulate what is behind her request to be given the additional access to key information that she judges she needs. This will enable her to do her job even more effectively and to do so right from the start. I hope I am right in anticipating a positive and supportive response to the commissioner and the Committee from the Minister.

[Baroness Hamwee (LD) [V]]

My Lords, Amendment 189 is of a rather different type. We are proposing that to remove an authority added by regulations to the list through Clause 15(4)(a), the regulations achieving that removal should be the subject of an affirmative resolution. The Minister may say that as the Secretary of State has imposed—I am not sure whether that is the best term—an added authority under Clause 15(4)(a), it is hers to dispose of, but unless there has been an aberration, the public authority so added will be of significance. The Minister will of course know that it is not unusual for my noble friend Lord Paddick and me to take a look at every regulation-making power we find in legislation.

With regard to the other two amendments in this group, listening to and reading the names of the victims of domestic homicide is very moving. They are individuals who together make up significant data. We are particularly aware of this in the context of those who have died during the pandemic. My noble friend Lady Burt has already given the support of these Benches to Amendments 51 and 54. As the noble Lord, Lord Russell, has just mentioned, these are matters that the domestic abuse commissioner designate is calling for. Her shadow period in post has led her to call for a limited number of significant amendments to the Bill. It is not an impossibly large number, and it is not an impossible ask, so I think we should have a very good reason to reject what she has identified as necessary.

In a Bill which is going through your Lordships’ House concurrently, and on many previous occasions, the Minister, and other Ministers, have argued for public servants to have all the necessary tools in the toolkit. We have not always agreed on what those necessary tools are but, on this occasion, we certainly support these amendments.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

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

That is what Amendment 176 would enable the Government, and this House, to do.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 176 and 177, to which I was pleased to add my name. My three fellow sponsors have made such a good job of the case for the prosecution that I will try not to sound like a worn record. I am also very conscious, listening to proceedings on this Bill, that the neverending stream of amendments could be viewed as an unwitting discourtesy to what are clearly the Government’s good intentions. It sounds like the digestive rumblings of an incontinent House, which always seems to find something to complain about. However, we are not just complaining; we are trying to articulate the case for something we think is important.

These amendments share an important characteristic with Amendments 51 and 54, which I spoke to last week: they have the express support of Nicole Jacobs herself. These amendments, like those, are designed to enable her to hit the ground running, and to use the once-in-a-generation opportunity afforded by getting this Bill on to the statute book to put critical pieces of infrastructure and support in place as early as possible.

We all recognise that delivering accommodation-based services is not enough by itself, welcome though it is. They are essential and important, but they support, and will only ever support, a minority of domestic abuse victims and their families. It is community-based services that can interact with and support victims, with a complex interlocking range of specialist interventions. As I have discovered, it is an area rich with impenetrable—for an outsider—acronyms, such as: IDVAs—independent domestic violence advisers; YPVAs—young people violence advisers; ISVAs—independent sexual violence advisers, and IRIS workers. That is nothing to do with eyesight, but stands for identification and referral to improve safety. Behind these acronyms exist a wealth of specialist knowledge and sensitive and targeted support, which, as other noble Lords have mentioned, look after the needs of 70% of domestic abuse survivors, supporting them in the community, while only the remaining 30% are looked after in refuges.

Nicole Jacobs’s plea is for the Bill to be balanced in placing equal emphasis on the provision and financing of accommodation-based and community-based services in England and Wales. Without this, she is concerned that there will be unintended consequences, as the right reverend Prelate said, and that focusing more on one area than on both will create a form of unhelpful tension or competition, or will force local authorities into making difficult and unpleasant choices. That will do nothing to help the majority of domestic abuse survivors.

The commissioner is also saying that the urgency in remedying this potential imbalance is sufficient to justify acting now, rather than waiting for the mapping exercise to be completed. Nicole Jacobs is an expert. She was appointed because she is an expert. She knows this field inside-out, and if she is saying that we are in danger of getting the balance wrong, she deserves to be listened to, and listened to seriously. Given the strains that the last 10 months have imposed on all of us but, above all, on so many families and relationships already close to breaking point, it is imperative that we act sooner rather than later.

The 70% of domestic abuse survivors and their families who are supported in the community are foremost in the commissioner’s mind. We speak for her but, most of all, we speak for them. I hope that the Minister can work with us before Report to look at this and, above all, to listen to the expert herself— Nicole Jacobs.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 5th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 8th February 2021 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Russell of Liverpool]

146: Clause 70, page 54, line 8, at end insert—
“(2A) The Secretary of State must issue guidance under this section which takes account of evidence about the relationship between domestic abuse and offences involving hostility based on sex.(2B) In preparing guidance under subsection (2A) the Secretary of State must require the chief officer of police of any police force to provide information relating to—(a) the number of relevant crimes reported to the police force; and(b) the number of relevant crimes reported to the police force which, in the opinion of the chief officer of police, have also involved domestic abuse.(2C) In this section—“relevant crime” means a reported crime in which—(a) the victim or any other person perceived the alleged offender, at the time of or immediately before or after the offence, to demonstrate hostility or prejudice based on sex, or(b) the victim or any other person perceived the crime to be motivated (wholly or partly) by hostility or prejudice towards persons who are of a particular sex;“sex” has the same meaning as in section 11 of the Equality Act 2010 (sex).”

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I rise to move Amendment 146 in my name, supported by the noble Baronesses, Lady Bull and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham. I will explore this relatively fully because it is, I think, the first time that misogyny, per se, has reared its ugly head in this Bill, so I hope that the House will forgive me if I go into detail to explain why I think it is important to consider it.

What, then, is the issue? What is this about and why on earth would anyone want to open what some might consider the Pandora’s box of recognising the link between misogyny and domestic abuse? Indeed, is this the “woke police” on the march, or is there actually a reason behind it?

Violence against women does not occur in a vacuum. Hostility towards them generates a culture in which violence and abuse are being tolerated, excused and repeated. Changing that means challenging not only individual acts of abuse but the very roots of the culture that enables it. Gathering the evidence about the extent, nature and prevalence of hostility towards women, and how these interplay with the experience of domestic abuse, is crucial to recognising these connections.

At Second Reading I mentioned the dreadful case of Kellie Sutton, a mother of three children under 15 who killed herself in 2017 after suffering five months of psychological and physical abuse from her partner, who was subsequently jailed for four years and three months and, in addition, given a 10-year criminal behaviour order requiring him to tell the police of any sexual relationship lasting more than 14 days that he enters into. Why is this case relevant to the amendment? It is because the perpetrator had already been reported to the police in previous years by three different partners. In his regulation 28 report to prevent future deaths, the senior coroner for Hertfordshire highlighted the fact that police records failed to flag up that this was a repeat domestic abuse perpetrator. The previous three complaints had been filed away as non-crime reports, which meant that the police would have found a link to the perpetrator only if they had searched for the victims, since no reports at all had been filed against the abuser. The coroner concluded in his report:

“This sort of information is clearly of value to inform officers’ decision making, when dealing with a report of potential domestic abuse and clearly of value when seeking to safeguard more widely the vulnerable parties in abusive relationships.”


The amendment seeks to do that by learning from the experience of the police forces around the country which have started to record misogyny as a hate crime. By requiring all police forces to do that and to assess how it influences incidents of domestic abuse, the amendment seeks to add to our understanding of the nature of violence against women and so the work on how to end it.

We are all aware that police forces are very stretched in their manpower resources, and that they approach domestic abuse incidents with great caution. Given the pressures that the police are under, why have some forces voluntarily taken on what some might regard as just more form-filling or box-ticking? The evidence of where misogyny has been identified as a hate crime to date by police forces in their recording of crime has been that it helps increase the understanding of the causes and consequences of violence against women. It is critical that every case of domestic abuse should be taken seriously and each individual given access to the support they need.

Both men and women may experience incidents of interpersonal violence and abuse but women are considerably more likely to experience repeated and severe forms of abuse, including sexual violence. They are also more likely to have experienced sustained physical, psychological or emotional abuse, or violence that results in injury or death. There are important differences between male violence against women and female violence against men; namely, the amount, severity and impact. Women experience much higher rates of repeated victimisation and are much more likely to be seriously hurt or killed than male victims of domestic abuse.

In one study of 96 cases of domestic abuse recorded by the police, it was found that men are significantly more likely than women to be repeat perpetrators and to use physical violence, threats and harassment. Over a six-year tracking period, the majority—83%—of recorded male perpetrators had at least two incidents of recorded abuse, with many having a lot more and one man having no fewer than 52 repeat incidents, whereas in cases where women were recorded as the perpetrator, the majority, 62%, had only one incident of abuse recorded, and the highest number of repeat incidents for any female perpetrator was eight, compared with 52.

In 2016 Nottinghamshire Police became the first police force in the country to enable women and girls to report cases of abuse and harassment as misogyny under their misogyny hate crime policy. Misogynistic hate crimes recorded by the police since Nottinghamshire adopted that policy include stalking, groping, indecent assault and kidnapping. While they initially did not include domestic abuse in that reporting as it was already being recorded as a form of crime, those involved in the scheme now say:

“Our experience of delivering training to the police tells us that, even though domestic abuse is not included within the hate crime policy, officers are often able to recognise that misogyny is likely to be at the root of this too. Similarly, we are aware that misogyny hate crime can act as a bridge to women talking about (and recognising) other forms of violence against women. Where women may feel that domestic abuse is something that happens to other women and is not linked to inequality, they are more readily able to recognise this with misogyny hate crime.”


Following Nottinghamshire’s example, the police forces in North Yorkshire, Avon and Somerset, and Northamptonshire have also made misogyny a hate crime, and are therefore already recording these figures to enable such an approach. The amendment would require other police forces to follow suit. Women’s Aid reports that police forces that are recording misogyny have not seen an influx of reporting of wolf-whistling but instead have received a growing number of reports of serious sexual harassment and assault. Making misogyny a hate crime would mean simply that police forces logged and monitored such incidents and thereby enabled to create a fuller picture of the problem, support victims and make them aware of where incidents were recurring. Indeed, women and girls need to feel that their concerns are being taken seriously by the police and that misogyny is not normalised. Categorising and calling out misogyny wherever it occurs would send a clear message that such behaviour was not acceptable, and should prevent more serious offences in the long term.

As we all know, domestic abuse cases have risen dramatically during the pandemic crisis, with cases of domestic homicides doubling in the UK. The Bill states that the Secretary of State must give guidance on the kinds of behaviour that amount to domestic abuse. The amendment states that the guidance should further take account of

“evidence about the relationship between domestic abuse and offences involving hostility based on sex.”

While there is no legal definition of “hostility”, the Crown Prosecution Service uses the everyday understanding of the word, which includes ill will, spite, contempt, prejudice, unfriendliness, antagonism, resentment and dislike. The amendment seeks to build on that concept. It would ensure that all police forces in England and Wales recorded any crimes where the victim or any other person perceived the crime to be motivated by this hostility or perceived the perpetrator to have demonstrated hostility in committing the crime. The police would then also be required to assess how that interacted with domestic abuse by making an assessment of how many of those crimes met the definition as set out in this legislation.

Proposals to recognise misogyny as a category of hate crime would therefore not make anything illegal if it was not illegal already. Instead, the amendment would help build our understanding of the forms of violence and abuse that women experience by ensuring that all were recorded. Those working in areas where this approach is being taken have reported the transformative effect that it has had on safety. As Helen Voce, CEO of the Nottingham Women’s Centre, pointed out:

“Misogyny is the soil in which violence against women grows.”


That is why we need to tackle it.

Following an amendment to the upskirting Bill, Her Majesty’s Government instructed the Law Commission to carry out a review of all hate crime and to consider incorporating misogyny as a new category of hate crime. The commission notes that there were 67,000 incidents of hate crime based on gender in 2018, 57,000 of which were targeted at women. Without recognising the role of misogyny in the experiences of women, our legal and criminal justice system masks the true extent of hostility based on gender.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister of State, Home Office (Baroness Williams of Trafford) (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions to this debate, which has been excellent. I can categorically attest to the fact that the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, is not a misogynist. The noble Baroness, Lady Bull, talked about how the behaviour of parents has almost a direct correlation with how their children might behave when they grow up. The noble Baroness, Lady Burt, talked about the trans community; the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, might have looked at my notes because the words I have written in response to her remarks are almost identical to what he said: that hate crime laws in England and Wales protect identity characteristics such as race, religion or sexual orientation, or groups such as trans or disabled people.

I thank noble Lords for all their comments, including the very thoughtful comments of my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham. The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, talked about the abuse of parliamentarians—it is horrific to see the comments that people have made—much of which is misogynistic. The opening gambit of the noble Lord, Lord Russell, was the tragic case of Kellie Sutton, which shows two things, one mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Paddick. It shows the failure to include domestic abuse in the MAPPA arrangements and the need for more effective use of Clare’s Law; the Bill remedies that, as it puts the guidance on a statutory footing. Noble Lords have talked about police forces that record misogyny. The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, rightly pointed out that those which record misogyny also record misandry.

I will be quite clear about the Government’s position on hate crime. All crimes that are motivated by hatred are totally unacceptable and have no place in this society. That is why, in 2018, as part of our updating of the Government’s hate crime action plan, we asked the Law Commission to undertake a review of current hate crime legislation, including considering whether other protected characteristics such as sex, gender and age should be included. We asked it to review both the adequacy and the parity of protection offered by the law relating to hate crime and to make recommendations for reform. This review began in 2019; over the course of that year and last, the Law Commission tried to meet as many people as possible who had an interest in this area of law, organising events across England and Wales to gather views and, of course, evidence, which the noble Lord so often talks about.

The noble Lords, Lord Paddick, Lord Kennedy and Lord Lucas, stressed the importance of data in our considerations. The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, asked about opening a debate with the police; I am sure that, following the Law Commission’s findings, such a debate will be opened up. However, we have specifically asked the commission to consider the current range of offences, aggravating factors and sentencing, and to make recommendations on the most appropriate models to ensure that the criminal law provides consistent and effective protection from conduct motivated by hatred towards protected groups or characteristics.

The review also took account of the existing range of protected characteristics, identifying any gaps in the scope of protection currently offered under the law and making recommendations to promote a consistent approach. The consultation to support the review closed on Christmas Eve of last year. That consultation focused on whether sex or gender should be added to hate crime laws, noting that misogyny by itself might introduce inconsistency to hate crime laws—as the noble Lord, Lord Paddick, also pointed out.

We will respond to the review when it is completed. Given the range and depth of the work undertaken by the Law Commission, we do not think it would be appropriate to prejudice the outcome of its work, including by issuing guidance or requiring the collection of statistics along the lines proposed by the amendment. As I have said, the noble Lord rightly wants to see evidence-based policy. The work of the Law Commission will add significantly to that evidence base. I hope the noble Lord will agree that we should allow it to complete that work rather than pre-empting it. We will consider what changes need to be made once we have had the opportunity to fully consider the Law Commission’s final recommendations. On the basis of these comments, I hope that the noble Lord will be happy to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I thank everybody who took part in this wide-ranging debate. I thought it was appropriate for it to be introduced by a member of the weaker sex, but I thank everybody of whatever sex for their contributions. I thank my colleague in the other place, Stella Creasy. She and I had the pleasure of spending quite a bit of time together at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, where I got to know her. She has been a doughty champion of trying to get misogyny recognised as a rather pervasive element in modern society and I applaud her for her efforts, which have been supported across the Chamber in another place.

The noble Lord, Lord Young—with his usual erudition and from his commanding height—laid out just how extensive the Law Commission’s interim report is. I, too, waded through 40-odd pages, and I confess that I did not look at about 500 footnotes in detail, but it is very impressive and goes very deep. What comes out of it very clearly is that the case for the prosecution is proven: misogyny is something that actually exists, is tangible and has a very unpleasant effect on a lot of people. However, finding out that it is bad is the easy bit; the difficult bit, which is what the Law Commission is trying to do now, is translating that knowledge—that truth—into legislation in a form that will have a materially beneficial effect on the very large number of victims of misogyny. That is the difficult piece to try to get right. Frankly, the more data that we have to help us try to understand how to do that effectively, the better.

My noble friend Lady Bull laid out some of the international context. This is not something that takes place only in our disunited kingdom, it is an international syndrome and a shameful one. The existence of gender-based hostility is a fact of life and it has probably always been with us from Neolithic times. The noble Baroness, Lady Burt, quite rightly made the point that we must have the right information. I am to some extent agnostic on the technical issues of sex versus gender and all the rest of it. That is not a battle that I am going to fight. I do not feel qualified to do so, but I am quite sure that the Law Commission will look at that in detail as it is looking at all the other elements.

The noble Baroness, Lady Jones, talked about the pervasiveness of misogyny, based in part, I suspect, on her own experience and that of others that she has seen. It is shameful. She also made an extremely good point about the value of really good police domestic abuse training. I do not know to what extent there is a template for best practice and what good really looks like. I suspect that, as ever, some police forces are doing it infinitely better than others. Can the Minister tell us how much knowledge the Home Office has of where best practice is in existence or being evolved and, if so, what is it doing, or what does it aspire to do, to try to make sure that that is applied everywhere, not just in those police forces that are ahead of the game?

The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, talked about the importance of enhanced information, but he rightly made the point, as a lawyer, that hate crime is a difficult and very sensitive area, and data really will be king. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy, I saw the reports about the way in which female athletes have been tormented and abused because they cannot go to the normal stadia and places to exercise. It is absolutely deplorable that one should be trying to do what one loves and has a passion for—indeed, what one may be representing one’s country for—and is subject to abuse on the street. I cannot even imagine what that would be like. I hope that if I witnessed someone doing something like that, I would give them a piece of my mind—not that they would probably take much notice.

The noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy, also pointed out that misogyny is a recruiting tool for hate groups. In doing research for this debate, I went down one particular rabbit hole that I found on the internet: a very bizarre male forum in which feminism is regarded as the root of many of modern society’s ills and as a conspiracy to belittle men and reduce their role. It was eye-closing, rather than eye-opening, to try to read it, but it exists and we cannot ignore it. We have to try to do something about it.

The noble Lord, Lord Paddick, quite rightly, with his extensive experience, laid out some of the heffalump traps that exist legally and in the way in which the police might try to apply this. He knows far more about it than I do, but I would defer to the Law Commission to try to work its way through some of the complexities that he outlined. I probably agree that they do not necessarily need to be in primary legislation; that is not the object of this probing amendment.

The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, again, referred to the importance of data and the role of social media. Like him, I greatly look forward to the arrival of our new colleague: his friend and mine, Vernon Coaker. When he arrives, he will be a sterling addition to your Lordships’ House. I also—since I am married to one—agree with the noble Lord on the very important role of powerful women.

The Minister quite rightly mentioned the pervasive influence of the home that one is fortunate or unfortunate enough to grow up in, and how that influences one’s views. We both have shared history in the importance of timely, accurate and informative data. I think we all agree that although we know this is here, we still do not really understand its full complexity, how to record it accurately or how to respond to it. I hope that the Law Commission will come up with some answers, but the pandemic has acted like a pressure cooker on an awful lot of what is going on. Many women and children are suffering unspeakable oppression at the moment and I am very conscious that, while it is neat and tidy to say that we will wait for the Law Commission findings to come out, there is a feeling among most of us who have spoken that it would be good to do as much as we can in the interim to acknowledge that this is a live and shameful issue, rather than just sit on our hands hoping that the Law Commission will pull a rabbit out of the hat.

On that basis, I thank everybody who has taken part. I thank the Minister for listening so politely and answering as I expected she might, but I hope that she and her colleagues will consider whether more could be done, given the circumstances that so many of these women and children are in, to try to send some message to police forces about the benefits that other police forces which have trialled this are having from it, and to encourage them to look at it seriously. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 146 withdrawn.

--- Later in debate ---

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

The noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, has withdrawn, so I call the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, in this morning’s Times there is an article in which the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead officer for child protection, Simon Bailey, said that arresting hundreds of sex offenders every month has little effect, because millions of abuse images are readily available online. Mr Bailey pointed out that the number of indecent images in circulation has risen exponentially, from 7,000 in 1990 to 17 million today. They predominantly involve girls aged between 11 and 13, because 44% of these images were or are self-generated. This is part of the ever-growing online library of intimate images, curated—in the loosest sense of the word—by technology and social media platforms, only some of which grudgingly acknowledge a limited degree of responsibility.

Consider the 11 to 13 year-old girls of today and how they may feel about these images existing and getting into the wrong hands as they navigate through adolescence and towards adulthood. Consider those women who were the 11 to 13 year-olds five, 10 or 15 years ago, who not only have their legacy images stored in the cloud but who may have continued to populate that library in the interceding years. This is the reality of the scale of the problem we are discussing tonight.

The statistics are compelling and depressing. An estimated 130,000 young people aged between 18 and 20 have experienced threats to share their intimate images, and almost 1 million people now in their 20s have experienced similar threats. Whether we like it or not, the sending and receiving of intimate images is an increasingly common part of dating and relationships. In 40% of cases in which individuals have received threats to share intimate images, they did not consent to those photos or videos being taken in the first place.

The amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, which I wholeheartedly support, is an important and necessary part of what must be a legal and societal assault on the myriad ways in which technology can be used to abuse, control and coerce. Whether individuals consented to their images being taken is irrelevant; they should have ironclad protection under the law from those images being used without their consent. Their bodies, their self-esteem and their right to privacy and protection should be theirs and theirs alone.

On 28 December last year, as we enjoyed a later-than-usual Boxing Day bank holiday in England, and your Lordships prepared themselves for the rigours of the 30 December debate on the TCA with the EU, in Dublin, President Higgins signed the Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Bill into law. This created two new offences. One deals with the taking, distribution or publication of, or threat to distribute, intimate images without consent and with intent to cause harm, with the penalty of an unlimited fine or up to seven years in prison.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

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

[Baroness Meyer (Con)]

My Lords, I support Amendments 7, 8 and 9, tabled by my noble friend Lady Stroud. Why? Because unborn children and small babies are as much at risk of domestic abuse as any other child, yet they have been largely excluded from this Bill. There seems to be no specific reference to them.

A very recent research paper published by the First 1001 Days Movement highlighted the fact that there are “baby blind-spots” in policy, planning and funding, where protections for children often do not work for babies. As my noble friend Lady Stroud mentioned, 30% of domestic abuse cases begin during pregnancy. That is a big number, but it is hardly surprising.

The prospect of having a child radically changes the dynamic in a relationship. The partner is suddenly faced with new responsibilities, both financial and emotional. Maybe the pregnancy was never discussed and comes as a complete surprise. The partner may feel duped or resentful, trapped in a relationship he never intended.

As we have heard throughout these debates, domestic abuse can take many forms. But just imagine how it feels when, at your weakest and most vulnerable point—which is how most women feel when pregnant—you are confronted by a partner intent on abusing you. When I was pregnant with my sons, I remember worrying that somebody would bump into me on the tube or I would fall and somehow injure that little being growing inside of me. I used to walk with my arms in front of me, shielding my stomach and my unborn child; it is a mother’s natural instinct. Imagine how frightened and helpless a mother must feel if her partner is a constant threat, not only to her but to her baby.

I remember my mother telling me when I was pregnant that I should only read happy stories, watch cheerful movies and listen to soft music. She strongly believed that the child absorbed everything its mother experienced and that this would affect the child’s development. Today it is an established fact that a baby’s development is as much affected by the mother’s emotional state as by what she eats and drinks, as we heard earlier.

As the First 1001 Days Movement attests, these are decisive moments in the life of a baby. Emotional abuse of the mother can damage the mental or physical health of the child, while physical or sexual abuse can lead to miscarriage. These soon-to-be-born human beings cannot be consigned to the category of “out of sight, out of mind”. If this is to be a piece of landmark legislation, our duty is that much greater to ensure that it recognises babies, the very young and the unborn. That is why I support the amendment.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I support all the amendments in this group. I declare my interests as an officer of the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Conception to Age Two, and, like the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, I have the privilege of being a member of Andrea Leadsom’s taskforce. We will be producing our findings imminently. I did not speak in Committee because, frankly, I thought I would leave it to people who know rather more about it than myself, including many contributors who have given birth. While I am capable of many things, that is one thing I am not capable of.

I studied the Minister’s answer in Committee very carefully and was not hugely impressed, so I was intending to stand up this afternoon and be slightly critical. However, I have had a quiet word beforehand with the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, and in the Chamber one has a great advantage: I was able to see the body language of the Minister when the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud, was making some comments, and it was extremely positive. I do not think those of us in the virtual world can see that—one of the benefits and privileges of being in the Chamber. Having studied the answer very carefully, I thought that what came out of it was something that concerns me and is worth flagging up.

The Minister tried to reassure us that all children will benefit from the Bill and that new guidance, which may be issued by the Secretary of State—it does not have to be—will cover all children, including those in utero. She then talked about the existing guidance which has been in place for some time. The Working Together to Safeguard Children initiative makes it clear that local authorities must have protocols in place to assess the needs of children in utero. She also specifically mentioned Section 47 inquiries under the Children Act 2004, which allow for a child protection conference if there are concerns for an unborn child.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, government Amendment 14 is very welcome. Clearly the call for the commissioner to have powers to collect information on domestic homicide through reviews of such homicides has been heeded. Domestic homicide reviews will give the commissioner a hugely valuable picture of deaths occurring as a result of domestic violence. They bring together the statutory and non-statutory partners to learn lessons and, hopefully, prevent deaths in future.

However, as the commissioner-designate says, actions can drift over time, and there is little accountability for implementation. Although statutory guidance says that a copy of each domestic homicide report should be lodged with the Home Office, it is often omitted because there is no legislative backing to the guidance. Someone needs to grasp that issue firmly, put all this disparate information together and drive the changes that are needed from the lessons learned.

Thanks to government Amendment 14, all domestic homicide reports must now be sent to the commissioner. As well as domestic homicide reports, though, there are other valuable sources of information into homicides and suicides—other reviews that hold vital lessons. Amendment 16 would spread the information net wider to incorporate reviews or investigations into deaths where domestic abuse had been identified as a contributory factor. Such reviews could come from any number of sources: safeguarding adult reviews, serious case reviews, NHS serious investigations, misconduct where a death was involved and so on.

Prevention of future deaths reports, issued by the coroner’s office, are hugely important in building up a picture of how things have gone wrong and can be improved in the future. Although this information resides on the coroner’s website, there is no systematic way to interrogate it. While recommendations are made, reports to the commissioner would enable her to correlate them and guide future best practice. The commissioner is anxious to preserve the independence of the Chief Coroner, which has been removed from the list of proposed public authorities required to co-operate with the commissioner, so that judicial independence is not compromised in any way. This is why proposed new subsection (3) requires copies of the coroner’s prevention of future deaths reports to be lodged with the Secretary of State and commissioner. Any public authority specified in Clause 15(3) would be covered; this is the subject of my Amendment 12.

During Committee, we proposed in Amendment 51 that Her Majesty’s Prison Service and the National Probation Service be added to the list of organisations with a duty to co-operate with the commissioner. It was subsequently confirmed that they already fall under this duty, as part of the Ministry of Justice, but there are a couple of authorities that the commissioner would find particularly useful to have added to the list. The Independent Office for Police Conduct will occasionally look at allegations of misconduct in relation to a death where domestic abuse has been a factor, while the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman will deal with deaths in prison or after release, when a victim or perpetrator of domestic abuse has been involved. These are two poignant examples of where the death of a victim can point to how such a tragedy can be avoided and circumstances can be better handled in future.

It is important to note that there is no intention of creating a blame culture here, but instead to learn lessons by producing thematic reviews that inform policy and practice. Every amendment in the group will strengthen the arm of the Secretary of State and the commissioner to do their job and design better systems to prevent systematic failure in the future. I beg to move.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I rise briefly in support of Amendments 12 and 16, to which I have added my name. In Committee, the Minister was constructive and sympathetic, as she invariably is when considering improvements to the quality, accuracy and timeliness of data, so we are grateful for government Amendment 14. She has followed through, as she promised she would in Committee, and we thank her for it.

The noble Baroness, Lady Burt, has explained clearly what is behind Amendments 12 and 16, so I do not need to go into more detail. It is also clear that the commissioner herself has requested these additions and she is in the business of trying to pull together multiple strands of information, in a way that has not been done before. She is not learning on the job, but to some extent learning as she settles into the job, about the greater complexity that there is and the different strands of information that she will need to make informed decisions and give the Government good advice. It is a direct request from her to fill what she feels are some important gaps in the data that she requires.

The two key benefits are fairly self-evident. The first is to ensure that all these recommendations are recorded and assessed, in particular to see if the recommended follow-up actions are being taken. The second is to draw out the key themes and lessons being learned in order to have a proactive, preventive, joined-up approach, which we clearly do not have at the moment. That is a large part of the genesis of this Bill. The commissioner’s request is extremely simple: please support and accept these amendments, and act. She will then move swiftly to build a more informed, accurate and insightful understanding, which will enable her to do her job as well as we all want her to.

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

The noble Lord, Lord Bhatia, has withdrawn, so I call the noble Baroness, Lady Newlove.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 10th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, I was pleased to table my amendment in Committee. I welcomed the debate and the overwhelming support from around the House. In particular, I acknowledge the support of the noble Lords, Lord Russell of Liverpool and Lord Rosser, and the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Derby.

I am, perhaps, even more pleased that I have not tabled it again on Report. I am grateful to my noble friend and her ministerial colleagues for giving so much of their time to meet and discuss this; for the amendments tabled in the name of my noble friend; and for confirming the Government’s commitment to address issues around community-based services in a letter to me last Thursday.

We all agree that community-based services are vital in supporting the majority of domestic abuse victims who remain at home. Government amendments to ensure that local authorities monitor and report on the impact of their duties under Part 4 on other service provision, are most welcome, as is the Government’s commitment to consult on the provision of community-based domestic abuse services in the upcoming victims law consultation this summer. These have been welcomed not just by me but in a press release, published under the leadership of Barnardo’s, by the domestic abuse commissioner, the Victims’ Commissioner for England and Wales, domestic abuse campaigner Charlie Webster, Imran Hussain at Action for Children, the End Violence Against Women coalition, the NSPCC and SafeLives. I congratulate my noble friend the Minister on uniting these groups and organisations in welcoming the Government’s commitments. This is an incredibly important step forward in understanding and addressing the provision of community-based domestic abuse services, so that all victims, especially children, will be able to access support, regardless of where they live.

I hope the consultation will take a holistic approach to tackling domestic abuse, carefully considering what is needed to support children and adults, as well as programmes to tackle the behaviour of perpetrators and break the cycle of domestic abuse. I am certain that my noble friend the Minister and her colleagues, working with the professional and deeply impressive domestic abuse commissioner—who I thank for her advice—will place community-based services on the same statutory footing as accommodation-based services. I appeal for her office to be properly and adequately funded.

Again, I thank my noble friend the Minister for her time and for the helpful letter she sent me. I am pleased to support the amendments in her name. I look forward to continuing to work with her and with all noble Lords as this important Bill becomes law.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I shall be extremely brief, not least because of the happy coincidence that the noble Lords, Lord Hunt and Lord Polak, have largely said what I was going to say. I thank them. I can now go and have a late lunch.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Polak, I was impressed by the Barnardo’s press release last Thursday, with all the different voices speaking in unison. My own experience of dealing with voluntary organisations over many years is that hell hath no fury like different voluntary organisations in pursuit of similar goals and, in particular, similar pools of funding. Peace seems rather dangerously to have broken out in this case. I hope it will continue.

I thank the Government for listening. It was a bit of a no-brainer with a Bill in which 25% of the accommodation-based services for domestic abuse victims were dealt with but 75% were not. That was an open goal waiting to be filled. I am grateful that the Government have acknowledged this and acted on it.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, I took note of the National Audit Office investigation and report into the state of local authority funding. I have observed a variety of individuals in this House—some of whom I have worked in co-operation with—who, for the best of reasons, ceaselessly plead with the Government to put more and more statutory duties on local authorities in a whole variety of different areas. In a sense, this is dangerous because, in a situation where local authorities are under the strains and stresses that they are, piling even more statutory duties or guidance on them runs the risk of mission failure and initiative fatigue. I am very conscious of this. It requires a joined-up approach from the different parts of Her Majesty’s Government.

The Home Office is doing its bit. The Ministry of Justice is going to do what may not come easily to it and talk more openly with the communities department —and vice versa. It was not terribly helpful that the Secretary of State, while acknowledging the councils’ problems, could not resist the political dig of accusing them of poor management. This is a bit rich coming from a national Administration who have spent the amount of money they have on initiatives such as test and trace, or who have presided over the highest number of deaths per million in the world during the current pandemic. Before one starts throwing political missiles at one’s opponents, it does one a lot of good to look in the mirror and have a degree of humility. None of us gets it right all the time.

When the domestic abuse commissioner comes back with her recommendations, I would plead with the various parts of national government and the local authorities to talk to one another, agree, buy into whatever is recommended, and put in place properly thought-through, long-term plans to deliver on this strategy and to fund it properly.

[Lord Rosser (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, government Amendment 17 requires the domestic abuse commissioner to prepare and publish a report on

“the need for domestic abuse services in England, and … the provision of such services.”

The report must be published no later than 12 months after this new clause comes into force.

Other government amendments require local authorities to keep under review the impact of the duty to provide accommodation-based services on their provision of other domestic abuse services in the community.

Amendment 30, in the name of my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, makes it clear that the public authority may not prioritise accommodation-based support services for persons with a protected characteristic over other support services for the same person, except in so far as those persons have a greater need for accommodation-based services than for other support services.

Amendment 31 would give the Secretary of State power through regulations to extend the duty in Part 4 to include community services, instead of just accommodation-based services. I agree with the points made and the concerns raised by my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath in his powerful contribution.

Amendments 85 and 86 in my name are the community service amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Polak, re-tabled. We tabled them pending sight of the Government’s specific commitments and amendments. I will not move them. Like others in the House and outside, we welcome the Government’s amendments and commitment to consult on community-based services as part of the consultation on the victims law. I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Polak, and to other noble Lords, as well as to all the organisations which have worked on this issue. I also pay tribute to the shadow Minister in the Commons, Jess Phillips, who pursued the proper provision for community-based services with some vigour and determination during the Bill’s passage through the other House.

We now need to see the Government’s words and commitments translated into real progress and meaningful action. The key to achieving this is for services, victims and perpetrators to be looked at holistically; to see what needs to be done in the round to prevent abuse, and to support victims who experience it. This also means providing services for children who are victims, for older victims and for perpetrators, as well as ensuring that there are specialist services for black and ethnic minority victims. Healthcare services are also vital.

--- Later in debate ---

I will be brief because others have already made the arguments, but I thank all the Ministers and their teams for being willing to listen and move on this important point. I hugely welcome the Government’s support of these new provisions and their willingness to use the Domestic Abuse Bill to make these changes.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, like everybody else who has spoken, I say that this is extremely welcome. We thank the Minister for listening to so many voices. It is great that the Government have listened, although, if I were being uncharitable, I would say they have listened somewhat belatedly. I am very pleased that the Law Commission review is now under way. I reflect that it took the influence of a very influential and effective recent Cabinet Minister to persuade her own party to listen, when so many voices have been trying to get the Government to listen over quite a long period. However, thanks are due, and thanks are given.

I am concerned that we often seem to be behind the curve when it comes to so many aspects of online harm and harassment-type behaviour in general. In today’s newspaper there was mention of a YouGov survey which has just been done. Of 1,000 women, 96% of them do not and would not report incidents of harassment to the authorities. One of them pointed out that the police can act if somebody drops litter on the street but are unable to act if somebody is harassed on the street, and that does seem wrong. I think 46% of the 1,000 ladies said, when asked why they did not report harassment, that it was because they had no belief whatever that it would change anything. That is a reflection on the various authorities and organisations that are meant to help victims of harassment. If they feel like that, there is clearly something wrong.

The noble Baroness, Lady Crawley, mentioned the extraordinary small market town somewhere in the United Kingdom where no fewer than 70 women have had intimate images shared on an online forum where somebody commented that they are “traded like Pokémon cards”. What must it feel like, as a woman or a man— as a human being—to have intimate images of yourself traded like Pokémon cards? On this online forum if you have an interest in a particular town you can message people on the forum who circulate these images and ask: “Do you have anybody from this particular town or who went to this particular school?” That is really shameful; the fact it is going on shames us all.

I am pleased that we are, belatedly, in catch-up mode. But I find it excruciatingly embarrassing and unacceptable that victims are suffering in many different ways, while Her Majesty’s Government and Parliament occasionally appear to be dithering over regulation and legislating. In doing that we are letting ourselves down, but far more importantly, we are letting the victims down.

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

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lords who have spoken, and I am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, and, of course, the Government, for accepting these necessary amendments.

At the outset, I also record my thanks to Dr Ann Olivarius of McAllister Olivarius, a very eminent lawyer who, about a decade ago, began her campaign against so-called revenge porn. Her outstanding work, both here and in the US, has definitely made a very significant contribution to the fact that we have had legislation for the last five years and it is a criminal offence to share sexual images without consent.

I welcome this amendment to extend the offence of disclosing

“private sexual photographs and films with intent to cause distress”

to an individual who appears in the photograph or film— known as a “revenge porn” offence—so as to include “threats to disclose”. One in 14 adults has experienced threats to share intimate images or films of themselves. Young women aged 18-34 are disproportionately impacted by this form of abuse, with one in seven reporting that she has experienced such threats.

Like other noble Lords, I commend Refuge’s The Naked Threat research, which found that the vast majority—72%—of threats experienced by women were made by partners or ex-partners, making it a clear domestic abuse or domestic violence issue. Therefore, the Domestic Abuse Bill is not only the right legislative vehicle for what is clearly a crime related to domestic violence or abuse but a piece of legislation that would allow the Government to make these required changes imminently. As such, I am very grateful for that.

Some 83% of women threatened by their current or former partners experience other forms of abuse alongside these threats. One in 10 women threatened by a current or former partner felt suicidal as a result of the threats, and 83% said that the threats damaged their mental health or emotional well-being. More than one in seven of these women felt a continuous risk of physical violence because of these threats. Only one in three women felt empowered to report this behaviour to the police, and, of those women, less than 14% said that they had received a good response. I am also deeply concerned about the lack of reports coming from black and other minority women.

As I have said previously in this Chamber, perpetrators of domestic abuse are increasingly using technology and the internet to control and abuse their partners and ex-partners. Threats to share images are used to control, coerce and abuse when they are in a relationship, and, after they have separated, this form of abuse is disproportionately perpetrated against younger women. Survivors of this form of abuse lack the vital legal protection that they need, with the police often telling survivors—or making them believe—that they cannot take any action until the abuser has shared the images, leaving survivors in fear and enabling perpetrators to use these threats to control them.

Like the noble Baroness, Lady Morgan, I thank Refuge, the Equality and Human Rights Commission and Barnardo’s, among others, which recommend making threats to share intimate images a crime, and extending the offence of controlling and coercive behaviour in an intimate family relationship to remove the cohabitation requirement. This is most welcome; it would therefore cover post-separation abuse, which would protect 4.4 million adults who have experienced this form of abuse.

Young people are the group most likely to be in an abusive relationship. A survey of 13 to 17 year-olds found that 25% of girls and 18% of boys reported having experienced some form of physical violence from an intimate partner. However, the Children’s Society found that 77%—a majority—of local authorities that responded to its FoI request do not have a policy or protocol in place for responding to under-16s who experience teenage relationship abuse, with just 39% of local authorities providing specialist support services for under-16s and 26% of local authorities providing no specialist support for this age group. Tragically, 500 children—mostly teenagers, but some as young as eight years old—were victims of image-based abuse.

The UK Safer Internet Centre is a partnership of three leading charities, including the Internet Watch Foundation. It reported an increase in the number of young people trying to view sexual abuse materials online, and that in just one month of lockdown its analysts blocked 8.8 million attempts by UK users to access such images and videos. We continue to see a rise in the number of children being groomed online into producing self-generated indecent images. I shudder to think of the underreporting, particularly among young people from black and minority-ethnic communities.

Can the noble Lord say what action the Government are considering to influence, inform and educate children and, more widely, the general population? What research, if any, have the Government undertaken into the impact of online abuse of women and intersectional online abuse of women from black and minority communities?

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 15th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rooker (Lab) [V]]

My Lords, I will speak briefly to give maximum support to my noble friend Lady Royall, but in effect to all speakers, since I have not heard anything that I disagree with.

I have four short points to make. First, I was very struck that buried in the short but useful briefing from the London Assembly was a warning that carrying on on a more casual, non-statutory basis does not work. It points out that in London from January to November 2019, the current domestic abuse protection order was used in only 0.5% of domestic abuse offences recorded by the Metropolitan Police. So the warning is that we have these well-intentioned tools but they are not used by the police or magistrates. I was very struck by a point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Bertin, in her powerful speech, and it is a warning to the Minister: saying “We’ll do it” but then not doing it makes the position far worse. It is a question of resources in finance and of course in will, and that is a crucial point that has to be made.

Secondly, I share the questions of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, having read the briefing from the Suzy Lamplugh Trust about domestic and non-domestic stalking. As the previous speaker, the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, said, Amendment 73 probably does not go far enough.

Thirdly, my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath made a point about the numbers affected each week, but we also have to remember not just what happened last week and what has happened since the Bill came into your Lordships’ House, but the fact that we know for certain that by the end of this week another two females will have been murdered.

Fourthly, regarding perpetrators, we have heard the range of examples that noble Lords and noble Baronesses have given. Now I know this might be classed as fanciful because it is not correct, but I ask the Minister to think of perpetrators as an organised perpetrators’ grouping. I know they are not and there would be very little evidence for it, but there is a pretty consistent pattern, not only over some cases but over many years, as if they were such a group. If they were treated as an organised perpetrators’ group by Parliament, the Home Office and law enforcement then by now we would be having strategic views, risk management and people’s names on registers in the same way as with existing registers. We would really be toughening it up. I would take that as a starting point for the debate today, not a finishing point.

As I said originally, I do not disagree with anything I have heard today and I give my full support to these two amendments, both verbally and if they are pushed to a vote.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

And so, my Lords, we come to tail-end Charlie. What is probably not obvious to those listening or watching today’s proceedings who are not around the Palace of Westminster is that they have been taking place with the sound of helicopters circling almost ceaselessly. I think that is because a group of people who feel strongly about what we are discussing, some of whom may even have been on Clapham Common on Saturday evening, have decided to come to Parliament Square today while we are having this discussion, and I suspect while another place is beginning to talk about the policing Bill, to voice their concern and—in a respectful way, I am sure—are trying to demonstrate how strongly they feel about this issue.

What an irony that we have a female Home Secretary and a female head of the Metropolitan Police, and that it was a female assistant commissioner who, under huge pressure, took a decision on Saturday evening that with the benefit of hindsight she may possibly regret. The evidence around the country of demonstrations taking place where the police decided to be judicious and hold back is that they seem to have gone off without event, while the two that I have heard of—one in London and one in Brighton—where the police decided to take a different decision have ended badly. I hope lessons have been learned from that.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 17th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, who has made a powerful speech on her amendment, to which I will add a fairly brief footnote.

As she said, over the last few days we have seen growing pressure on the Government to alter the terms of trade, the balance of power, between men and women. The murder of Stephen Lawrence in the 1990s marked a turning point in our attitudes towards race in this country; the murder of Sarah Everard may do the same for attitudes towards women. Other noble Lords may have had telephone calls yesterday from women asking for support for this amendment. Elesa Bryers rang me, asking if she could send me a petition she had started which had some 700 signatures. I readily agreed.

It is crucial for the Government to strike the right balance in response, avoiding a knee-jerk reaction and a headline-grabbing solution that does not stand the test of time but recognising that, after careful analysis, we have to move on from where we are. I can think of few people better placed to help make that judgment than my noble friend the Minister who is replying to this debate.

Turning to the amendment, no one could say that this is a knee-jerk reaction to the tragic events of last week, as, of course, the case for it was made last month in Committee by the noble Lord, Lord Russell, and others. I have reread the reply that the Minister gave on that occasion. My noble friend said:

“Given the range and depth of the work undertaken by the Law Commission, we do not think it would be appropriate to prejudice the outcome of its work, including by issuing guidance or requiring the collection of statistics along the lines proposed by the amendment. As I have said, the noble Lord rightly wants to see evidence-based policy. The work of the Law Commission will add significantly to that evidence base.” —[Official Report, 8/2/21; col. 59.]


“We do not think it would be appropriate” is not a total rejection of what we were asking for. Indeed, one could argue that the amendment would add significantly to the evidence base that the Minister referred to in her reply, because it would broaden that evidence base beyond the 11 police forces which currently collect the relevant statistics. I wonder whether my noble friend has sought the views of the Law Commission on this amendment as it completes its work.

We know that the domestic abuse commissioner is supportive of the principles behind the amendment and strongly welcomes proposed subsection (2) about issuing guidance. I was pleased to hear in her interview on Friday that the domestic abuse commissioner said she was listened to by the Government, and my noble friend can build on that basis of trust in her response today.

Winding up the debate in Committee, the noble Lord, Lord Russell, offered a way forward by suggesting that we should

“try to send some message to police forces about the benefits that other police forces which have trialled this are having from it, and to encourage them to look at it seriously.” —[Official Report, 8/2/21; col. 61.]

Perhaps that offers us the way forward today.

Rereading the briefing for this amendment, I was struck by the evidence from Citizens UK and from the organisation HOPE not hate that ideological misogyny is emerging in far-right terrorist movements, and that there has been a growth in online misogynistic abuse. Hate motivated by gender is a factor in a third of all hate crimes, the same briefing tells us—all of which reinforces the case for a fresh look at this issue.

As other noble Lords have said, we need to rebuild confidence in the police. The noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, referred to the case of Nottingham and the survey, where they have already adopted the measures outlined in this amendment, as she said. That survey showed, first, that the problem was taken seriously by the police and, secondly, that what Nottingham did increased public confidence in the police in the county. Adopting this amendment could do the same for the police nationally.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, I was very happy to put my name to this amendment, and I pay tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, for the eloquent and detailed way in which she has introduced it.

At Second Reading on 5 January, I mentioned that I would raise the issue of misogyny and probably put forward an amendment in Committee. First, those of your Lordships who, like me, laboured through the Second Reading—there were no less than 90 contributors —were brave, but, secondly, it is interesting to note that, of all the contributors, I think I was the only one to actually mention the dreaded noun “misogyny”. I was not surprised when the Minister, in her summing up of so many contributions, also did not mention misogyny.

We fast forward to Committee, and on 8 February—the fifth day in Committee—I put forward an amendment, ably assisted by the noble Lord, Lord Young, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Bull and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, to all of whom I am extremely grateful. As the noble Lord, Lord Young, said, the Minister basically said, “We can see it is quite a good idea, but we have asked the Law Commission to look at this, and we will wait and see what it recommends”.

Now we fast forward to today—17 March—the fourth day of Report, and Amendment 87B. Harold Wilson once said that one week is a long time in politics. I do not know about the rest of your Lordships, but, for me, the last 10 weeks since Second Reading have felt like a lifetime in politics. But more to the point, as the noble Baroness, Lady Royall of Blaisdon, said very movingly on Monday, the last 10 weeks have not only seemed like a lifetime, they have also seen the loss of no less than 30 lives—30 women killed by men, whose names she read out on Monday.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con) [V]]

The noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, is absolutely correct about what Nottinghamshire Police records. I cannot confirm what the conclusion will ultimately be, but I have said that I will consult.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

I thank the Minister very much for that helpful response. I would like clarification on how we are going to proceed. Does she agree that the police forces currently recording crimes such as misogyny are doing so slightly differently in each case, because each police force has decided to interpret it in its own way? What the Minister’s department is about do to with the National Police Chiefs’ Council is to look at the different ways different police forces currently collect this data. I imagine she will also work with the Law Commission to take into account its evidence taken on sex and gender and its interim recommendations. Therefore, she will come out with a clarification of the guidance to be given to all police forces in England and Wales.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con) [V]]

I can confirm that to the noble Lord. I think a bit of consistency here would be very helpful to give us the information we seek.

Domestic Abuse Bill

Lord Russell of Liverpool Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments
Tuesday 27th April 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I too wish to start by thanking the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, for her helpful speech from the Dispatch Box this afternoon and for the repeated emails and meetings with some of us to try to progress matters. We recognise that some of the things we would like to see in this Bill are better placed in statutory guidance and I thank the Minister for her reassurance and the offer of showing us that draft statutory guidance to bring these perpetrators to justice. It was also encouraging to hear details about the thresholding document.

Herein lies the problem, which the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, referred to in part. We need to substantially change the culture and practice inside the criminal justice system to tackle these particular perpetrators. We have said repeatedly that the consequence is that these fixated, obsessive, serial and high-risk perpetrators escalate their behaviour—far too often resulting in serious violence and murder. That is why we welcome the changes to the current arrangements for a perpetrator to be considered for MAPPA category 3. The assessment of past patterns of behaviour is vital—something we asked for in the stalking law reforms of 2012—including convictions at a lesser level. I thank the Minister for her words on that.

One of the consequences of an effective risk assessment for these serial and high-risk perpetrators is that MAPPA teams need more resources than they currently receive. It should not be possible for these cases to be disregarded because of resources. I echo the question that the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, asked about how much of the extra perpetrator funding the Minister outlined during the passage of the Bill will be dedicated resource for local MAPPA areas to manage a larger numbers of offenders. This is one of those few times when it will be good to see numbers going up, because it will provide reassurance that these perpetrators are being managed properly. This Bill and these arrangements will fail without those resources—and this Bill must not fail.

The noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, cannot be in her place today, but she specifically asked me to make the following points to your Lordships’ House on her behalf. She joins those of us who signed the amendment on Report in expressing concern that serial and serious high-risk perpetrators of domestic abuse and stalking must be included and therefore on the database.

Can the Minister give the House some assurance that domestic abuse and stalking experts and agencies will be included as a matter of course in the MAPP meetings? Their expertise at a local level will be vital; risk assessments of patterns of past fixated behaviour will not be effective without their input. It is the early identification of these patterns of behaviour that can change the experience of the victim and, with appropriate support, can help the perpetrator too.

The noble Baroness, Lady Newlove, also asks whether the domestic abuse commissioner and the Victims’ Commissioner will have access to MAPPA data— especially, but not only, that relating to those serial and high-risk stalking and domestic abuse perpetrators. It is vital for them to be able to hold those making decisions inside the criminal justice system to account. She makes the point that this is particularly important because, until the victims law the Government have promised comes into force, it will provide powers for the Victims’ Commissioner. Until then, there will be no powers for the Victims’ Commissioner to perform that role. It is vital that both the domestic abuse commissioner and the Victims’ Commissioner have similar powers to hold the Government and agencies to account.

I will end by looking both backwards and towards the future. This month marks the 16th anniversary of the start of the harassment and stalking campaign of which I was the principal target. It took three years before the perpetrator was caught and my many discussions with the police mirrored far too many of the cases we have heard of elsewhere. I swore to myself that no one should have to repeatedly explain incident after incident to the police as if each one were the first—but that is still the case far too often.

During the passage of this Bill we have all spoken of the tragic deaths of far too many women at the hands of stalkers and abusers—currently between two and five per week. This morning on Radio 4’s “Today” programme Zoe Dronfield spoke movingly of her own experience. She discovered, after escaping a violent attack with her life, that her previous partner had stalked and attacked a dozen women before her. This Bill and the arrangements for the statutory guidance the Minister outlined have the capacity to start to change the experience of victims such as Zoe, but only if every single part of the criminal justice system engages with these changes to make them work. That is why the expertise that exists in pockets of good practice in the police and probation needs to be mainstreamed into MAPPA—and the work before MAPPA in call centres, front-line policing and the court system—with effective training throughout to watch for the red signals and pick up on this type of behaviour.

I want Parliament to hear of reductions in attacks and murders, of an increase in the number of offenders successfully managed by MAPPA, and a world where victims can start to live their lives no longer in fear—knowing that they can turn to the police and others for help. This Bill is the start of a very long journey to be continued in the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill and the domestic violence and violence against women and girls strategies. We will watch with interest and, in fulfilling our duty, we will return to challenge and scrutinise how these important changes are being effected. At the end of the day, lives depend on the Government and everyone in the police and criminal justice system getting it right.

[Lord Russell of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, at the last stage of the Bill I started by saying it felt dangerously like

“déjà vu all over again”.—[Official Report, 21/4/21; col. 1935.]

I am very pleased to announce this afternoon that it does not feel like déjà vu any longer. I think we are in mortal danger of actually moving forward—for which I thank the Minister very warmly.

It is perhaps no coincidence that this group of amendments, which in many ways is at the heart of the Bill, is coming right at the very end of it. The reason for that is that it is probably the most difficult part of the Bill to deal with. Almost all the excellent work done in both Houses up until this point has been dealing with some of the effects and after-effects of domestic abuse. What we are talking about in this group is trying to identify the causes and early signs of domestic abuse: in other words, trying to stop it happening rather more efficiently and effectively than we have done in the past.

To the Government’s credit—and this is not easy to admit—they have admitted that the current system is not working well. You just have to look at the weekly litany of deaths and some of the stories behind them to realise that it is not working. But it still takes a certain amount of courage to admit that one has not got it right and that one needs to change—so I am very grateful for that.

Although I have played an insignificant part, I am also extremely grateful to the noble Baronesses, Lady Royall and Lady Brinton, the latter of whom is an expert on stalking, for putting forward such compelling arguments for stalking to be included that the Government have acceded to the strength of their arguments. I am extremely grateful for that.

I am also grateful that new statutory guidance will be forthcoming. But at this point I want to issue a very strong health warning. I apologise to the Minister, who heard me go on a bit about this earlier this morning. For any new guidance to be effective, it must be created and then applied in a fundamentally different way from the way it has been done in the past. Part of that is that it needs different voices and experiences around the table. The individuals responsible for MAPPA at a national level and in the 42 different MAPPA areas all around the country—effectively, each police force—are largely the same group of people from the same organisations that have been responsible for trying to make the MAPPA system work over all these years.

However, part of the Government’s recognition of the complexity behind the causes of domestic abuse—in particular the addition of stalking—means that there is a compelling need to bring these new experiences and knowledge to the table. They have to become an integral part of MAPPA. They must have the same power of voice and vote around the table. Part of what needs to happen is for MAPPA to evolve and develop a different way of looking at all this. It needs to develop a new language, and new forms of assessment and forecasting, and to do so in a dynamic way, not looking at things every six months or every two years. It has admitted that part of the reason why the statutory guidance is now online rather than printed is that it has probably already been out of date by the time it has been printed. Putting it online means that it can be updated constantly; I genuinely welcome that.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, said, I managed, by googling away, to find the job description for the new head of MAPPA, who Her Majesty’s Government are currently seeking. Some of your Lordships may have seen a slip of paper in the past couple of weeks, before the election of the Lord Speaker, where, after 30 or so years of being a head-hunter, I put pen to paper—actually finger to iPad—and wrote a brief description of some of the attributes I thought were important in the role, as well as, very importantly, some of the deliverables. The glaring omission in the job specification for the head of MAPPA is any definition of relevant experience. There is nothing whatever to indicate what type of prior experience and knowledge would qualify the candidates to be on that shortlist. I put it to the Minister that whoever becomes the next head of MAPPA must have a breadth of knowledge, an openness of mind, and an ability to manage and argue compellingly for change of a different order of magnitude from what has been required before. That will be absolutely fundamental.

I finish my rant by again thanking the Minister very much indeed. We have made considerable progress. I look forward to not forgetting about the rear-view mirror —as a dedicated cyclist I know that would be extremely dangerous; indeed I have rear-view mirrors on both of my bicycles. I congratulate the Government on the progress they have made, but I ask them to take what I have said seriously to heart and to try to make sure that we get it right this time. The test will be when the awful metronomic death toll of the work done week in, week out by the Counting Dead Women initiative starts going down, and the number of people on the MAPPA system starts going up with the right sort of people. At that point we can feel that we are actually doing something that all these victims and their families have been looking for, for so many years; that will be really good news.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Finlay of Llandaff) (CB)]

A Member in the Chamber has indicated his wish to speak. I call the noble Lord, Lord Paddick.