Protecting the Public and Justice for Victims

Matt Western Excerpts

Wednesday 9th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

Justice cannot be brought without first apprehension, then investigation and finally resolution. What we have witnessed over the past decade has been the considerable dismantling and diminution of our criminal justice system—the loss of 22,000 police from our streets; the closure of hundreds of police stations such as in Warwick, Hartlepool and elsewhere, making access to the police more difficult and meaning that more crimes go unrecorded; and the closure of half the courts between 2010 and 2019.

Across the country, as a proportion of all crime recorded by the police, violence reached its highest level in 2019-20 since comparative records began. Violence against the person increased in every police force across the country, and overall only one in 14 crimes led to a charge. Locally in Warwickshire, knife crime has quadrupled since 2013-14—a 300% increase in just seven years.

I want to focus on the failures of justice in relation to sexual violence and harassment and child abuse, as shared with me by constituents. Let me start with sexual violence and harassment. We see this Government failing to protect women and girls from violent criminals, which should be one of the first duties of any Government. With record low conviction rates of perpetrators of sexual violence and an epidemic of misogyny that makes women and girls feel unsafe, the Government are treating victims of violence as an afterthought. New research has found that seven in 10 women say that the Government’s efforts to make the UK safer for women are not working and consider Government action to be inadequate. Victims are losing faith that the justice system will be there for them.

In Warwickshire, there were 1,600 arrests for domestic abuse-related crimes between 1 April and 30 June, and 15% of all recorded crime is domestic abuse-related, yet still the police and crime commissioner is replacing all nine staff from its domestic abuse unit with police constables, who should be out on the street.

The crime survey of England and Wales estimates that 3.1 million adults were victims and survivors of child sexual abuse before they turned 16, which is likely to be a highly conservative estimate. Cases brought before courts are too few, and convictions are even fewer.

Tackling gender-based violence is at the very top of Labour’s agenda, by making misogyny a hate crime, increasing sentences for rapists and stalkers and creating new specific offences for street sexual harassment and sex for rent; time prevents me from going through all the details. With record low conviction rates for perpetrators of sexual violence and the epidemic of misogyny against women and girls, which makes them feel so unsafe, this Government are treating victims of violence as an afterthought. That is why I will be voting for our motion.