Domestic Abuse Bill (Eleventh sitting)

Nickie Aiken Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate: 11th sitting: House of Commons
Wednesday 17th June 2020 Public Bill Committees

[Nickie Aiken (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)]

I have experience of Operation Nexus in Westminster, where we have seen an awful lot of trafficking and modern slavery. I would be grateful for the hon. Lady’s thoughts on whether sometimes the immigration officials need to get involved, because women want to go home, or they want to be safe. Rather than being persecuted by the police or being involved in criminal activity, they are victims. If the immigration service is involved, in my experience, they can be treated more safely and sent home.

[Alex Davies-Jones]

I appreciate the point the hon. Lady makes, and I am glad that she has had such a positive experience of Operation Nexus, but I believe that is an exception to the rule. I think, if we spoke to other hon. Members in this House, they would not have the same experience. Some women in that situation do want to go home, but I think the majority of them just want to be safe and protected from abuse, and that is not the case with anxiety and fear hanging over them from immigration officials sat in the room, especially if they do not speak the same language. It is very difficult.

Colleagues have also spoken about the lack of recourse to public funds that migrant victims of domestic abuse face. That lack of support is a huge barrier for women across the country. We have heard that without recourse to public funds, victims are not eligible for welfare benefits, which are required to cover the cost of stay within a refuge service. Very few refuge services do not face a funding crisis after 10 years of cuts, and they are unable to cover the cost of women’s stays without that funding. Indeed, only 5.8% of refuge vacancies in England in 2017-18 would even consider a woman with no recourse to public funds. That is not because they do not want to help them, but because they are physically unable to do so.

Some fantastic initiatives have been set up in response to the crisis, but, frankly, this legislation should be there to protect those women in the first place. The destitution domestic violence concession, the DDVC, is just one example of a vital lifeline run by and for BAME women. It provides survivors with welfare benefits for three months, so that they can stay in refuge while applying for indefinite leave to remain under the domestic violence rule.

However, the DDVC and the domestic violence rule are only available to those on spousal visas where their spouse or partner is a British citizen or has settled status in the UK. Many migrant survivors are therefore barred from accessing this protection. Advice can only be provided by an immigration solicitor or barrister or an accredited immigration adviser and, given the legal aid restrictions we have heard about, gaining access to that advice can also be a severe challenge and is pitted with so many problems and issues.

The DDVC provides access to public funds as long as a woman applies for leave to remain within three months, yet for women escaping their abuser and who are experiencing trauma, that timeframe is often too limited. Changes to appeal rights also mean that most women refused indefinite leave to remain under the DVR cannot appeal the Home Office’s decision—a decision that is made without ever even meeting the applicant. That means that women who cannot submit objective evidence for domestic abuse support in their application are at a severe disadvantage.

The experiences of survivors with no recourse to public funds, unable to access refuge, are shocking. Only 8.2% of the women with no recourse to public funds supported by the No Woman Turned Away project in 2017 were able to access refuge—just 8.2%. Many had to sleep rough, sofa surf or even return to the perpetrator while they waited for help. We have already discussed the pressures on the housing sector in England, but for a migrant survivor, the impact is even more severe. Urgent changes to the DDVC and the DVR are required to ensure that migrant women can access those basic protections.

The impacts are felt across the Union. It would be a shame for me not to use the opportunity to briefly mention the impact that the UK Government’s policies have had on migrant women in my constituency. I hope that hon. Members will indulge me as I briefly discuss a case that my office recently worked on involving a migrant domestic abuse victim.

I am sure that other new hon. Members will agree when I say that, since my election in December, I have been overwhelmed in every sense by the number of campaign groups that have been in touch to ask me to support their cause. It is often difficult to choose where to focus my efforts and I am still learning. For me, however, sharing local resources and information aimed at domestic abuse victims has been a priority, especially given the current coronavirus climate.

South Wales police is doing some excellent work with local organisations to encourage a multi-agency approach to processing reports of domestic abuse, and I wanted to do my bit too. I am sure other hon. Members will agree that any social media content that is produced in relation to domestic abuse is usually shared far and wide, and often outperforms any other content. That is an indication of the broad reach that domestic abuse support has.

After one specific Facebook post, in which I shared local helplines and encouraged victims to reach out for support if necessary, my office was contacted by a woman suffering domestic abuse in north Wales. Before hon. Members scold me for not following parliamentary protocol and raising cases only on behalf of my constituents, the woman had no fixed address and was initially afraid to share any specific details for fear of negative repercussions. Her story was one that I have since heard from many on a number of occasions of having no recourse to public funds. It is a story that persists.

There are some fantastic organisations in Wales that operate solely to help women such as that woman, who now lives in my constituency. Bawso is just one group that I know has helped many MPs and Members of the Senedd across Wales with similar cases. As an MP representing an area in Wales, it is often extremely difficult and challenging to marry up the broad help and housing policies that the Welsh Labour Government have implemented that are specific to domestic abuse victims with the often restrictive and hostile immigration policies of the UK Government. I sincerely hope that migrant women, like the ones living in my constituency, will finally have their voices heard and will ultimately receive parity in terms of access to welfare support in future.