Oral Answers to Questions

Polly Billington Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd September 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jess Phillips]

I am sure that the whole House has sympathy for the case that the hon. Gentleman has outlined. I understand that the inquest is ongoing, but to answer the substantive point of his question, children’s and adult social care have historically not always been what victims felt they could rely on, with many cases to demonstrate that over the years. Without doubt—as I sit next to the Secretary of State for Education—the work with my office, with the Ministry of Justice and with her office to ensure that that is handled in the violence against women and girls strategy, and more broadly, is at the top of the agenda for all of us.

[Ms Polly Billington (East Thanet) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend use this opportunity to remind the House how many women and girls are vulnerable to people they know, as distinct from people they do not know? Will she also use this opportunity to condemn elected politicians who peddle misinformation about who is most at risk and where the targets really are?

[Jess Phillips]

I do not have in front of me the exact data that my hon. Friend has requested—I am not entirely sure that exact data exists—but what I can say, based on decades of experience, is that women and girls in our country are far more at risk from people who know our names, and whose names we know, and who we work among and live alongside. The idea of “stranger danger” is one that most women do not recognise; the people they fear are people they know.