Violence against Women and Girls: Plymouth

Rachel Maclean Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2023 Westminster Hall

[Rachel Maclean (Redditch) (Con)]

It is a great honour to follow the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon).

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South West Devon (Sir Gary Streeter) for securing the debate, which allows me to give my very strong opinions on this topic on behalf of my constituents in Redditch, as well—of course—to express my sympathy for the victims of the horrendous events in Plymouth. I served as a Minister in the Home Office shortly afterwards and it impacted many of us deeply to see the situation unfolding in Plymouth.

However, what is a real credit to the spirit of Plymouth is the way the city has come together and responded through the practical measures of the commission that my hon. Friend mentioned. Those practical measures are extremely encouraging and a great example for the rest of us across the rest of the country to follow to tackle this pervasive, absolutely pernicious and—sadly—endemic issue.

I would just like to ask the Home Office Minister who is in the Chamber today to respond to a few points. The Home Office has done an extremely good job in responding to the strategy to end violence against women and girls, but I think that we would all be interested to learn a bit more about some of the ongoing work, including how she is pushing it forward and how we can see the measures rolled out to protect more women and girls.

The first issue that I want to highlight is the importance of prevention. Of course we all know the emotional and psychological impacts of crimes of violence against women and girls on the victims. However, there is also the economic impact. Home Office statistics have set out that the costs of violence against women and girls are in the region of £66 billion for the whole economy, although those are quite old figures. I am sure that the Minister knows of more recent ones. It is absolutely vital that we tackle the issue for the sake of our entire economy.

Will the Minister update us on the work that she is leading on prevention? Specifically, I mean the domestic abuse prevention orders and the domestic abuse prevention notices; the electronic tagging, the provisions for which were introduced in the Domestic Abuse Act 2021; the ongoing work on the register of perpetrators to ensure that we monitor and track perpetrators and keep women and girls safe; and any work that she is doing on the mixed picture on stalking prevention orders. We know that some areas are fantastic at rolling these orders out; others are not so good. Many stalkers are being missed and are slipping through the cracks, so we really need to ramp up this work and use these powers to keep these people monitored and keep their victims safe.

Secondly, there is the incel phenomenon. May I bring the House’s attention to the very good work of Laura Bates, who has sone extensive research on that topic? It is a relatively new subject—I say “new”, but I mean in terms of our understanding it and making policy about it. What should the policy response be? Is it right to look at it through the terrorism lens? Should we have a bespoke response? Of course, we know that it is proliferating online. The Online Safety Bill introduces a number of measures to strengthen the response of the online platforms, but is the Minister concerned about the phenomenon and, if she is, what more can she do from a policy perspective so that we really understand why these young men are being radicalised in this way and committing such horrendous acts?

Thirdly, we have done a fantastic job in the Home Office of kicking off the Enough public information campaign, which I know is having an impact across the country. Will the Minister update us on it? Does she plan to roll it out more widely? Does she plan to repeat it? Does she plan to roll out the campaign across the transport network, because we know a lot of crimes of violence against women and girls occur on buses and trains? Can she update us on the Home Office’s work on prevention and what works? We all want to prevent these crimes taking place.

We need to understand the psychology of perpetrators, who are mostly men, although some women commit such crimes. We know there are interventions that work and, thankfully, prevent lives being lost and trauma inflicted on women and girls. We need to understand that. If the interventions work, we need to roll them out widely, so that every area knows what to introduce and what is right for their area.

My hon. Friend the Member for South West Devon set out some good interventions that are clearly working in his area, but we need to gather that data so that every single local authority has no excuse but to come to the Home Office and ask for funding if needed. That funding should be available so that local authorities can roll it out and know that it will make a difference.

Finally, will the Minister update us on the strategic policing requirement, which was a commitment that we in the Home Office made on the back of the Policing, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022? A lot of work has gone on in the Home Office, and it is important to bring together strategic law enforcement at a national level, so that police forces are working and know what to do, so that we can tackle this and keep more women and girls safe.