Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing an emergency fund for those impacted by domestic abuse to provide them with the resources required to flee the perpetrators of that abuse in the context of the increases in the cost of living.

Tackling domestic abuse is a priority for this Government. A key part of this is making sure victims and survivors get the support they need.

The Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan, which we published in March, invests over £230 million, including over £140 million specifically for supporting victims and survivors. The commitments in the Plan include doubling funding for the National Domestic Abuse Helpline.

The Plan also committed to establish trials of a ‘flexible fund’, which charities could use to provide extra money to victims and survivors in light of the increased cost of living.

More widely, the Government is providing direct Cost of Living Payments to more than 8 million UK households on means tested benefits. These payments will be tax-free, will not count towards the benefit cap, and will not have any impact on existing benefit awards. The Government also is protecting the most vulnerable in society, many of whom face the biggest challenge making their incomes stretch, by increasing benefits in line with inflation. This means that they will rise by September Consumer Prices Index (CPI) inflation – 10.1%.