Female Genital Mutilation

(asked on 21st January 2019) - View Source

Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what recent steps the Government has taken to develop a cross-departmental strategy on tackling FGM.


Answered by
Victoria Atkins Portrait
Victoria Atkins
Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
This question was answered on 29th January 2019

Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is a crime and it is child abuse. The Government is clear that we will not tolerate a practice that can cause extreme and lifelong suffering to women and girls

The Government has significantly strengthened the law in 2015 to improve protection for victims and those at risk, and to break down the barriers to prosecution.

Work to tackle FGM is an integral part of our cross-Government Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) strategy, published in March 2016. The Strategy commits to continue to challenge deep-rooted social norms, attitudes and behaviours that discriminate against and limit women and girls across all communities. As part of our commitment to tackling all forms of VAWG, we have pledged £100 million in funding, including the £17 million VAWG transformation fund. This year, we will refresh the strategy to ensure that we are doing all that we can to tackle crimes which disproportionately affect women.

In July 2017, the National FGM Centre received additional funding through the Department for Education’s Social Care Innovation Programme to sup-port its work through to the end of March 2020. The intention was for this funding to be time limited, with the Centre to be self-sustaining from April 2020. Therefore, the Home Office have no plans to contribute to the funding of the Centre beyond March 2020.

The Home Office does not hold information on the average cost of supporting an FGM victim in the UK. However, we are committed to continuing our work to protect and support victims and those at risk of this terrible crime.

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