Asked by: Lord Lexden (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether all police forces in England, including the Metropolitan Police, work with independent schools in implementing Operation Encompass, through which schools and police work together in safeguarding children at risk from domestic abuse.
Answered by Lord Sharpe of Epsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Home Office)
Operation Encompass is currently active in all 43 police forces across England and Wales. Implemented on a voluntary basis by police forces, the scheme works by directly connecting the police with schools. When officers have attended a domestic abuse incident, police share the information with a school’s trained Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL) before the start of the next school day, so that appropriate support can be given at the earliest possible opportunity.
Aligned with police forces’ operational independence, each police force operates the scheme differently, in terms of the notification pathway and which institutions receive notifications. Importantly, the scheme does not discriminate on what type of schools these notifications should be sent to.
Asked by: Preet Kaur Gill (Labour (Co-op) - Birmingham, Edgbaston)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps she is taking to help ensure specialist support is available to children with mental health needs who are victims of domestic abuse.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
We are investing at least an additional £2.3 billion a year in expanding and transforming mental health services in the National Health Service by March 2024 compared to 2018/19. As part of this, an extra 345,000 more children and young people, including those who are victims of domestic abuse will be able to get the NHS-funded mental health support they need.
We are also continuing the rollout of mental health support teams to schools and colleges in England. While these teams deliver interventions for mild to moderate mental health issues, they can also liaise with external specialist services to help pupils get the right support. There are currently around 400 mental health support teams in place, covering over three million children, which is approximately 35% of pupils, and we are working to increase this coverage to 50% of pupils by March 2025.
Nov. 26 2008
Source Page: Responding to domestic abuse: a handbook for health professionals. 161 p.Found: Responding to domestic abuse: a handbook for health professionals. 161 p.
Dec. 14 2011
Source Page: Cross-government definition of domestic violence: a consultation. Consultation paper. 28 p.Found: Cross-government definition of domestic violence: a consultation. Consultation paper. 28 p.
Asked by: Whitfield, Martin (Scottish Labour - South Scotland)
Question
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on how it supports children and families that are affected by domestic abuse.
Answered by Brown, Siobhian - Minister for Victims and Community Safety
Our Equally Safe strategy, Scotland’s strategy to prevent and eradicate violence against women and girls, acknowledges the significant impact domestic abuse and other forms of violence against women and girls (VAWG) can have on children and young people and their families lives, including impacts on their health, education, wellbeing and future life chances.
Through Equally Safe, which is co-owned by COSLA and the Scottish Government, we are working collaboratively with key partners to ensure that its principles are embedded into the work we do that supports children, young people and families who have experienced VAWG. This includes ensuring support is available through Child Protection and Adult Support and Protection systems, housing and homelessness support services and community justice support services amongst others.
We are also investing £19 million a year in specialist services and projects through the Delivering Equally Safe (DES) Fund, £18.5m for specialist advocacy support for victim/ survivors of gender based violence from the Victim Centred Approach Fund and £573,300 through the Children, Young People and Families Early Intervention Fund & Adult Learning and Empowering Communities Fund for improving children and family wellbeing.
The DES fund supports 83 projects that undertake work with children and young people who have experienced or witnessed VAWG, including funding to projects delivering the CEDAR programme, which aims to help mothers support their children in their recovery from domestic abuse. Funding is also given to support the role out of Safe and Together, an internationally recognised suite of tools and interventions designed to help professionals in children and family services become domestic abuse informed.
We will continue to ensure support for children, young people and families through our commitment to the Equally Safe strategy.
Written Evidence Feb. 06 2024
Inquiry: Children’s social careFound: 45% drop in domestic abuse convictions leaves a huge increase in violent men out in the community
Apr. 23 2024
Source Page: I. Universal Credit guidance April 2024 [update of previous guidance, deposited Oct 2023, DEP2023-0791]. 204 docs. II. Letter dated 15/04/2023 from Jo Churchill MP to to the Deposited Papers Clerk regarding documents for deposit in the House libraries. Incl. file list at Annex 1. 9p.Found: Domestic abuse Content Introduction What is domestic abus e?
Asked by: Simon Jupp (Conservative - East Devon)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps he is taking to help tackle violence against women and girls in East Devon constituency.
Answered by Laura Farris - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Ministry of Justice) (jointly with Home Office)
It is difficult to determine the specific activity to tackle violence against women in the East Devon constituency as services are mostly commissioned at a national level, and not monitored by the Home Office by constituency.
To help support local service commissioners, we published a revised National Statement of Expectations in March 2022, which sets out how local areas should commission effective services. It also aims to increase understanding of the need for specialist services and the value of those designed and delivered by and for the users and communities they aim to serve.
As part of the effort to tackle these crimes across England and Wales, in 2021 we published our cross-Government Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy to help ensure that women and girls are safe everywhere - at home, online, at work and in public. This was followed by a complementary cross-Government Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan in 2022.
These documents aim to transform the whole of society’s response to these crimes with actions to prevent abuse, support victims and pursue perpetrators, as well as to strengthen the systems that underpin the response. The actions set out in both strategy documents benefit all regions across England and Wales, including East Devon.
The Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan committed to over £230 million from 2022-2025. As part of this commitment, the joint Home Office-Ministry of Justice VAWG Support and Specialist Service Fund will provide up to £8.3 million (in total) from 2023-2025 for specialist organisations to support victims often facing the greatest barriers to getting the help they need.
The Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan funding also includes the Children Affected by Domestic Abuse (CADA) Fund, which allocated £10.3 million over three years (2022-2025) to eight organisations across England and Wales to provide specialist support within the community to children who have been impacted by domestic abuse. Part of this includes c.£1.25m for the Children’s Society to provide direct support for children and young people and families, including those from rural and hard to reach communities, covering Devon, Shropshire, Rochdale and Merseyside.
In May 2023, the Home Office also launched a £300,000 ‘flexible fund’ trial in partnership with Women’s Aid Federation for England to make direct cash payments of £250 to victims and survivors of domestic abuse (£500 to those with children and those who are pregnant) to help remove barriers to leaving an abusive relationship. In November 2023, the Government commitment to support victims was renewed with a further £2m investment into the Flexible Fund until March 2025.
Through the current Round Five of the Safer Streets Fund, the Home Office has directly awarded £34 million to Police and Crime Commissioners across England and Wales to deliver interventions to tackle neighbourhood crime, anti-social behaviour and VAWG. Devon and Cornwall received £819,998.64 (2024-2025) to support projects covering Paignton, Camborne and Redruth and are delivering educational training packages such as bystander training to help address behaviour and attitudes on VAWG and using night-time economy marshalls for patrols in the town centres.
Jan. 26 2024
Source Page: Children’s wellbeing at the heart of family court reformsFound: abuse victims and children, following the government’s response to the Private Family Law Early Resolution
Jan. 26 2024
Source Page: Children’s wellbeing at the heart of family court reformsFound: abuse victims and children, following the government’s response to the Private Family Law Early Resolution