Clause 1 - Breach of non-molestation order to be a criminal offence
Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Bill [Lords]
9:30 am
Mrs Cheryl Gillan (Shadow Minister, Home, Constitutional & Legal Affairs; Chesham and Amersham, Conservative)
Amendment No. 14 has been helpfully drafted to enable us to discuss at the start of this first sitting the definition of domestic violence. That topic was raised in the early stages of deliberations in the other place, and I hope that the Committee will bear with me if I reiterate some of the arguments that members have no doubt already had the opportunity to read.
The Minister is familiar with the large number of outside organisations that back a formal definition. They think it is extraordinary that, despite the fact that domestic violence is the leading subject of the Bill, there is no definition of domestic violence that the Department has agreed or consulted on outside its confines. I understand that the Home Office uses a three-line definition involving any violence between current and former partners in an intimate relationship, wherever and whenever the violence occurs, with the violence including physical, sexual, emotional and financial abuse.
I further understand from some organisations that have briefed me on the Bill that a ministerial committee may have adopted a definition of domestic violence for use across all Departments. There was some concern that another definition might have been adopted that has yet to be published, and which has not been subject to any consultation. Therefore, I ask Minister what the latest position is and whether the
organisations that have been briefing us are mistaken in their view that there is a new definition that will be commonly used across all Departments.
I am particularly grateful to Women's Aid, which has provided briefings on the amendments, and particularly on new clauses 3 and 9. New clause 9 defines domestic relationships. Many people felt that, because such a definition was missing in the other place, Baroness Scotland was not willing to consider it. Whether that is the case remains to be seen; we will learn more when the Minister responds.
Women's Aid has the backing of about 200 organisations for the inclusion of a definition of domestic violence. The definition suggested is taken from New Zealand's Domestic Violence Act 1995. It has been endorsed by many organisations dealing with domestic violence, and by the Advisory Board on Family Law's Children Act sub-committee, which said that it was a useful, comprehensive and gender-neutral definition.
Why is a definition needed? Some organisations think that the existing definition that the Home Office uses is too narrow. Southall Black Sisters, with which I am sure every Committee member is familiar, says that the Home Office definition is limited to violence between partners and former partners in intimate relationships. Many agencies would like an extended definition to include other members of the family. Although Southall Black Sisters recognises the need to focus on intimate relationships, since partners and ex-partners are the most common group of perpetrators or victims, the definition that the Home Office uses fails to recognise domestic violence perpetrated by other family members. Many black and minority women find that one or more members of the family and the wider community can perpetrate or collude in domestic violence. That is particularly the case where Asian women live in extended families and can be subject to abuse from partners, ex-partners, parents, siblings, uncles, aunts, in-laws and former in-laws, as well as people in the community such as family friends, community leaders and even bounty hunters, private detectives or organised networks of men.
The Minister may be familiar with the news this morning that, on the back of a conference being held in The Hague, the Metropolitan police is looking at honour killings and bounty hunters and is examining more than 100 cases of murder in the United Kingdom to see whether there is any linkage. The Minister may want to inform the Committee on the latest position on that, because I know that hon. Members on both sides of the Committee—particularly on the Government Benches—have taken a great deal of interest in the issue and have been very brave in making a stand on it.
It is also thought that, by limiting the definition, the Home Office has excluded culturally specific forms of harm such as forced marriage and female genital mutilation. I need go no further because our Chairman is probably the greatest expert in this House on that subject. However, I hope that widening the definition will address some of the issues that Southall Black Sisters in particular has identified as part of the problem.
Women's Aid has produced an excellent briefing. I make no apologies to the Committee for taking members through some of the arguments it deploys, particularly because it represents the views of more than 200 organisations that have endorsed the line on which it has taken a lead. Although domestic violence accounts for a quarter of all violent crime, there are many myths and misconceptions about it that result in ineffective outcomes when cases enter the justice system. By the time such cases reach the family courts, when abusive parents apply for contact or residence orders, the risks associated with domestic violence are usually perceived as not very serious. A widespread misconception among legal professionals is that domestic violence stops on separation. However, research shows that women are at higher risk of violence and of being killed after leaving a violent partner.
Another common misconception is that domestic violence affects only adults, but nearly three-quarters of children on the child protection register are in cases featuring domestic violence. That reflects the fact that men who abuse their female partners are also likely to abuse their children, and children are often traumatised by witnessing domestic violence.
Many legal professionals believe that contact is good for the child, even with a violent parent. For that reason courts have made orders granting unsupervised contact to schedule 1 offenders convicted of offences against children. Last year a survey found that 16 per cent. of refuges in England and Wales knew of local cases in which a contact visit with a violent parent had resulted in a child being significantly harmed since the good practice guidelines were introduced in April 2001.
The most commonly asked question with regard to domestic violence is, ''Why doesn't she leave?'' For someone who has not been subjected to psychological abuse, it can be difficult to understand why an abused woman stays in a relationship for years without notifying the police or social services and why some women return to their abusers not once but several times. The court may decide that there are good reasons not to believe allegations of abuse, but in the experience of Women's Aid, women who return to their abusers are often those who have been most psychologically damaged by their experiences. It believes that the amendment will help to dispel those misconceptions because it acknowledges that domestic violence affects children and recognises the significance of psychological and emotional abuse.
Domestic violence presents the courts with a serious problem because of the legal principle that he who asserts must prove. Abused women often find it difficult to prove that abuse has taken place because it typically occurs behind closed doors in the family home when no independent witness is present. Even when it is possible to prove that a violent incident took place, the court may decide not take it seriously because it was only one incident or the woman was not seriously injured. In one case, in which the court
accepted that the father had attacked the mother when she was holding the child, that was not considered a serious assault, so a contact order was granted. Eventually contact became unsupervised and was enforced with a threat of a penal notice. The father subsequently sexually abused the child.
It is vital that the courts should understand the dynamics of abusive relationships so that they can provide appropriate protection for the child. The amendment suggested by Women's Aid, which I have tabled on its behalf, encourages the courts to do that by considering all aspects of the abuse and its effects on the child.