Second Reading debate resumed.

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 6:20 pm on 15 December 2003.

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Photo of Baroness Greengross Baroness Greengross Crossbench 6:20, 15 December 2003

My Lords, I, too, very much welcome the Bill. It deals with extremely important issues about which we all care deeply. I shall concentrate my remarks on domestic violence and the abuse directed against older people. I do so partly as a patron of Action on Elder Abuse, which I helped to set up in 1993 when I was director general of Age Concern.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Linklater, said when she spoke about domestic violence generally, abuse against older people can be physical, emotional, psychological, financial, verbal, mental or sexual. It can lead to death but more often involves cruelty of varying degrees, and it is often of a domestic nature.

When caring for a frail older person at home, a carer can be marooned for 15 years or more in a job that will end only with the person's death, be that person a wife, husband, aunt, uncle, grandparent or whoever. This is a very difficult set of circumstances for anyone to cope with emotionally. It can lead to guilt, despair and unspoken wishes when, for example, a loved one with dementia becomes completely unrecognisable as the person he or she once was.

Vulnerable adults vary enormously. We all know that some can be delightful, charming and grateful for the care that they are given. However, others who displayed negative traits in their younger days may find that those traits become exaggerated as they get older leading to very much more demanding behaviour than anyone can cope with. They can make life hell for a carer. In those kind of cases action to prevent abuse is absolutely essential—real respite care, quality community care and so on. Just as important as this Bill is the need to ensure that care is there when it is needed and that it works for the benefit of the carer and of the cared person. However, when abuse occurs, domestic or not, we have to make sure that the law is there to protect the victim.

For many years it was thought that this type of abuse was very rare and restricted to certain groups and sectors in society, and that it never occurred among some minority groups, for example, for whom respect for their elders was part of their culture. However, research over recent years has shown that to be a fallacy. Unfortunately, it occurs among all ethnic and socio-economic groups and is much more widespread than was previously imagined.

Action on Elder Abuse estimates that between 500,000 and 900,000 older people suffer elder abuse, but we need more information on its prevalence and what proportion of this is domestic. For example, much of this abuse might be a continuation of domestic abuse in a family with a history of violence.

I therefore welcome the Bill as it is a firm step in the right direction, but I am a little unclear—given the Minister's understandable focus on women and children in her opening speech—how much attention in the genesis of this Bill was given to tackling domestic elder abuse. I hope that the Minister can reassure me.

I welcome in particular Part 1 of the Bill, which includes the new charge of unlawful killing of a vulnerable adult. In Clause 4(6), the definition of a vulnerable adult is very broad. While old age is not as such a defining factor of being vulnerable, age plays a significant part for some very old people as they are unable to remain independent. They no longer earn their keep and their resulting poverty, and their need for help in every-day tasks can lead, and often does lead, to their vulnerability. The important words here are,

"a person aged 16 or over . . . [who] is significantly impaired through physical or mental disability or illness".

Can the Minister confirm that I am right to assume that the Bill's provisions apply to people who have never cohabited but live together, for example, two sisters, a mother-in-law with a son and so on? I welcome the provisions of Clauses 2 and 3 to extend coverage to same-sex couples and non-cohabiting people.

As I have said, vulnerability can be multi-faceted and is not just caused through mental incapacity. We have to do more to recognise elder abuse. I mean by this that we must educate the police, the Crown Prosecution Service, nurses and social workers, among others, to recognise it and tackle it. Frankly, we must also educate the general public that it is as unacceptable as child abuse, and seek to give its eradication as high a profile as that very worthy cause gets in the media. If even cases of alleged unlawful killing can go unpunished, is there any hope that we can deal with less serious but more common cases of elder abuse unless we tackle the matter? For example, a 78 year-old woman died five weeks after moving in with her son-in-law and was found to have a catalogue of 60 injuries—razor blade cuts, cigarette burns, bruises and so on. More than 2 years later no one has been charged with her murder.

I have one further question about Part 1. I am unclear what is the definition of a household. Will it, for example, cover domestic violence in sheltered housing, other communal living arrangements or long-term care homes, which become the home or domestic setting for a long-term resident? I wonder whether this might have to be spelt out more clearly in the Bill.

Part 3 of the Bill concerns support for victims. My worry here is that victims are often unwilling to make a complaint, or may not be able to do so due to their vulnerability. For example, the elderly mother of a violent son may feel that making such a complaint reflects on her failure to raise her child successfully. Another victim may fear reprisals. For example, a victim in sheltered housing may worry that the warden against whom she makes such a complaint could take revenge for that. In that respect I welcome the announcement of the new helpline. The helpline of Action on Elder Abuse has been running for six years and has taken more than 5,000 calls, of which less than one-third were from victims; the majority were from relatives and care workers. I also welcome the Victims' Advisory Panel. I hope that it will include experts from the field such as experts from the charity, Action on Elder Abuse.

In conclusion, I congratulate the Government on introducing this important Bill. I hope that it will play a role in helping to tackle domestic abuse of all kinds against people of all ages.