Examination of Witness

Part of Domestic Abuse Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 9:29 am on 29 October 2019.

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Louisa Rolfe:

Thankfully, much of the training we have invested in and the work on domestic abuse risk assessment will apply, because it identifies coercive controlling behaviour, which is often prevalent in those relationships where there are adult children and an elderly parent. I do not worry that we will struggle.

The police service has been working for many years to better understand and address vulnerability, and that is why we had such a dramatic increase in the reporting and recording of domestic abuse. In reality, many of those incidents are already recognised and reported. The challenge is often in the provision of adequate support services, to ensure that victims feel confident that they can take that leap and pursue a prosecution.

There are some great domestic abuse perpetrator programmes out there, such as the Drive Project, which focuses on addressing behavioural change. The evaluation of that programme has shown that it reduces abuse by 30%, which is hugely impressive. However, the reality is that the College of Policing recently looked at the provision of perpetrator programmes and found that only 1% of perpetrators participate in them. I do not think that that is because of the reluctance of perpetrators; it is about the lack of availability.

We found in the significant increase in the reporting of domestic abuse that many incidents might not meet the threshold for prosecution. In the absence of perpetrator programmes to address the behaviour, we are in a difficult position. We must do something, so we focus on safeguarding victims, but we really want to work with other agencies to ensure that there is also a solution to address that behaviour.