Agenda item

[Hannah Pawley,Community Safety Manager, and Keisha Harper,Domestic Violence Specialist,to present report]

Hannah Pawley, Community Safety Manager, and Keisha Harper, Domestic Abuse Specialist, gave a joint presentation on the work being done and planned to prepare for the implementation of the Domestic Abuse Bill.

The Domestic Abuse Specialist briefly outlined the progress of the Bill and the background to an announcement by the then Prime Minister of plans to transform the way the Government thinks about and tackles domestic abuse.

The Bill is currently going through Parliament. The Bill is having third reading in the House of Lords to consider amendments during the committee stage. The Bill is due to be implemented in April 2021.

The Domestic Abuse Specialist outlined the four main objectives of the Bill relating to domestic abuse. The Domestic Abuse Bill has seven key parts. For example, the Bill will create the statutory definition of domestic abuse. This would involve changes such as lowering the age from 18 to 16 years to ensure that children are included as victims or witnessing seeing or experiencing domestic abuse and recognising that domestic abuse is not just physical but also includes the idea of coercive control, and different forms of abuse  such as psychological and economic. The Bill will introduce the post of Domestic Abuse Commissioner who will be responsible for overseeing and leading national public policy on tackling domestic abuse.

The Community Safety Manager outlined the new duties that the Bill will place on local authorities. The Bill will place additional duties on local authorities in responding to domestic abuse. Local authorities will have to identify or establish a local partnership board that will be responsible for overseeing the response to domestic abuse and the implementation of the Bill. The local authority will have to provide support and safe accommodation in the City for victims of domestic abuse and their children. The local authority will also be required to commission a robust needs assessment and report back annually to Government on progress.

The Community Safety Manager gave further details of the statutory duty for the local authority to provide safe accommodation and specifically to support all victims of domestic abuse and their children. The duty will include things like the provision of refugees and specialist rescue support, both commissioned and non-commissioned accommodation.

The Community Safety Manager commented on the support for people with protected characteristics or complex needs, in terms of the provision of face to face services and translators.

The Bill will introduce a Capacity Building Fund which is intended to help authorities meet their new responsibilities. Each tier one authority will receive £50,000 from a national budget of £6 million to prepare and conduct a needs assessment.

The expected outcome of this work will be increased engagement with key partners which will help facilitate expertise and information sharing about current local provision both commissioned and non-commissioned.

The Community Safety Manager commented on the expected outcomes of the fund.

The Community Safety Manager commented on the proposed next steps for implementing the Bill.

The panel thanked the Community Safety Manager and Domestic Abuse Specialist for their presentation. The panel welcomed the plans to map provision of commissioned and non-commissioned safe accommodation and support providers across the City.

The panel queried how the views of the victims of domestic abuse will be captured and considered during the needs assessment work, in response to concerns about the provision of support services. The Community Safety Manager responded that the needs assessment work will enable the Council to hold accommodation support providers to account for the services they have agreed to provide to victims of domestic abuse.

The panel queried the basis for the allocation of capacity building fund and how it can be used. The Community Safety Manager advised the panel that every local authority will be given £50,000 to prepare for the implementation of the Bill. The money will be used to fund the cost of the mapping and engagement work to be completed before April 2021.

The panel queried the proposed next steps to be taken in preparation. The Community Safety Manager advised the panel of the work being done with partners to prepare for the implementation. The service has identified the key partners working in the domestic abuse specialist provider sphere, for example, The Haven has been commissioned to provide services in the City.

There are plans to commission providers working either regionally or nationally to work with specific groups. The service is working with partners such as the police, courts and the health sector to make sure that as a City it is really responding to all key themes of the Bill detailed earlier. The panel queried work done to support refugees or people who have language barriers to access domestic abuse safe accommodation and the details of plans to engage with different providers in the City. The Community Safety Manager advised the panel that the service is working with frontline providers about supporting refugees with no recourse to public funds who are victims of abuse.

As part of the needs assessment mapping work the service is starting to engage with victims from different backgrounds and this information will help to better understand the victim’s journey, which will include people from the refugee and migrant communities, who may not be aware of the support services available.

The panel queried if the service is planning to work local faith organisation and make them aware of the resources available which can then be shared with the members of the community.

The Community Safety Manager reassured the panel of the work done to support different communities and to raise awareness of the issue of domestic abuse and interpersonal violence. In addition, a targeted awareness campaign is planned to reach more people within local faith communities as there is an acceptance that this an underreported crime. The Community Safety Manager added that work is being done to understand how to encourage people to firstly report domestic abuse, but also to seek support which can help them break the cycle.

The panel queried the work that will be done to capture the views of victims of domestic abuse when developing plans to protect and support them. The Community Safety Manager added that the work is at an early stage of developing conversations with frontline providers about how to best engage with victims; while recognising that it is a sensitive topic. A key part of the work will be to ensure that victims voices lead this process and they feel protected and safe.

The panel requested a report on progress to be reported to a future meeting.

The Community Safety Manager agreed to present a progress report in September 2021 when the needs assessment and service provider mapping work will have been done.

Resolved:

1.    The panel agreed to note the report.

2.    The panel endorsed the proposed next steps for implementation of the Domestic Abuse Bill as outlined in the report.

3.    The Community Safety Manager and Domestic Abuse Specialist to jointly present an update report on progress in September 2021 in meeting the new duties on local authorities as detailed in the Domestic Abuse Bill.