By Bill Heaney
Keeping women safe from husbands who have abused them is one of the priorities of the Scottish Government, the Minister for Victims and Community Safety Siobhan Brown, told parliament this week.
Ms Brown told MSPs: “We are investing record levels of funding to support victims through a range of front-line specialist services.
“Our victim centred approach fund will provide £48 million to 23 organisations between 2022 and 2025, including £18.5 million for specialist advocacy support for survivors of gender-based violence.
“Of the annual £19 million in the delivering equally safe fund, £7,719,700 is provided to women’s aid groups, and we will help to fund the domestic abuse and forced marriage helpline to offer free confidential support.
West Dunbartonshire Council formed its own committee on domestic abuse matters, but there have been no recent reports of the progress they are making.
“Fourteen organisations, including Victim Support Scotland and women’s aid organisations, have also shared more than £1.3 million of grant funding from the victim surcharge fund to provide practical help to people who are impacted by domestic abuse.”
SNP member Collette Stevenson asked for details of the discussions which have taken place with the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, Police Scotland and third sector organisations such as Scottish Women’s Aid, about whether a trauma-informed approach, particularly in domestic abuse cases, could include ensuring that survivors have a single key point of contact in order to minimise the need for them to repeat and relive certain time periods through the process from reporting domestic abuse to a sentence being served?
She also asked the Minister to make it possible for people to find out about prior domestic abuse convictions of a partner?
Siobhan Brown told her: “The cabinet secretary is currently taking through Parliament the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill, which will put victims and witnesses at the heart of the justice system, and will include their need for a trauma-informed approach.
“The victims task force has commissioned work to explore models of a victim-centred approach to justice, with the goal of providing a single point of contact for delivery of criminal justice services.
“In relation to domestic abuse convictions, the disclosure scheme for domestic abuse Scotland enables individuals to obtain, from Police Scotland, information on previous convictions for offences related to domestic abuse, information that might not have led to a domestic abuse conviction, and information on any other convictions linked to coercive control or on patterns of potentially abusive behaviour being displayed.
Minister Siobhan Brown, Neil Bibby , Labour MSP, Minister Angela Constance and Tory Pam Gosal.
“The power to share or to disclose that information is considered case by case by Police Scotland, which uses a three-point test—whether disclosure is lawful, necessary and proportionate. That is about disclosure to the applicant being necessary to protect the individual from being the victim of domestic abuse.”
West Scotland Tory MSP Pam Gosal said her proposed domestic abuse prevention bill would offer more support to domestic abuse victims. I hope that the Government will soon come on board and support my proposal.
In light of the recent news that domestic abuse victims in the rest of the United Kingdom will be able to receive cash payments of £2,500 in order to leave a violent home, will the Scottish Government expand its leavers fund to cover all of Scotland?”
Siobhan Brown claimed: “At the moment, Scotland is leading with a £500,000 pilot of its fund to leave. The pilot is being supported across local authorities to help women to flee domestic abuse situations.”
Labour’s Katy Clark said domestic abuse courts have been operating in some sheriff courts and inquired about the success of them.
The Minister indicated that the expansion to Glasgow of the domestic abuse courts would mean that many more victims and witnesses will benefit from cases being resolved at an early stage, and from the reduction in unnecessary citations and hearings.
She added: “As Katy Clark knows, a pilot court has already demonstrated a significant reduction in the volume of witness citations being issued. It is an on-going pilot.”
Labour’s Neil Bibby asked for a response is to the BBC Scotland “Disclosure” programme, “Surviving Domestic Abuse”, which was broadcast on 11 March.
Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Home Affairs Angela Constance told her: “Domestic abuse is abhorrent. The documentary showed that it is vital that perpetrators are held to account and brought to justice, and that support services can be accessed.
“This month we announced funding of £2 million to Rape Crisis Scotland and Scottish Women’s Aid to reduce waiting lists for women who need support services.
“That is in addition to £19 million of annual funding from delivering equally safe fund, which has supported 121 projects from 112 organisations since October 2021.
“Almost 32,000 people benefited in the first year of delivering equally safe. Of course, we want to stop abuse taking place in the first place, which is why we all have a role to play in tackling the deep-rooted sexism and misogyny that is inherent in the perpetrating of violence against women and girls.“
Neil Bibby agreed and added: “The harrowing documentary showed the story of seven women in Scotland who had suffered years of abuse from their ex-partners.
“I have been in contact with one of those women, whose ex-husband not only abused and raped her for 27 years but abused their son.
“In a joint statement—and in the documentary—all the victims raised the unfairness of plea bargains being offered to the attackers without the victims being notified.
“Six of the women said that their abusers had breached their bail conditions, yet no action was taken.
“Those brave women deserve a system that protects them once they make the agonising decision to contact the police, yet they feel let down.”
He asked Ms Constance to meet the women involved in the documentary, so that the Scottish Government can ensure that the system works better for domestic abuse survivors?
Angela Constance agreed to meet the women and added: “Mr Bibby is right to describe the programme as harrowing. I watched it myself, and I put on record the bravery of all the women involved, who had the courage to convey their personal testimony on the programme.
“It was an informative and a hard watch, which will motivate all of us to do more to protect women and girls.”
Angela Constance said: “Despite how it has been reported, Police Scotland has confirmed that it responded to a freedom of information request with detail of the instances in which some detail of a registered name has been changed.
“To be clear, that is not the same as individuals having changed their name, and could include, for example, a new email address or the issuing of a gym card bearing a name. Therefore, the actual number of individuals identifying under a new name is lower than the reported figures.
“The Scottish Government takes the safety of the public very seriously. Sex offender notification requirements apply to an individual, irrespective of what name they use, and multi-agency public protection arrangements documentation includes the recording of any aliases.
“Sex offenders must inform the police of a name change within three days, and failure to notify such a change can result in a prison sentence.”
But Sue Webber told her: “Recent reports have raised concerns about the ability of sex offenders to change their name, whatever the numbers may be—one is bad.
“The loophole in the legal system allows dangerous criminals to hide in plain sight, and we know of instances in which it has allowed dangerous sex offenders to change their name and subsequently target new victims, who have no way of knowing their new identity.”
She asked the Scottish Government to consider “closing that loophole in the interest of public safety”.
Looking at Pam Gosal, I was wondering – Do the welsh politicians, or even any welsh workers turn up for professional work in full national costume ?
Sorry. that is my fault. MS Gosal does not. That’s an old picture. I’ll look for a different picture when I get back to my desk.