Women’s Aid responds to new Ministry of Justice reforms

Farah Nazeer, Chief Executive of Women’s Aid, comments: 

“This week, the Ministry of Justice announced a range of reforms to the criminal justice system, as well as much-needed funding for victims’ services. For too long, survivors have been left to muddle through the justice system without adequate support, often without being believed, so these changes are welcome.  

The announcement that £550 million will be invested in victim support services, to be spread over three years, will provide some respite to life-saving services, which have continued delivering high-quality care and support despite a funding crisis. While we await further clarity on the critical question of what proportion of the funding will be ring-fenced for domestic abuse and sexual violence services, and while we would of course like to see further investment in the long-term, this 2% uplift is welcome given the challenging economic context that we are currently in, whilst recognising that costs have increased for many services well beyond this. 

Looking ahead and in the context of this government’s commitment to halve violence against women and girls (VAWG) in a decade, we continue to urge that  £280 million be committed annually to support these community-based support services, which provide survivors with life-saving help, when they need it most. 

This week, we also saw a number of changes introduced to tackle the backlog of court cases, which is having a detrimental impact on survivors – causing them to drop criminal proceedings due to the damaging impact the delays have on their mental health. A key element of this week’s proposal is the diversion of cases away from court and towards out of court resolutions. We are concerned that the increased responsibility of judicial discretion and on magistrates in domestic abuse cases could mean an increased risk to the safety of women and children due to inconsistent levels of domestic abuse training across judges. Coercive control is an insidious part of domestic abuse and it is vital that judges and magistrates understand its complexity, and the responsibility that they have towards survivors, women and children alike. We urge that specialist domestic abuse training be provided to all judges and magistrates to ensure that decisions are risk-assessed and survivor-focused.  

We are pleased to see further reform, including reforms recommended by the Law Commission which centre the needs of survivors over those who commit heinous crimes against them, accepted by the government. We are pleased to see that it will be enshrined in law that where previous convictions evidencing domestic abuse exist, these can be used at trial for further domestic abuse related offences. We are also pleased to see vital measures introduced to restrict the use of ‘bad character evidence’ against rape victims in court. For too long, survivors of rape have been disbelieved, questioned and undermined, while conviction rates remained stubbornly low. These changes are vital if trust in the justice system is ever to be rebuilt.”