Only one in three women fleeing domestic abuse can be helped by refuges, the chief executive of Women’s Aid has said, warning that the sector’s services are on the brink of collapse.
Giving evidence to the Commons Public Accounts Committee, Farah Nazeer warned that she has seen more services close – or sit on the brink of closure – in the last 7 months than she has in the previous four years.
“We are in a real state of crisis and we are now at a point where we have a 65 per cent refusal rate into refuges, and a 50 per cent refusal rate into community based services”, she said.
“You have survivors desperate to access services, and people don’t go to services as a first resort, they go as a last resort - so they are at a point of crisis generally and [these services] are saying no.
“So, in the current equation, we have no way of even beginning to address this issue.”
The warnings come after construction began on two safe houses for survivors of domestic abuse and their children, which are being built as a result of The Independent’s hugely successful Brick by Brick campaign.
The campaign, in partnership with Refuge, raised more than £500,000 in total and the two safe houses are expected to be completed by spring.
Explaining the problem facing services, Ms Nazeer said: “Demand is as high as it ever was. Demand has become more complex since Covid - people have lived in circumstances that are very challenging for longer period of times.”
Meanwhile, funding has become more volatile, meaning that services are “haemorrhaging very experienced staff”, she said.
Giving evidence alongside Ms Nazeer, Nicole Jacobs, the domestic abuse commissioner for England and Wales, warned that “we haven’t touched the sides of what we need to do” when it comes to tackling violence against women and girls.
While Ms Jacobs said she doesn’t want to ignore the “strides that have been made” in this area, she added: “The fact is, we still have some very chronic fundamental problems that have been left unaddressed.”
The deep concerns come as Lib Dem home affairs spokesman Josh Babarinde continued to push for a new law specifically making domestic abuse a crime.
Currently domestic abuse is only covered by other crimes, such as assault or grievous bodily harm.
Mr Babarinde used an adjournment speech in parliament to push for a specific law to be created as part of the Crime and Policing Bill going through parliament.
It comes after ministers admitted they have no idea how many people guilty of domestic abuse are in Britain’s jails. A number were allowed out early as a result of measures taken to tackle overcrowding.
Mr Babarinde told The Independent: “It is extraordinary that it is impossible to say how many people in prison are guilty of domestic abuse. How on earth can the government commit to halving violence against women and girls over the next decade (a very good aim) if the MoJ isn’t even measuring domestic abuse?
“And how can we know what interventions are successful at reducing reoffending among domestic abusers if the government is not able to measure their reoffending rate? It is a scandal.”
A government spokesperson said: "We are determined to halve violence against women and girls in a decade which is why we have given police across England and Wales a £1 billion boost to restore neighbourhood policing, in addition to confirming over £190 million in support for the next financial year for a range of organisations supporting victims of crime.
“We will not stop until we have a system that protects victims, supports their journey to justice and holds perpetrators to account. We are committed to supporting organisations that help victims of crime, building on our activity over the last six months, to better protect victims and pursue perpetrators.
“This includes launching new domestic abuse protection orders, starting the roll-out of domestic abuse specialists in 999 control rooms, strengthening the police response to spiking and stalking, and pioneering a truly cross government approach to tackling these issues.”
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