Coalition economic policies have hit woman’s purses more than twice as hard as men’s wallets but now what Yvette Cooper has called a ‘blind spot’ about services to help women has taken a more sinister turn. Cuts in public spending, particularly to legal aid, local government, health and the police, together with changes to the commissioning of services, are not being audited for their cumulative impact on women’s personal safety.
Complaints and concerns are coming in daily about those changes and so Yvette has set up the Women’s Safety Commission to go out to women and women’s organisations and take evidence about what is happening on the ground, when all these changes are added together.
We have held two sessions so far and what we have heard is more worrying than I expected even against a background of the male-dominated coalition’s seeming to lack any cultural affinity with 21st century women’s issues.
They attempted to give anonymity to rape defendants when the real problem is that the trial system doesn’t give women the confidence to prosecute. Kenneth Clarke implied that ‘serious’ rape is being attacked by a stranger, when 80 per cent of cases are by partners, ex-partners or acquaintances.
He proposed 50 per cent sentence cuts for men who plead guilty when they are charged with rape, a stage of the case when the conviction rate is just 19 per cent. Not only would few defendants plead guilty with those odds but a sentence of half the current five-year tariff, would mock the suffering that can follow disempowering sexual assaults.
The government announced that victims of domestic violence will be exempted from the ban on family law legal aid, but has defined domestic violence extremely narrowly and limited the range of evidence which can prove that it has actually taken place. Research, by Refuge, shows that half of domestic violence service users will not get legal help. When parliament debated this, the minister talked about ‘false claims’ of domestic abuse, not about safeguarding the vulnerable.
Without legal aid, women will have to conduct their own court cases and, perhaps worse, so will their violent partners, who will get a state-sponsored opportunity to abuse their victim further by cross-examining her face to face. The Women’s Institute has produced a seminal paper showing the disastrous impact these measures will have on women.
New to us is what has been called ‘a fast-approaching crisis’ in accommodation for women fleeing violence. This has been raised at both our evidence sessions so far. A combination of disproportionate budget cuts and chaos in local commissioning has meant that organisations like Eaves Housing are frequently unable to source accommodation.
While this would always have happened occasionally, it now occurs several times a week. Organisations have felt forced to advise how women can minimise their risk if they have to sleep on the streets. They tell them to go to where there are people around, to accident and emergency units and even to Occupy camps. Some vulnerable women, having mustered the courage to leave home, are bound to be forced back. It is well known that separation is the most dangerous time, as perpetrators will escalate violence to regain control. Years of persuading victims that they are safe to leave because there are services in place to help them may be coming to an end.
But recent spending and legislative decisions by the government aren’t just impacting on women in abusive relationships. They have worrying implications for the safety of a much wider group of women too.
Street lights being turned off and poorer public transport affect everyone but they worry women the most. Ninety-eight out of 133 councils approached by the Times were scaling back lighting or considering doing so. While Local Government and Communities Secretary Eric Pickles called this ‘a sensible decision’ the Police Federation said that that the lighter an area is the safer it is.
With at least 10 more evidence sessions to come and statements hitting our website at a fast rate, there is much to learn, but women are keen to talk to us and express anger to us when they do. We are inquiring whether the coalition may be disproportionately damaging women’s safety in the same way that it has disproportionately damaged their finances.
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Vera Baird is a former Labour MP and solicitor-general
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