Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 17 March 2021
I am delighted to take part in today’s incredibly important stage 3 debate—all the more so because improving support for survivors of domestic abuse is a subject that I care very much about.
Since I was elected, it has been an honour to work with and to learn from two brilliant community organisations: Waves (Women Against Violent Environments) and the Daisy Project in Castlemilk, which do so much to support survivors of domestic abuse and male violence. It is sadly but undoubtedly the case that domestic abuse and violence are happening in every community in the country. The situation has been exacerbated by the pandemic. Local groups such as the two that I just mentioned will never be more important than they are now.
A truly damning statistic is that the police in Scotland have in recent years recorded more than 60,000 domestic abuse incidents a year, on average. We all know that that is just the tip of a horrible and bloody manmade iceberg. We must do what we can to eradicate domestic abuse and to support the victims who are affected.
In this parliamentary session, the Government introduced a world-leading bill—it became the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018—to make psychological domestic abuse and controlling behaviour a crime. Scotland is one of only a handful of countries in the world that have introduced a dedicated bill that covers not just physical behaviour but other forms of abusive behaviour that could not easily be prosecuted under the previous criminal law. The bill builds on that important work by providing additional protections for people who are at risk of domestic abuse, particularly when the person is living with their abuser.
In 2019, I held a round-table event in the Parliament and secured a members’ business debate shortly afterwards on financial abuse and how it should be recognised as coercive and controlling behaviour. It was clear from our discussions that domestic abuse perpetrators are very often the main claimant on benefit claims and the main signatory on car finance and mortgages, which leaves the person whom they are abusing having to rely on them. It is hard enough for women—of course, survivors are overwhelmingly women—to leave an abusive relationship through fear for their or their children’s safety, and worry about other issues such as their housing situation adds to the feeling of helplessness and fear.
It is clear that survivors should not be made to suffer more after having had the courage to take action about their abuse. The perpetrators should be held accountable and should be the ones who are removed from the house. The likelihood is that the bill will provide courts with a new power to do just that, through the domestic abuse protection order.
The bill also contains important provisions for social landlords and their tenants. I have read the submission by the Glasgow and West of Scotland Forum of Housing Associations, which made an extremely important point. It wrote that
“It has long been a source of extreme frustration for social landlords, and of course for people on the receiving end of domestic abuse, that the law does not allow one of two joint tenants to be evicted alone.”
It therefore warmly welcomed the tenancy-related measures in the bill, including
“Recovery of possession of the house, in the case of a perpetrator who is a sole tenant, with the intention to then create a new tenancy in the name of the abused person”
That provision will prevent a victim from becoming homeless by enabling them to remain in the family home, if that is what they desire. I agree with Scottish Women’s Aid, which said that the bill as a whole could make an immediate and significant difference for women and children who are experiencing domestic abuse.
It is fitting that my last speech of the session is on this subject. If I have the privilege of being returned, supporting women and working to eradicate violence against women and girls will be at the top of my agenda.
During a time when the Scottish Parliament is under attack, it is good to be able to remind everyone of what has been achieved in just the past seven days. Last week, we passed the Redress for Survivors (Historical Child Abuse in Care) (Scotland) Bill, yesterday we passed the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Incorporation) (Scotland) Bill and today, we will pass this fabulous piece of legislation. The Parliament can be proud of the work that it consistently does—in particular, what it has done to support survivors of domestic abuse. We should all back the bill whole-heartedly at decision time.