Hansard

The poet and domestic abuse survivor Christy Ann Martine wrote this:

“You can’t keep her in a cage,
clip her wings, tell her lies,
say that fragile birds
were never meant to fly.
Watch her live behind
a rusted door, latched tight,
her spirit slipping away
so you can keep her in sight.
Beautiful creatures
cannot be confined.
Her wings will grow,
she’ll find the sky.”

I will talk about that in a minute.

Around one in three women and a growing number of men become victims of abuse. We like to think that we find such behaviour completely and utterly appalling and disgusting, which we do, but some people are still too inclined to brush it under the carpet. However, we know that it is still happening—the evidence tells us that. We are better informed by statistics, but too many victims are still fearful of seeking redress. Perhaps some people—particularly, although not exclusively, the abusers—think, “Oh, well. You’ll get over the broken bones, the bruises and the smashed teeth and life’ll go on”, but we know from the committee’s evidence and evidence from other avenues that that is certainly not the case for many victims.

The question is whether we are doing enough. We need to wipe out home-based domestic violence and make it completely unacceptable. That is the culture change that my colleagues have spoken about. With the right tools in place, Scotland can become an exemplar and can really chip away at an old and outdated notion—the “It’s none of my business, pal” mentality.

That can be done through grass-roots community work. Many of the relevant organisations have been mentioned, and I would like to thank them for all the help and support that they have given me in the work that I do in co-convening, along with my colleague Claire Baker, the cross-party group on men’s violence against women and children. We have seen some improvements—in many cases, huge improvements—through the work of locally led groups, such as South Lanarkshire Women’s Aid and the Lanarkshire Rape Crisis Centre, which I have worked with, as well as the brilliant work of the STAMP—stamp out media patriarchy—project in schools.

The bill tackles one of my biggest concerns, which is coercive control, the victims of which are not aware that being isolated from friends or family, having their access to money and bank accounts restricted or having personal medical conditions revealed are domestic abuse. It needs to be a criminal offence. Such behaviour devastates human lives. Using gestures and eye contact to warn a person or control their behaviour can be undetectable to most of us, but devastating to the person who is the target of it.

The Justice Committee saw so much “compelling and persuasive evidence” of psychological abuse that it saw it as

“a real and pernicious issue, the effect of which can be every bit as harmful as any violent abuse.”

It is important to add that an increasing number of victims are young men and women in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex community. Having a same-sex partner does not protect people from abuse. Members of that community find themselves being bullied, humiliated, laughed at or rejected through psychological and coercive behaviours and the physical violence that comes with them. We must be mindful that that is happening.

In its briefing, Scottish Women’s Aid welcomed the principles behind the bill and said:

“The new law offers a policy sea change by focusing our criminal justice response on the actions of the perpetrator rather than the circumstances of the victim. By doing so, it will enable better understandings of domestic abuse and its impact on women, children, and young people in our communities, institutions, and country.”

I agree. Our present law leaves a gap that the bill will, I hope, close. It will give better protection to victims who seek redress for acts that will be criminal in law. At the moment, if someone wants to make a case, they must do so either on the ground that their physical integrity has been attacked or the ground that threatening behaviour has caused them fear and alarm.

Fundamentally, the bill carefully defines the offence of engaging in an abusive course of conduct against a partner or ex-partner. The asks that some members have made notwithstanding, it will enhance the power of the police and improve protection for victims. Here is my ask: I ask the Scottish Government to strengthen the bill when it comes to the impact on children, on which I know Scottish Women’s Aid has some proposals. I would also welcome the Government confirming that the review of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 will include consideration of that issue, and I reiterate Kezia Dugdale’s call for similar mindfulness.

I also ask the Scottish Government to be mindful in its review of short-term sentencing during the passage of the bill—I am sure that many organisations will tell the Government why they have concerns about that.

The bill presents an opportunity to break the lock of the cage that Christy Ann Martine described.