Violence against Women and Girls

This Government will treat violence against women and girls as the national emergency that it is, and later this year our new comprehensive violence against women and girls strategy will spell out how we plan to fulfil our unprecedented commitment to halve that violence. In the interim, we have announced Raneem’s law, whereby domestic abuse specialists will be embedded in 999 control rooms, and we are working with police to develop a national framework to track and target high-harm offenders. We are piloting new domestic abuse protection orders in selected areas, and we have outlined new measures to protect women against stalking and spiking.

The entire country was appalled by the terrible crime of girls being groomed by gangs of older men, and outraged by the lack of action taken by authorities to help protect those victims. It is about 10 years since these crimes first came to light. Since then we have had the Jay inquiry, which has made 20 recommendations. Will the Government commit to implementing all those recommendations, in full and at pace, to help protect future victims?

I thank the hon. Gentleman for both the tone and the sentiment of his question, and I hope that everyone in the House agrees with him. I spent the weekend in my surgery dealing with cases that are live today involving the grooming of both boys and girls by organised groups of varying sorts. It is, in fact, 15 years since the original Jay report on the events in Rotherham. As for the recommendations of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, we will work at pace with the stakeholders, including the victims and Professor Alexis Jay, to ensure that what was intended in those recommendations can happen. I will do that as quickly as it can possibly be done, but I will not do what was done by the last Government and just say, “Yeah, sure” and then leave it to chance.

North Yorkshire is the largest rural county in the country. Behind the beauty of the villages and hamlets in my constituency of Scarborough and Whitby lies an ugly truth: on average, victims in rural areas are subject to domestic abuse for 25% longer than those in urban areas and are half as likely to report it. Can the Minister reassure the House that more funding to tackle rural domestic violence is part of the Government’s strategy to halve violence against women and girls?

The strategy to halve violence against women and girls is for every single part of our country. The Government recognise that victims in rural and remote areas face particular barriers in fleeing abuse and accessing support. We are already driving forward a range of activities that will support rural victims. The Victims and Prisoners Act 2024 will require local commissioners to develop joint needs assessments for victims of domestic abuse, to identify gaps in support. I encourage all Members to engage with that process when it comes to their local area, and I will happily work with rural MPs in this House to make sure that that is the case.

Palestinian women detained in Israeli prisons face sexual assault, beatings and threats of rape and death, according to United Nations reports. Given our commitment to tackling violence against women and girls, what discussions is the Minister having with Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office colleagues about the implications of the gender-based violence faced by Palestinians, particularly as Israel continues to deny access to detention sites?

I thank my hon. Friend for his question. My FCDO colleagues sit on the violence against women and girls sub-group for the mission, and I have every faith that they take the issues that he talks about incredibly seriously. We have to protect women the world over.

A consistent finding of the serious case reviews into child sexual exploitation is that the authorities have turned a blind eye in cases where they believe that a child, often as young as 13, is in a consensual sexual relationship with an older man. Of course, regardless of whether the girl believes that she has given consent or not, the adult is committing a criminal offence. Does the Minister agree that one way we might stop the next child rape gang is by insisting that, in all cases, adults who have sex with children are investigated and prosecuted?

Absolutely. From my years of working on the frontline, I know that the boyfriend model of consent to get young people into these groups is undoubtedly one of the most common in that field. I absolutely agree that in any case where any adult has sex with any child, they should be investigated, charged and convicted. A fundamental part of our violence against women and girls strategy is about prevention and working with young people, who are a growing cohort of both abusers and victims in this space, to ensure that we are acting to prevent and not just to protect.

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

When it comes to keeping children, especially girls, safe from violence and abuse, there has been a lot of talk about inquiries over the last week; indeed, some comments have been more constructive than others. Inquiries can be a powerful tool for uncovering the truth about injustice, but they only reach their full potential when there is a duty of candour that requires public officials and authorities to co-operate fully. The Government have committed to bringing that duty into force, so can the Minister and her colleagues commit to a timeline for introducing the Hillsborough law to Parliament?

The number of national public inquires that we have had—for example, into Hillsborough, for which nobody has been held accountable—shows the importance of the Hillsborough law and the duty of candour. Obviously, we committed to it in our manifesto, and it will absolutely be introduced by this Government. We will keep in touch about the timeline for that.