Domestic Abuse: Emergency Accommodation

Baroness Boycott Excerpts

Wednesday 26th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

I do not accept that at all, hence the increase in funding and the fact that we have given a guarantee that for at least the next three years, the funding will remain stable at least, allowing local authorities to plan with consistency and security, knowing what the level of funding is going to be.

[Baroness Boycott (CB)]

My Lords, it is just over 50 years since Erin Pizzey opened the first women’s refuge in Chiswick. I went there myself. At the time, about 1.5 women a week were being killed. That number has stayed remarkably consistent, despite government efforts of every stripe. If all those women in a year were killed on the same day in Trafalgar Square, there would be a national outcry. But there is a drip feed of women consistently suffering from domestic abuse, which is not taken seriously enough by the police or the authorities, and they are dying. It is truly shocking that 50 years later we have the same statistics. Are the Government building enough houses, is there enough police support and is there enough public awareness that it is not the woman’s fault?

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

The fact that it does not all happen on one day in Trafalgar Square does not make it any less of an outrage. I think every noble Lord in this House will hear the anger in the noble Baroness’s voice and, I hope, in my own voice. There is a profound commitment from across this Government to halve violence against women and girls within a decade. There are various departments engaged in this, all pulling together to try to deal with the three strands I mentioned earlier: prevention, support for victims and robust interventions against the perpetrators. We are determined to do this, and we are going to.