Domestic Abuse-related Deaths: NHS Prevention

Kirith Entwistle Excerpts

Tuesday 20th January 2026 Westminster Hall

[Kirith Entwistle (Bolton North East) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir John. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Dr Opher) for securing this important debate, which has crucially focused on the important fact that prevention has to work across the NHS.

When domestic abuse escalates towards serious harm or death, what can the NHS do to stop it? For too long, we have talked about domestic abuse as if it happens outside public services—as if it starts and ends behind closed doors—but the truth is that the NHS is already in the story; it just has to connect the dots. The moment someone sits in a GP waiting room trying to keep their voice steady, the moment that someone turns up at A&E with an injury that they cannot easily explain, the moment that someone finds out they are pregnant at a maternity appointment and are terrified of going home, or wants to ask for help but cannot because their perpetrator is sat there with them—those are moments of contact with the NHS and crucial opportunities to save a life.

The NHS absolutely has a duty of care to its patients: it must not just treat injuries but respond when someone is at risk. In domestic abuse, risk is not theoretical. The most recent national figures show that there are 108 domestic homicides a year. For the first time, suspected suicides linked to domestic abuse have overtaken intimate partner homicides. That is a flashing warning light for the health service. If suicide is preventable, domestic abuse-related suicide must be treated as preventable too.

A duty of care is real only if staff are trained and equipped to carry it out. If someone reaches out in the NHS and gets silence or disbelief back, or if a note is taken but there is no action, that can be the moment that they stop asking for help. In domestic abuse, missed moments can be fatal.

For the majority of victims and survivors, health professionals are the first—sometimes the only—person they disclose to. People often assume that a victim’s first call is to the police, but the first brave step for many survivors who disclose is often telling a GP, a midwife, a nurse, a health visitor or even their pharmacist. Our healthcare system is the frontline of support for victims of domestic abuse. Tragically, too many survivors are forced to seek help again and again before the system even responds. In fact, 85% seek professional support about five times before they finally receive help.

In Bolton, we see both the challenge and one of the solutions. We operate a system called Identification and Referral to Improve Safety, a specialist training programme that links GP practices directly with domestic abuse support services. IRIS is delivered by Fortalice, a local domestic abuse charity—I am incredibly grateful to Gill and her team for their hard work. Since it began in 2014, nearly 3,000 victims have accessed support, and 274 healthcare professionals were trained in the last year alone. That training matters, because it changes what happens in the room. It helps clinicians ask safe questions, spot warning signs and act so that when someone says, or their face or demeanour tells us, that they are not safe, the response is not panic or paperwork but support. We need that consistently, because Bolton has seen what happens when the system does not join the dots.

One case that has stayed with local services is the domestic homicide review of Margaret—not her real name: an 80-year-old woman killed by her husband in 2019. While the husband was in hospital, Margaret disclosed fear and abuse and said that she did not feel safe. Those concerns were discussed in a meeting between hospital staff and social workers, yet once her husband’s physical health stabilised, he was discharged home. Days later, Margaret was dead.

If a patient can say, “I am not safe,” and the NHS cannot act, the NHS is not yet safe enough. So how do we make it consistently safe? I have three practical asks. First, we need proper and consistent domestic abuse training—not a one-off e-learning module but trauma-informed training, refreshed over time for the whole team, including reception staff, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud said, who are often the ones who see the warning signs first. The Government have said that they will launch a mandatory safeguarding and learning programme that covers domestic abuse. That is welcome, but it must be embedded in day-to-day NHS practices.

Secondly, there must be sustained funding for evidence-based pathways, such as IRIS and the specialist services that it relies on, because referral routes work only if support exists and exists safely. The Government have set out an ambition that by 2029 there will be dedicated referral services for women and girls affected by abuse in every area of England. That is exactly the direction we should be travelling in. However, those routes must cover the whole NHS.

Finally, the NHS should establish a universal codeword scheme, so that a victim can ask for support just as easily as we can at pharmacies, a bar, a pub or even a restaurant. The NHS is our frontline and it absolutely needs to be well-equipped to spot, safeguard against and deal with domestic abuse, as it should have been doing for decades.

Domestic abuse thrives in silence and isolation. The NHS can be the opposite of that: a place where someone is seen, believed and connected to safety. Bolton has shown what is possible when services work together—when we connect the dots. Now we need our NHS to match that with consistency; every week we delay, more families will be left asking the most painful question of all. They reached out for help, so why were they still not safe?