Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what training his Department provides for staff involved in dealing with strangulation and suffocation crimes.

The new offence of non-fatal strangulation, in section 70 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, comes into force early next month. There will be media communications to mark the introduction and the Government will continue to highlight the dangers that can result from strangulation and suffocation.

Regarding training, NHS England is also funding a free online training event to occur in late June which is aimed at NHS front line staff including paramedics, GP practices and A&E staff, Domestic Abuse Partnerships, non-Government offices, staff in the statutory domestic abuse and sexual assault sector, the police, prosecutors, social work, judges and magistrates, probation and psychologists. The judiciary, who are independent of Government, will – through the Judicial College – consider whether specific training and/or wider training on domestic abuse is necessary.

Building on the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, the Government has made substantial commitments in the Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan, published by the Home Office in March 2022, to better support victims of domestic abuse. Commitments include multi-year funding for victim support services which are crucial for helping victims engage in the criminal justice process. As part of this, the Ministry of Justice is bolstering support for victims by increasing its funding from £150.5m in 2021/22 to £185 million by 2024/25. This will ensure support is available to more victims and includes funding to increase the number of Independent Sexual and Domestic Violence Advisers to over 1,000, and other key services like crisis helplines. The Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan also contains a perpetrator Strategy which sets out clear commitments to prioritise addressing domestic abuse, with the aim of preventing people becoming perpetrators and victims in the first place. Additionally, through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, victims will be given more time to report domestic abuse-related assaults by extending the time limit for prosecutions to six months from a formal report to the police within an overall limit of two years from the offence.