Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, when she plans to ratify the Istanbul Convention.

This Government remains committed to tackling violence against women and girls, and to ratifying the Istanbul Convention. In most respects, the measures already in place in the UK to protect women and girls from violence comply with or go further than the Convention requires.

Further amendments to domestic law, to take extra-territorial jurisdiction over a range of offences, are necessary before the Convention can be ratified. We will seek to legislate when the approach to implementing the extra-territorial jurisdiction requirements in England and Wales is agreed and Parliamentary time allows.