Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

It is always a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Slough (Fiona Mactaggart) and I pay tribute to the work done by her and other Opposition Members when they were in Government. They undoubtedly made huge advances in the prosecution of people who had committed offences of domestic violence and put protection in place to enable victims of domestic violence to come forward in both the criminal jurisdiction and the family and civil jurisdiction. That protected not only those women but their children. We part company, however, on this matter as I believe that the Government have gone as far as they should in their acceptance of the definition of domestic violence and what should support any allegation of domestic violence. I do not think that it is fair simply to criticise those on the Front Bench for not understanding domestic violence, especially if it were suggested that they did not do so by virtue of the sex of the ministerial team or the Secretary of State. I am not suggesting that the hon. Member for Slough said that herself, but others have. It was interesting that in her speech she told us that the peculiarity and horror of domestic violence, which is demonstrated in the fact that women will often suffer for year after year without making any formal complaint or any complaint at all and that they suffer in silence, came as a surprise and a shock to her when she first learned of it in a conversation with two police officers. Many Members on both sides of the House have experience by virtue of their work in the health service, the criminal justice system or—I am thinking in particular of my hon. Friend the Member for Maidstone and The Weald (Mrs Grant)—as a solicitor in the family division. Unless one has had that first-hand experience, some of the appalling stories one hears beggar belief. It is difficult to accept the fact that appalling abuse can go on, year after year, unreported. It has been generally accepted across the House that we still have a long way to go. Members of this House conducted an admirable investigation into the inadequacy of our stalking laws, notwithstanding the efforts made by the previous Administration. We know that more legislation is needed to protect from stalking which is, in my opinion, not only an offence of abuse but, in effect, an offence of violence because of the psychological damage it causes. Recent events in Nottingham, which my Broxtowe constituency touches on, show that we still have police officers who, when it comes to domestic violence, simply do not get it. A woman was murdered who had repeatedly complained to the police. The real subject of this debate is whether the Government have finally got it right. I welcome the changes they have made and I am pleased and proud that they listened to what others have said. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for South Swindon (Mr Buckland) about regulations. We do not need to put all the provisions on the face of the Bill. I am more than content for the matter to be dealt with in regulations, which give us flexibility, so that if a point arises that we have not yet thought about or even discovered, it can be added to the regulations. On the question of evidence, I caution against saying that all that is needed is a simple complaint to someone, somewhere along the line. There has to be something more substantial than that. After all, that one has been abused in some way by a partner or ex-partner is a serious allegation to make. Although I do not for one moment suggest that the overwhelming majority of complaints are not properly made, it has to be said that still, in a very small number of cases, people make false allegations to advance some other dispute in which they are involved. That is why I err on the side of caution. I am pleased that the Government have accepted the point about a report to a GP, which is more than someone just saying to a GP, ““He hit me.”” There will be some reason and some visible sign of why a woman has gone to her GP. I have no difficulty with that, nor with reporting abuse to a refuge. As I think I asked the Secretary of State, why on earth would a woman go to a refuge if she had not been a victim of domestic violence? She is hardly likely to go to a refuge for a pleasant break away from home. She goes because she is undoubtedly the victim and is taking concrete measures that support her complaint. I support the Government on those measures and congratulate them. On mesothelioma, last week I made an off-the-cuff speech, even though, to be truthful, I knew little about the subject. I urged the Government to find an alternative way to sort the matter out. They have done so and I am delighted to support them on that.