My Lords, we return now to the debate we had in Committee about the role of the domestic abuse commissioner in helping all relevant agencies to learn the lessons from domestic abuse-related homicides and suicides so that we can avoid such deaths in future.
In Committee I undertook to consider further amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Burt. We agree that the commissioner has an important oversight role to play in this area, and government Amendment 14 will support it by placing a duty on those responsible for carrying out a domestic homicide review under Section 9 of the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004 to send a copy of the report of the review to the commissioner.
As I indicated in Committee, we are not persuaded that it is necessary to extend this requirement to the other homicide reviews listed in Amendment 16. Given that the bodies involved are required to engage and feed into domestic homicide reviews, we think the lessons will be captured through this process. Where necessary, the commissioner can also use her powers under Clause 15 to request relevant information from the public authorities subject to the duty to co-operate.
Amendment 12 seeks to add to the list of public authorities subject to the duty to co-operate. We agree in principle that the IOPC, the Independent Office for Police Conduct, should be added to the list. Clause 15(4) includes a power to add to the list of specified public authorities by regulations, and we propose to exercise this power in relation to the IOPC. The IOPC has come late to the party, as it were, so we consider it preferable to use the regulation-making route to allow time for the IOPC and the commissioner’s office to work through the implications for the IOPC of adding it to the list of specified public authorities.
As for the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman, I must point out that it is not a statutory agency, and therefore there are difficulties with referring to it in statute. On a more practical level, the ombudsman routinely publishes its fatal incident investigation reports, so they are accessible to the commissioner and others. That said, there is scope for discussions between the commissioner and the ombudsman about how the flow of relevant information might be improved.
As I indicated at the start of my remarks, we consider tackling domestic homicides a top priority and we intend to work closely with the commissioner on this issue. The changes being made through Amendment 14 and our commitment to add the IOPC to the list of relevant public authorities by regulations are only part of the wider programme of work taking place to tackle domestic homicides. I hope, therefore, that the noble Baroness, Lady Burt, would agree that these are important advances and that accordingly she would be content to withdraw her amendment.