Labour says that it’s putting tackling gender-based violence at the very top of its agenda as it’s published a Green Paper on crime, after the Government’s own Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill and last week’s Queen’s Speech.
As Labour says, this is an unusual move for an Opposition party. Labour says that it would make misogyny a hate crime, toughen sentences for perpetrators of rape and stalking, create new specific offences for street sexual harassment and the practice of landlords asking for sex in lieu of rent, and seek to reverse low conviction rates for rape. Proposed is a cross-departmental approach to tackling misogyny that underpins the abuse women and girls face at home, in the street, at school, college and university, in the workplace, and online, Labour says, pointing to legislation brought in by the Labour devolved government in Wales.
New proposals include new custodial sentences for those who name victims of rape and sexual assault; a survivor support package for victims in the courts, including legal help, and training for professionals; training for teachers to help identify, respond to and support child victims of domestic abuse; and criminal sanctions for tech executives who do not act fast enough to remove misogynistic abuse on their platforms.
David Lammy, Labour’s Shadow Justice Secretary, said: “The Conservatives are failing to protect women and girls from violent criminals, which should be one of the first duties of any government. With record low conviction rates for perpetrators of sexual violence and an epidemic of misogyny that makes women and girls feel unsafe, this Government is treating victims of violence as an after-thought.”
PCC elections
At the May 7 elections for police and crime commissioners, Labour lost ground; while it holds three of the four PCC posts in Wales (Plaid Cymru holds the other) and runs policing in London and Manchester and West Yorkshire through the elected mayors, and held the PCC positions in the metropolitan force areas of Northumbria (Newcastle) and South Yorkshire (Sheffield), and West Midlands (Birmingham), otherwise England PCCs are all Conservative, with gains from Labour and the last independents, first elected at the first PCC elections in 2012.
Meanwhile the former Northumbria Labour PCC now The Victims’ Commissioner for England and Wales, Dame Vera Baird QC, has raised a concern that the proportion of victims dropping out of prosecutions has significantly increased over five years – more than doubling across certain crime types. She said: “This raises a lot of questions. Why are we seeing such high levels of victim attrition? Is there a sense of no action from the police? Is there a sense that the CPS won’t charge? We don’t have the granularity of data to be sure. But it’s clear that this trajectory is no good for anyone and this cannot carry on – we must get to the bottom of this.”
