Today is the UN’s International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and Girls which kicks of the annual 16 days of activism against gender based violence which goes through until International Human Rights Day on 10th December.

Every 10 minutes, a woman is killed by an intimate partner or family member.

Violence against women and girls must end.

We all have a role to play in preventing it.

More from @UN_Women on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. ⬇️ #16Days

— United Nations (@UN) November 25, 2024

The theme this year is #noexcuse. Because there is no justification, ever.

One of the good things about this Labour Government is that Jess Phillips, who has been fighting against violence against women and girls for her entire life, is now a minister and there has been a definite positive change in the tone of communications from the government and its view of the importance of these issues than we have seen in the past five years. To give Theresa May her due, she was key to getting the Domestic Abuse Bill through when she was Prime Minister.

In the Commons today, two Liberal Democrat MPs questioned Jess Phillips. Monica Harding asked about coercive control:

Today is White Ribbon Day which calls for the elimination of violence against women and girls. In parliament I asked about the assessments needed around the policing of domestic violence “Coercive control is a criminal offence but it is often overlooked”. pic.twitter.com/rlHCEysIls

— Monica Harding MP (@monicabeharding) November 25, 2024

The text is below:

As the hon. Member for Stourbridge (Cat Eccles) pointed out, coercive control is a criminal offence but it is often overlooked, despite research suggesting that it is the third highest risk factor in domestic homicide. In my surgeries in Esher and Walton, victims have told me that there is not a sufficient understanding of coercive control in police interviews, particularly when other crimes are being investigated. What assessments are being made of the effectiveness of the roll-out of the domestic abuse risk assessment—DARA—toolkit, which was introduced by the College of Policing in 2022?

Jess Phillips
A number of different risk assessment tools are used, whether DARA or Dash—the domestic abuse, stalking, harassment and honour-based violence risk assessment—which has a more historical grounding and is used more widely. I want the hon. Lady to know that it is impossible to read any domestic homicide review in our country for the past decade and not think that risk assessments, and how well they are used and operating, is something that we should look at.

Sarah Dyke also asked about the disparity between sentencing for people who take a murder weapon to a venue and those who just pick up something in their home and kill their partner:

There is a significant disparity in sentencing for murder based on whether a weapon was taken to the scene of a domestic crime or was already present. Sentences for murderers who used a weapon already available at the crime scene start 10 years lower than sentences for those who brought a weapon with them. Does the Minister agree that this disparity must be tackled?

Jess Phillips
I thank the hon. Lady and pay tribute to Julie Devey and Carole Gould, two of the parents who are fighting this campaign. A Ministry of Justice sentencing review is currently ongoing, and I know that Carole and Julie and Members here will want to feed into that.

Over the next 16 days, we’ll keep an eye on what our MPs and councillors are doing on this vital issue.

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings. You can find her on Bluesky at caronmlindsay.bsky.social