Minutes:
7. RESTRICTED: Update on VAWG and Domestic Abuse
The East Area BCU Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) Strategy 2022-2023 has been created due to the events of the last two years brought violence perpetrated against women and girls into sharp focus, with London’s communities expecting tangible action and outcomes to tackle VAWG. Daniel Thompson proceeds to present a PowerPoint outlining what has been done to combat violence against women and girls (VAWG) locally as well as the East Area BCU VAWG strategy:
Strategic Aims:
- To make EA’s public, private and online spaces for women and girls.
- To deliver the highest possible standard of care and investigation. If that standard is not reached, police will seek to learn and continuously improve, engaging women and girls in our attempt to do so.
- To act as a focal point for VAWG- related activity and align it to a single governance structure that endangers inter-strand and intra-organisational collaboration.
- To quality assure EA’s capacity to identify, investigate and achieve prosecution of VAWG perpetrators.
- To endanger an internal culture that aligns to the organisational vison set out in STRIDE, encourages the challenging of wrong-doing and stands up to public scrutiny of our standards and behaviour.
- To engage our partners third sector VAWG organisations and women across our communities to respond collaboratively to VAWG challenges.
Data on VAWG at a local level:
- The London Borough of Barking and Dagenham (LBBD) saw 6,795 VAWG offences. 134+ or 2% on the previous reporting period (October 2020-2021).
- Out of the 6,795 offences, 66% were reported as domestic abuse.
- The sanction detection rate stands at 6.2% which has increased by 0.3% in the last reporting period (October 2020-2021).
- The highest volume of VAWG offences out of London local authority areas was Croydon with 10,570 offences, whilst the lowest volume was Richmond-upon-Thames with 2,601 offences.
- LBBD had the 17th highest volume of offences in the MPS.
- Since the strategy came into place at the start of the financial year, during Q1 & 2, there have been 3,435 VAWG offences, 66% being domestic abuse reports, with a total sanction detection rate of 5.8%, an +1.2% on the previous reporting period (October 2020-2021).
Victimology of VAWG in LBBD : Age of Victims of VAWG in LBBD:
- White: 1,007 – 44.8% - 10-17: 265
- Black: 393 – 17.5% - 18-24: 372
- Asian: 355- 15.8% - 25-29: 275
- Other: 11- 0.5% - 30-39: 677
- Unknown: 482 – 21.4%
Suspects:
- VAWG suspects were 88.6% male (164), and 11.4% female (21).
- 91 suspects (49%) were committing DA crimes.
- 66% of VAWG suspects were over the age of 30.
- In terms of ethnicity, White (52.4%) was the most prevalent suspect identity code, followed by Black (20.5%), Asian (10.3%), Mixed (4.3%), Other (1.6%) and Unknown (10.8%).
Daniel Thompson to feed all information presented into LBBD’s Strategic VAWG group. The next steps for the police are too:
- Engage more efficiently with women and girls in LBBD to help shape our response to VAWG.
- Develop a Strategy to engage effectively with men and boys in LBBD to ensure they are involved in the response.
- Continue to drive engagement with Street Safe and Walk and Talks.
- Improve our engagement with VAWG-sector organisations in LBBD.
Councillor Worby commented that she does understand the Tri-borough approach is necessary in certain aspects but raises an issue of that a Tri-borough approach could potentially remove resources from LBBD, which is statistically worse off in terms to VAWG offences, in comparison to other boroughs – causing an imbalance resource delivery.
Councillor Worby further assessed that the data provided on the ethnicity of both VAWG victims and suspects were underrepresented as there are a vast number of ethnicities residing in Barking and Dagenham, whereby many can be placed under a single ethnicity bracket. In order for the VAWG services to be efficient, a further breakdown of the ethnicities in each ethnicity category as well as exploring cultural differences would ensure targeted support.
Daniel Thompson responded that in terms of representation, some communities are generally harder to reach than others when it comes to domestic violence. The Met has introduced an initiative called GWEN (Girls, Women Engagement Network), whereby police go out into the community and deliver talks on VAWG. This has recently been commissioned for the East Area, including Barking and Dagenham. Daniel Thompson further reassured that all three of the East Tri-borough areas will be receiving equal resources in terms of Walk and Talks, positive activity initiatives and operation make safe in the night-time economy venues.
Angela D’Urso noted that GWEN should potentially be layered into the current engagement mechanisms that Barking and Dagenham already have for efficiency, instead of creating separate ones. As well as this, Angela D’Urso also highlighted that findings from the Children’s Safeguarding Partnership Practice Week is a crucial step going forward to develop expertise and knowledge on the front lines, hot spot areas and increase awareness of services that are available to support women and girls, as well as men and boys.
Andy Opie introduced that besides the VAWG Strategic Group a separate Women’s Safety Group has also been established to tackle the actuality and perception of safety for women and girls in public spaces. The LBBD enforcement team have proactively been working jointly with the police to patrol in particular hot spot areas of unsafety. There will also be some investment towards a comms campaign around womens safety – this will be shared with CSP members when a finalised plan is in place.
Councillor Ghani questioned if the Walk and Talks by police could be held at night. Daniel Thompson responded that the East Area BCU were one of the first to carry out night-time walk and talks and this was particularly received well in the night-time economy on Friday and Saturday night. There is no limit to when these walks can be carried out, it is just a matter of when the police think the public will turn up.
ACTION: Chris Lyons to share Womens Safety Comms Campaign plan to CSP members when finalised.
ACTION: Daniel Thompson to inform Chris Lyons and Andy Opie of when walk and talks take place so this can be promoted through the Womens Safety Comms Campaign.