Jess Phillips
MP for Birmingham Yardley · Labour · United Kingdom
“I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Claire Hazelgrove). Mainly because I am a bit lazy, I rarely prepare to speak in debates, and never have copious notes. Her remarks have led where my remarks will go. I will cover the issue of coercion, which hon.”
“Then, when it came to the point that a doctor made the call and said, “Your mom is about to die,” my brother could not come back—this was about four weeks later. So it was me who was with my mom when she died—not all of her children, and not all of her grandchildren. I am eternally grateful that I was there.”
“She was doubly incontinent by this point. To give hon. Members an idea of the kind of woman my mother was, she was an absolute titan. She was like Erin Brockovich, but with a bad perm, in the 1980s. She could lay claim to being able to spot talent, because she gave a job to the current Prime Minister, who worked for her for some time.”
“She did not die in terrible pain—I recognise what my hon. Friend the Member for West Lancashire (Ashley Dalton) is saying. She was not writhing. It was not awful. However, she should have been able to choose to have her family with her. I will vote for this Bill.”
“Suicide currently outstrips homicide as the main reason for the deaths of women in cases of domestic abuse and coercive control, so what the right hon. Gentleman outlines is currently happening. Arguing for the status quo is not something I feel comfortable with.”
“It is very good to hear the Minister commit to checking whether guidance is enough. Many of us who have tried to rehouse victims of domestic abuse, even after great laws have been written into legislation in this place, will know that getting them the priority need status under the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 still takes a huge amount of advo…”
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“I have been a cynic about all protection orders, as a person who has them, and as a person who has worked with them and watched breaches not be followed up by policing. That leads to some of the issues everybody has spoken about in terms of confidence in policing. If an order is breached and no one does anything, you do not call the police the next time, and that might be the time you get murdered. So I went into it trepidatiously when we came into government. The orders are now used in both the Metropolitan police area and in Greater Manchester, and they have already started to roll out to three other police forces. The plan is absolutely to roll them out across every area—I certainly want them for the women where I live.”
“He was the prosecuting barrister in the case of Alice Ruggles—a very tragic and famous stalking case. I very much look forward to his work in respect of the legislation, which I imagine will be relatively quick. The hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam and I have spoken before about what is currently wrong with the legislation for a section 2A stalking charge. I very much hope to come back and talk about that. Domestic abuse protection orders have been hailed today in the newspapers—the photo they used of me made me realise I need to get a haircut. I cannot stress enough how I am often a bit cynical, including when we were writing domestic abuse protection orders into the law under the previous Government, who wrote nice words on goat skin.”
“To do that, the Government plan to lay out, I think at the beginning of next year, a whole-systems reform of policing. Much of that will be about violence against women and girls because, for example, for the last 10 years or however long the police have never been asked to have any performance framework on violence against women and girls. We can talk about collecting data and which metrics we will use; well, based on the last decade the starting point is zero. We will take an overarching measure from the crime survey, which has been undertaken for the first time this year. The hon. Member for Weald of Kent might know that the data on which we will measure the metric was released earlier in the year. On stalking, my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse talked about the review by Richard Wright, who I met this week.”
“As someone who has been in her position, I offer that advice. My hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse spoke clearly about the need to go beyond the criminal justice system. She and other Members, including the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Luke Taylor), mentioned the Charing Cross incidents. What can I say? It was absolutely horrifying. I do want to speak up for some, though: a female officer featured in that documentary was trying to fight for the remand of a violent offender. It is easy to forget that some brilliant people were shown in that documentary—brilliant police officers who were trying to fight for the right thing. We need to make sure that those are the people who rise to the top of the ranks in our police forces.”
“Member for Weald of Kent now—my door is always open. Not once since I have been in this role has anyone from the Opposition Front-Bench team come to talk to me about possible solutions or things we could work on together, but I absolutely send out that message. I have met with Lib Dems and Conservative Back Benchers. I feel like I see the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) more than my husband, such is our life in this place. I have met Members of every different political hue on my own side. On this we are united. The hon. Member for Weald of Kent is welcome in my office with solutions, ideas about the frontline and detail. I extend that offer with great respect, and I truly mean it. I had great relations with my counterpart before, and I never ever sought to make headlines rather than helping the frontline.”
“As others have said, we have also banned strangulation in pornography and made fundamental changes to the family court—something that many in this Chamber, including myself, campaigned for a decade to get across the line. I apologise for the delay in ensuring that every Government Department was doing absolutely everything it possibly could to get to where it needs to, but that did not stop me from cracking on with as much as I possibly could in the meantime. When I had the job of the hon. Member for Weald of Kent, sitting on the Opposition Front Bench, I spent my time, almost week in, week out, with the then safeguarding Minister—the previous Government did not call it VAWG—looking at solutions and at different places. As I said in my letter back to the hon. Member for Rutland and Stamford—and I say this to the hon.”
“We are introducing a range of measures on sex offender management and stalking through the Crime and Policing Bill. We are investing £13.1 million in a new policing centre for VAWG and public protection. We have launched the new domestic abuse protection orders—raised by a number of Members—on which the previous Government passed the legislation then did nothing for four years. We are investing nearly £20 million for frontline support to victims and in other projects, including increasing investment to organisations such as Southall Black Sisters, who have been mentioned, and specific increases to ensure that women can remain in refuge if no recourse to public funds is an issue. In 2024, we announced a funding increase of £30 million, making a total investment of £160 million for the domestic abuse safe accommodation grant.”
“Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam) asked me in the main Chamber about the hon. Member for Rutland and Stamford (Alicia Kearns) writing to me to ask when the strategy will be published. My answer is simple: it will be out imminently. About now, I am satisfied that the strategy is as good as it could possibly be. That has taken lots of detailed work across every Government Department. It is not just tokenistically saying, “Enough is enough.” But I did not need to wait for a piece of paper or something to be published on a Government website. Since I have been in this position, and since this Government have been in power, we have announced that we are providing £53 million in funding over four years to roll out the Drive project across England and Wales.”
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Stringer. First, as everybody else has done, I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Apsana Begum) who, at some personal cost to herself, always speaks up on these issues, and does so with clarity, brilliance and bravery. She always approaches the issues with solutions in mind. People across the political divide want to see solutions and to work with the Government, and that is what we should seek to do. I will go through every one of the issues raised by my hon. Friend, and then cover as many of the others as I can. I cannot promise to be completely detailed, but I can follow up with a level of detail. I suppose I should start with the criticism that has come to me around the delay to the violence against women and girls strategy. Last week, the hon.”
“The first part of the Angiolini review has already reported, and reporting on the second part is imminent. The Metropolitan police promised to follow up on the Louise Casey review. I speak to Mark Rowley many times—he is actually from Birmingham—and the Home Office is making sure that the Metropolitan police is following up on all those things. More broadly, we need to change the regime and reform police vetting and standards, and disqualify people when they commit some of these crimes. Apologies that I did not respond to everybody, but I want to give my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse her minute to wind up. I promise I will answer all questions in writing—to which everyone behind me thinks, “I wish she had not said that!””
“It is a different story across the country, so it is nice in this debate about London to be able to say that I have seen good practice undertaken in London in this regard, through the Mayor’s office working with local councils. I have seen bad practice elsewhere. We need to make sure that there is a standard in the country, no matter where someone is. It is the same for policing and for the CPS. As I said, I see the hon. Member for Strangford more than my husband; I feel like he has always been in the room. I have a special place in my heart for Northern Ireland and will continue to work with the devolved Administrations over there. Many people, including my hon. Friend the Member for Tooting (Dr Allin-Khan) very clearly, mentioned the issue of David Carrick, and other issues of trust in the Metropolitan police.”
“We cannot keep saying that this is everyone’s business and not expect employers to take part. I have to say, actually, that there is quite a lot of enthusiasm—my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes Central (Emily Darlington) said that the businesses in her area really want to take part. On the ringfences in respect of refuge accommodation, part 4 of the Domestic Abuse Act 2021 created a ringfence for housing-related statutory support. This Government have increased the amount of money in the last year by £30 million. My hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse gave a good example of it being done well in London, and some of the money being used for specialist “by and for” services. She identified the fact that we really need to bottom out where services are commissioned well and where they are not.”
“It was shared with me that in just one part of the Greater Manchester pilot—I will definitely get the colloquial thing wrong if I say which bit of Greater Manchester—there had been a 76% reduction in repeat offences just in the cohort that had been given domestic abuse protection orders. Anyone who looks at the Government’s mission and who knows anything about domestic abuse and violence against women and girls will know that we cannot halve anything unless we stop the repeat. The repeat is a massive problem, so seeing a 76% reduction in that cohort already is very good. People have spoken about employers and the need to make sure that they are included in the strategy. There was a great mention of the brilliant work done by USDAW, and organisations such as Lloyds giving staff two weeks’ paid leave. There are brilliant examples.”
“Honestly, police officers in the Met and in Greater Manchester, where I have visited them undertaking these orders, are so very grateful. Some tweaks have come out of the pilot, which is the reason for doing a pilot. Some of them are legislative, some are about resources and some are about offender management. The fundamental thing is that they allow the police to do proper, good old-fashioned policing. It means they are responding. We are not waiting on a victim to say, “This person breached it.” They are going out, talking to them and finding out if the order has been breached. I really want to see the state taking the administration off the woman.”
“Tackling violence against women and girls is a top priority for this Government, and our mission to halve violence against women and girls in a decade has begun. We will deliver a transformative cross-Government approach that is underpinned by the new strategy, which we will publish soon.”
“I thank and give special mention to my hon. Friend and to my hon. Friend the Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Dr Tidball), who have worked tirelessly since they arrived in the House to join some of us who had been trying to get the Conservatives to change the presumption of contact in domestic abuse cases for 11 years—with no success. I work closely with the Victims Minister and with the Minister for Courts and Legal Services, and we will be making sure that this matter is part of a cross-Government package of security.”
“I would be happy to speak to my hon. Friend and her constituent about that case; I have heard similar cases with regard to high-worth, powerful rapists or alleged rapists. It is vital that we undertake a proper change to how our policing and justice system works for rape victims, whether through Operation Soteria or other interventions such as the new national centre for VAWG; we need to improve the situation across the country, not just see pockets of good practice. It is going to take time, but I am more than happy to work with her on that.”
“We recognise the vital role of specialist “by and for” services in providing tailored support to victims and survivors. It has been my personal pleasure over many years to work alongside the brilliant women at Sikh Women’s Aid, who operate so furtively in our local area. I meet regularly with Imkaan, the umbrella lead for such “by and for” services, to seek solutions to exactly the problem of ensuring that there is not a postcode lottery and that everybody can have specialist support.”
“I very much look forward, no doubt, to coming to the right hon. Lady’s Committee to discuss the strategy on its publication. It is not for the Home Office to tell law enforcement exactly what the definition is in this regard—there are obviously definitions of domestic abuse and sexual violence in the law—but we will lay out clearly what we mean by “violence against women and girls”, and police operational matters will be corralled, like I say, by the new centre, which has had £13 million of investment to ensure that there is standardised practice across the country and we are all singing from the same hymn sheet.”
“I can absolutely confirm that the part of the police and crime commissioners’ role that involves commissioning local victims’ services will be brought into the new system. It will not be that that money is gone from the centre; this is about how it will be given out. I cannot say for certain that all organisations that currently have that money will have it on the basis that they currently have it, because nobody could commit to that. That is the commissioner’s job. We look forward to the violence against women and girls strategy, because there will be a huge amount on victims’ commissioning in that.”
“There is absolutely no reason why historical cases should not be brought forward and reviewed. As part of the work following on from the Casey review—certainly in cases of historical child sexual abuse—the opening of “no further action” cases has been worked on at pace through Operation Beaconport. More broadly, there are review systems, and I will send the hon. Member information about the organisations that the Home Office works with and that work alongside the police to look into the review systems that might be needed for people in cases such as hers and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Highgate (Tulip Siddiq) that have not been picked up.”
“As somebody who meets the Domestic Abuse Commissioner on a very regular basis, I cannot say that she would ever say that I did not have the enthusiasm to make this work—but perhaps I am wrong. I shall ask her what she meant by those comments. What I absolutely can say is that the strategy will come; it will be out very soon. It will be out when it is the best it can be, but we do not need to wait for a piece of paper to start our action. I will not take up too much time going through the list of about 13 things that we have already changed in the last 18 months, such as Raneem’s law or the roll-out of domestic abuse protection orders, which for four years—”
“The national inquiry into group-based child sexual exploitation and abuse will mirror the Casey audit, and therefore cover England and Wales. That said, all parts of the UK must work together to protect children and bring perpetrators to justice. We have committed to sharing relevant findings with devolved Administrations and are considering how the inquiry’s work may interact with devolved responsibilities in Scotland, including cross-area trafficking concerns.”
“I thank the hon. Gentleman—others are stating from a sedentary position that the SNP Government in Scotland have said something different. However, any information can be given to the inquiry. In the example that the hon. Gentleman gave, where people are trafficked into Scotland, that evidence can be given to the inquiry. But police, justice, education, children’s services and health are all devolved, which is different to the system in England and Wales, where just policing and justice are devolved. We have to ensure that we are working within frameworks where the recommendations can be fully taken, but we will work with all nations to make sure that the findings make things better in the future.”
“I thank the hon. Lady for raising this case with me, and I am happy to look into it in more detail. It is a fundamental principle that victims of sexual violence are entitled by law to anonymity, and breaching that anonymity is a crime. I am very interested to hear from her and to see how we can ensure that that is not happening.”
“I agree entirely with my hon. Friend, and we are working urgently to establish the inquiry. Baroness Casey is supporting that work. She and I recently met some of the people my hon. Friend is talking about, and I look forward to updating the House.”
“Tackling violence against women and girls is a top priority for this Government. We will deliver a cross-Government, transformative approach underpinned by the new strategy, which we aim to publish as soon as possible. This strategy is overseen by the violence against women and girls ministerial board, the safer streets mission board and regular stocktakes by the Prime Minister. This structure holds the Government Departments to account.”
“I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. However, there have been recent successful campaigns by British Transport police and the Rail Delivery Group, which is the rail industry-funded group representing the views of the rail industry, to encourage reporting of offences against women and girls, and we believe that some of the rise in recorded offences is because of that success and the willingness of victims to come forward and bystanders to intervene or report on a victim’s behalf. However, we are not complacent. The Department for Transport recently announced £17 million of investment to better connect CCTV at train stations. The project will enable greater real-time access for the BTP to accelerate investigations and identify offenders as quickly as possible to bring them to justice.”
“Sadly, what my hon. Friend describes is something that I think everybody in the House would recognise. We are strengthening the justice system to better support victims, and we have committed to ensuring that there are specialist rape and sexual offences teams in every police force and that police officers receive stronger training on violence against women and girls, including on coercive and controlling behaviour. We will also ban anyone with a history of violence against women and girls from joining the police force and we will increase the powers of the Victims’ Commissioner through the Victims and Courts Bill, so that they can hold criminal justice systems accountable and independently scrutinise the victims code of compliance.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for his passionate plea, and I absolutely will take up his suggestions in the meetings to which I have already referred. Tier 1 local authorities in England have a legal requirement to assess and address the need for support within safe accommodation for all domestic abuse victims. The Government have increased the funding to local authorities to £160 million this year—an uplift of £30 million from previous years—to provide further support in safe accommodation for domestic abuse survivors. The Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government has published statutory guidance, which is clear that local authorities should ensure that sufficient suitable support in safe accommodation is available to meet the needs of victims locally.”
“I absolutely do support the “Loose Women” in this regard. I was about to say that I would like to think of myself as one, but I am not sure that that would come across very well. I agree that signage in GPs’ surgeries, dentists’ waiting rooms and pubs and clubs are valuable tools to warn the public about the signs of domestic abuse, and can help to point those who are worried about a friend or family member to places where they can be helped. We as a Government must ensure that when people need to see that signage it will be there, and that is what we are doing”
“Yes, I can absolutely give the hon. Gentleman that assurance, and I would be more than happy to meet him to discuss these matters and see where we can go forward together. The delay is being caused by the fact that the work will be completely cross-governmental; we must ensure that the allocations processes, and all the things that go on in Government Departments, are as good as they possibly can be, because the National Audit Office reports about previous VAWG strategies have left a lot to be desired, and I do not want that to happen again.”
“I thank my hon. Friend and Birmingham constituency neighbour and share his real concern about a spate of what appear to be instances of racially motivated sexual violence. All I can say is that some of these cases are sub judice and charges have been laid, but I absolutely assure him that I have spoken to organisations that work on the ground with black and minoritised women to ensure that we do everything we can, along with the police and other agencies, to make sure that women where he and I live feel safe.”
“I greatly appreciate the hon. Lady’s question, and I was very proud when it was announced yesterday that this Government would make strangulation in pornography illegal in our country, because of the rising tide of its becoming acceptable. Much of that work comes from the institute that she mentioned. She must be in absolutely no doubt that there is not a Cabinet Minister in the country who is not aware of the strength of my feelings about what should be spent on violence against women and girls.”
“I have seen those cases. Domestic homicide reviews point to failures in the Child Maintenance Service that have led to the most tragic circumstances. We are working with the Department for Work and Pensions to ensure that the system that operates in our country is completely safe, but we are also working with the DWP more widely on exactly what we are doing in that Department on violence against women and girls.”
“I have handled cases myself that were not dissimilar, where a third party could not be given that information, so I absolutely understand the hon. Lady’s frustration. That area, which sits within the Home Office, is one that I scrutinise very closely, and I will gladly take away her recommendations, because, frankly, I think they are quite good ones.”
“The hon. Lady makes a very important point about how women’s health can be used in coercion, especially their fertility—on both sides of the coin: about having an abortion or not having one. She will know that, unlike her, I am positively pro-choice. However, she is absolutely right that, when we look at any changes to abortion legislation in our country, those conversations will absolutely be going on, and all safeguards will be put in place.”
“I will have to go away and check exactly what the Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones) has said regarding the people who the hon. Lady says will be released, because there are, of course, exceptions—and more exceptions than there were under her Government’s prison release scheme, because people like me and my hon. Friend had oversight of this process and cared about the women involved. It is absolutely shocking that someone from a Government who oversaw the total collapse of our prison system, where we would not have been able to arrest rapists because there were no places for them in prison, can dare to stand there and suggest that that is something that we should—it is unbelievable that she cannot recognise her own role in this.”
“The Ministry of Justice, which oversees victims funding, absolutely ringfenced those two sexual violence funds last year to ensure that they were protected. As for future funding, it would be difficult for me to stand here and guarantee anything while the comprehensive spending review is being allocated, but as someone who used to work in one of those services, I find it vanishingly unlikely that they will not be funded in the future.”
“The Minister for Women and Equalities is already wearing a pink jacket. I absolutely pay tribute to the group in my hon. Friend’s constituency. The Under-Secretary of State for Justice, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontypridd (Alex Davies-Jones), who is the Minister with responsibility for tackling violence against women and girls, will be visiting Stroud very soon and has offered to don the pink jacket on our behalf.”
“This process, contrary to the reporting, was managed not by the Home Office but by the independent child exploitation charity NWG Network. We are gathering views to ensure that the perspective of victims and survivors remains central. We must avoid delays, as were seen in the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse, and we are progressing as swiftly as thoroughness allows. Misinformation undermines this process. Allegations of intentional delay, lack of interest and a widening or dilution of the inquiry’s scope are false. The inquiry will remain laser-focused on grooming gangs, as Baroness Casey recommended.”
“The inquiry will examine safeguarding systems, accountability and intersections with ethnicity, race and culture, identifying failures and good practice. The inquiry will work alongside Operation Beaconport, a national police operation. The appointment of the chair is at a critical stage, and we hope to confirm its conclusion soon. Victims and survivors have been at the heart of the process, with trauma-informed opportunities to share their views. We have engaged with them on the chair appointment and the terms of reference, which will be shaped by the chair in public consultation with stakeholders. As has been widely reported in the media, victims and survivors are meeting prospective chairs this week—today, in fact.”
“As stated in my previous statement to the House on 2 September and in my letter to the Home Affairs Committee yesterday, the Government remain resolute in delivering Baroness Casey’s recommendations following her national audit of group-based child sexual exploitation and abuse. These crimes committed by grooming gangs are among the most horrific imaginable. Baroness Casey’s report exposed more than a decade of institutional inaction, and we are determined to ensure that such failures are never repeated. Central to our response is a statutory national inquiry under the Inquiries Act 2005. It will oversee local investigations and will have full powers to compel evidence. It will also be time-limited to three years to ensure that victims and survivors receive answers swiftly.”
“Gentleman requiring a judge, Baroness Casey said to the House in the Home Affairs Committee that she did not want a traditional judicial-led inquiry. She was explicit about that. Can anyone in the House find me an institution that did not fail these girls over the years? That includes our courts, which took children away from the grooming gang victims and which criminalised some of them. There is no institution in our country that has not failed. Today, I will meet many of the victims and get their feedback, and I will continue to progress with that in mind. I will engage with all the victims, regardless of their opinions, and I will listen to those who have been put in the media and are put in panels. I will always listen, and I will speak to all of them.”
“The right hon. Gentleman cannot have listened to my remarks at all if he is suggesting that the Government have silenced anybody. The Government have not handled the process; it has been handled by a grooming gang charity. He cited and named a victim of crime. If the right hon. Gentleman had done anywhere near the level of work that I have done, he would know that not all victims and survivors are of the same opinion. They are not one homogeneous group of people who all think the same thing, who all want the same exposure and who all want their identities known. I have spoken to Fiona Goddard many times, and I will continue that relationship with her, should that be what she wishes. Every single survivor who has been engaged with—there have been many—will have different feelings on the subject. With regard to the right hon.”
“I will not be chairing the inquiry, so I can only say to my hon. Friend that the terms of reference—I am not sure this is usual—will be consulted on in public. That is because of the issue of bad faith and the concern about transparency. The remit of the inquiry will be decided by the chair, living within those terms of reference. Having been part of various different inquiries or watched them from a distance, I know that no stone will be left unturned. Whoever chairs the inquiry will feel empowered to do what they think is best.”
“We have already done some of the work on the terms of reference with victims’ groups, but we cannot publish those—we will do that publicly, as I said—until a chair is appointed. I will not rush that, because I will take note of all the feedback I receive.”
“I thank the hon. Gentleman for both his tone and his approach. As per the Inquiries Act 2005, the terms of reference have to be set and consulted on with the chair. The chair is being decided on. I have to say, it is not taking any longer than the covid inquiry or the infected blood inquiry, which I think each took seven months from their announcement to the appointment of the chair. I do not remember huge amounts of criticism or bellyaching about that, because we wanted to get those things right. Actually, getting this right means dealing with lots of different stakeholders and victims with different views. The process has to be followed that the terms of reference go through the chair.”
“I thank my hon. Friend. I think she mischaracterises me as the fiercest of advocates because she, as a grooming victim, with a child born of rape, is the fiercest and bravest. I could cry, I feel so proud that the Government sought to get her elected. I have been campaigning for the thing she has fought for with grooming gang victims for nearly a decade. I met with Ministers of the then Government and nothing was done. [ Interruption. ] The exact thing that she has campaigned for was asked for repeatedly and nothing was done. I am incredibly proud of her, as it is because of her and this Government that today I can say that that will change.”
“Can I be completely clear? I am suggesting that I will listen completely and utterly to the feedback from the victims who were on the panel and those who still are. They are not spreading misinformation at all, but the hon. Member’s interpretation is a brilliant case in point. I will be completely honest. The conversation with Oldham is: do we not think it might be better for Oldham just to take part in a statutory inquiry? It has absolutely nothing to do with the idea that Oldham is telling me what to do. The more people on the Conservative Benches— [ Interruption. ] Oh, the hon. Member can hold up his letter and have a smug face all he likes, but the fact of the matter is that there is no council in this country that will tell the inquiry where it can and cannot go.”