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<p>We made forced marriage a criminal offence in 2014 to better protect victims and
send a clear message that this abhorrent practice will not be tolerated in the UK.</p><p>The
Forced Marriage Unit (FMU) (a joint FCO and Home Office Unit) leads the Government's
forced marriage policy, outreach and casework. It carries out a range of awareness
raising work, including a comprehensive programme of outreach, new e-learning for
professionals, and the launch of short film aimed at deterring potential perpetrators.
For the financial years 2014-16, the Home Office has allocated £200,000 to the FMU.</p><p>Statistics
on the number of cases of forced marriage investigated by the police are not collected
centrally. The Crown Prosecution Service’s (CPS) most recent violence against women
and girls report shows that the volume of referrals from the police to the CPS with
a forced marriage element is going up: from 67 in 2013-14, to 82 in 2014-15. In addition,
to date over 1,000 Forced Marriage Protection Orders have been issued to prevent marriages
from taking place and to assist in repatriating victims.</p><p>We are encouraged by
the first conviction secured in June last year, but there is still work to be done.
We want to see more victims having the confidence to come forward and being identified
by the police. As part of the wider work to improve the police response to so-called
‘honour’ based violence, we will continue to work with the partners to review the
implementation of the new legislation and lead efforts to tackle this barbaric crime.</p>
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