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<p>Our landmark Domestic Abuse Act 2021 is bolstering our response to domestic abuse
on every level, strengthening protections for victims whilst also ensuring perpetrators
feel the full force of the law. On 30 March this year, we went even further and published
the cross-Government Tackling Domestic Abuse Plan. The Plan seeks to transform the
whole of society’s response to prevent offending, support victims, pursue perpetrators,
and strengthen the systems and processes in place to deliver these goals.</p><p>Controlling
or coercive behaviour can persist and often increase post-separation – which is why
the Domestic Abuse Act amended the offence. This means that it will soon apply to
intimate partners, ex-partners or family members, regardless of whether the victim
and perpetrator live together. To further assist frontline agencies in identifying,
investigating and evidencing such abuse , we are updating the Controlling or Coercive
Behaviour Statutory Guidance.</p><p>In the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, the Government
also legislated for a new Domestic Abuse Protection Notice and Order, to be piloted
from Spring 2024, which will go even further in protecting victims from all forms
of domestic abuse. This includes making the order available in all courts and making
breach a criminal offence. The order will have no minimum or maximum duration and
will be able to impose electronic monitoring requirements.</p><p>The criminal justice
system’s response to domestic abuse continues to improve, and this is reflected in
the number of controlling or coercive behaviour offences that have reached a first
hearing at a magistrates’ court having increased year on year. From 2016/17– the first
year in which controlling or coercive behaviour cases reached this stage of the criminal
justice system – to 2017/18, for instance, numbers increased threefold from 309 to
960. The number has since increased to 1,403 in 2020/21.</p><p>It is vital that police
are able to effectively respond to domestic abuse, which is why controlling or coercive
behaviour is covered extensively in the Domestic Abuse Matters training for police,
with a 2020 evaluation of the programme showing a 41% increase in arrests for the
offence. To strengthen the police response to domestic abuse and controlling or coercive
behaviour, in the 2021 Domestic Abuse Plan, we committed up to £3.3m until 2025 to
support the further rollout of this training.</p>
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