Domestic Abuse in the Rhondda

Part of 2. Questions to the Leader of the House and Chief Whip – in the Senedd at 2:58 pm on 18 July 2018.

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Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 2:58, 18 July 2018

Yes, I completely agree with David Melding. I was very privileged to attend the launch of the Pobl Gwent roll-out, where registered social landlords are beginning to understand their role in tackling domestic abuse and have trained their staff to recognise the signs. This includes all staff—staff going in to do maintenance work and all the rest of it—to pick up the signs. They have an immensely helpful web portal part funded by the Welsh Government, which is actually available to anyone. If you want to look at it it's very helpful, just for you to be able to sit in your car afterwards and just run through what you can and can't do, when to ask for advice, and what other questions to ask—say you've forgotten your screwdriver and go back in and ask a question, or whatever. I'm delighted to see that being rolled out, and that is very much part of our framework and training, to enable that to happen across our RSLs. Also, we are working very hard so that we have a commitment in place, for example, that if you have a secure tenancy and you have to move to another part of Wales, we honour that. We're working very hard to ensure that we have reciprocal arrangements across borders, because the systems change quite radically, but we're working hard to make sure that we have reciprocal arrangements in place for mostly women who are fleeing. It's not always women, but it's mostly women who are fleeing that kind of domestic abuse.