Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:57 pm on 22 January 2019.
I thank the Member for that important supplementary question. She is quite right that a great deal of work has gone on across this Chamber, including putting on the statute book the Violence against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Act 2015. It has been followed up. We have trained 135,000 professionals to recognise the signs of domestic violence here in Wales so that it doesn't go unreported or unattended, and we are investing £5 million in this financial year in grants under that Act to local authorities and third sector organisations to be able to make sure that we are able to follow through on the issues that the Member has raised.
She will know that I have previously referred to the rates at which children are taken away from families here in Wales, and circumstances in which women lose their children as a result of abuse that they have suffered is clearly unacceptable as a course of action and will be part of a new focus that I want the Government to place on making sure that we do everything we can to help families through difficult periods and to help families to stay together, rather than thinking that removing children from families is always the best way of responding to difficulty and distress.