Supporting Victims of Domestic Abuse

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:33 pm on 28 June 2022.

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Photo of Mark Isherwood Mark Isherwood Conservative 1:33, 28 June 2022

During the passage of the Violence against Women, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Act 2015, I moved amendments calling for the national strategy to include provision of at least one perpetrator programme, noting that Choose2Change was the only then current Respect-accredited programme in Wales. Questioning your predecessor First Minister in 2016, I referred to this and stated that the then Minister, although not accepting the need to include reference to perpetrator programmes, committed the Welsh Government then to gathering further evidence on taking forward pre-custodial perpetrator programmes. I asked him what action his Government was taking to facilitate that. He responded:

'these are issues being taken forward by the ministerial advisory group and, of course, via the strategy.'

So, what specific action has your Government therefore taken since, where your second violence against women, domestic abuse and sexual violence national strategy, published last month, six years later, refers only to the Welsh Government's intention to build on the work already done in this area by increasing our collective focus on these individuals?