The Tories have failed to protect women for 12 years – today is the final straw

We are seeing the tragic consequences of inaction across the country, and this weekend we can see this is a particular problem for disabled women and girls, writes Anneliese Dodds

We urgently need to see action on this issue to protect all victims and survivors better (Getty/iStock)

This weekend, we simultaneously celebrate the International Day of Disabled People and are halfway through the UN’s Sixteen Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence, a campaign to eliminate violence against women.

For disabled women and girls, the conjunction is particularly important. The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics show that 17.5 per cent of disabled women between the ages of 16 and 59 have experienced domestic abuse, compared with 6.7 per cent of non-disabled women.

A landmark report published last week by the Domestic Abuse Commissioner for England and Wales, Nicole Jacobs, took evidence from more than 4,000 victims and survivors as well as from commissioning services across the country. Jacobs’s report suggests there is a deeply troubling postcode lottery for access to support – and that disabled women, Black, Asian and minority ethnic women, and LGBT+ women are particularly poorly provided for.

The report provides some stark analysis. Those with a learning disability, for example, are less likely to disclose abuse, to know where to get information, or to understand that they are able to report it to police. One young woman described being placed in an older people’s home to address a threat to her immediate safety, with no attempt made to contact a domestic abuse service. Often, cases are not brought to court because the survivor is either considered “unreliable” or it is judged that they would be unable to cope with the process.

This is a complex area requiring long-term solutions. The Conservative government, though, has failed to act on domestic abuse. The postcode lottery of support identified by the report is one of the results of this inaction. It reflects the wider trend in which we have seen an epidemic of violence against women in the past 12 years, with increased levels of domestic abuse, and rape convictions at a record low.

We urgently need to see action on this issue to protect all victims and survivors better, and particularly to ensure that disabled women have the right support. Labour’s Ending Violence Against Women green paper proposes a long-term, whole-system response that would provide justice and protection for survivors as well as delivering effective prevention. Our proposals would ensure that all victims of violence – including those who are subject to multiple barriers to access – are seen, supported and protected.

We’ve also committed to a package of measures to improve our criminal justice system. For example, Labour has committed to the rollout of specialist rape courts, rape investigation units in every police force, and a policy that all victims of rape and serious sexual offences should be able to have their evidence recorded and be cross-examined prior to a trial.

These measures will support disabled people to take a case of domestic abuse or rape to court and see it successfully prosecuted. A domestic violence register will ensure that disabled victims and survivors are protected properly from serial domestic abusers who may target the most vulnerable, and that those criminals are properly monitored and their offences recorded.

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The Conservatives have failed to act, and we are seeing the tragic consequences for women and girls across the country; this weekend, we can see there is a particular problem for disabled women and girls.

Yet it feels that Rishi Sunak has not even woken up to this problem – only last month he cited “events of the last year” as evidence that “actually for a while” women and girls haven’t felt as safe as they should. Anyone even taking a cursory glance at the figures, or at some of the appallingly tragic news stories we have seen, will know that this epidemic of violence is a legacy of the government’s poor record – not just over the past 12 months, but over the past 12 years.

Only the Labour Party has a clear plan for tackling the epidemic of violence against women and girls, and the political commitment to see it through.

Anneliese Dodds is the Labour MP for Oxford East and the shadow secretary of state for women and equalities