On Thursday 21 May, the Lords Domestic Abuse Act
2021 Committee will hear from two panels of witnesses in sessions
that focus on various aspects of domestic abuse. These include
economic abuse, faith/spiritual abuse and tech abuse in the first
session and honour based abuse and coercive control in the second
session.
The first session will start at 10.35am and the second
session will follow at 11.40am. Both sessions will be available
to watch live or on demand at Parliament
TV or can be attended in person in
Committee Room 2, Palace
of Westminster.
Giving evidence will be:
10.35am
-
Dr Nicola Sharp-Jeffs OBE, Economic Abuse
Expert;
-
Jen Reed, Head of Policy, Gender and Tech
Research Lab, UCL; and
-
Professor Lisa Oakley, Professor of
Safeguarding and Knowledge Exchange, University of Chester.
11.40am
-
Natasha Rattu, Karma Nirvana; and
-
Dr Cassandra Wiener, Reader in Law at City
University of London.
Questions will include:
- Please provide a short definition of the area of abuse you
specialize in and outline how it manifests in cases of domestic
abuse? How is this type of abuse perpetrated and what harm does
it cause to survivors?
- How effectively does the Act's definition of abusive
behaviour capture the type of abuse you are expert in?
- How well does the definition in the Act of how people are
‘personally connected' cover different forms of domestic abuse?
What impact does the definition of ‘personally connected' have in
practice for the type of abuse you are expert in?
- How is the statutory definition of domestic abuse used by
frontline workers or agencies working in relation to domestic
abuse, such as the police, courts, local authorities, and
community service providers?
- What changes would you make, if any, to the statutory
definition set out in the Act?
