Domestic abuse is the most common form of violence against women in Scotland. Half of all women killed are killed by their partner or former partner, and it is estimated that each day in Scotland 200 children see their mothers abused. The incidence of abuse in the home is many times more prevalent than attack by a stranger, yet shame and fear prevent many women from coming forward. In this briefing, issues surrounding domestic abuse are explored together with an outline of the work of the Scottish Parliament in tackling the problem.

Domestic abuse is more than just physical violence. It can also be sexual, mental or emotional, and is based on exploiting unequal power relationships. The vast majority of domestic abuse is carried out by men against women, though it can occur in any intimate relationship. There is no typical abused woman and no typical abuser.

While major advances have been made in the way that police and the courts deal with incidents of domestic abuse, there is still more to be done. Agencies dealing with abused women have been chronically under-funded and vulnerable to local authority funding cuts.

The effects of domestic abuse on women can be very severe, including a loss of self esteem, depression, fear and anxiety. There may even be a link into criminal behaviour: a study at Cornton Vale prison found 70% of women prisoners had suffered emotional abuse within the home, while 60% had experienced physical abuse and half had been subjected to sexual abuse in a domestic environment.

Some women stay with an abusive partner because they fear no one will believe that he - who may be highly regarded within the community - is an abuser. Others have nowhere to go and put up with the abuse just to keep a roof over their head. And as MSP Lyndsay McIntosh points out, "It is hard to admit that one has made a mistake by marrying or setting up home with a man who abuses one cruelly".

Domestic violence not only affects women; it also affects families. A strong connection exists between the abuse of women and the abuse of children within the family. Figures from Scottish Women's Aid also suggest that up to 100,000 children are living in households where there is domestic abuse. 90% of children whose mother is assaulted are in the same or next room at the time of the assault.

The impact of abuse on families is devastating, both within the home and after a decision to leave. When a woman leaves her abusive relationship with her children, the only refuge may be many miles away from their local area. This can mean that children suffer the disruption not only of leaving home, but of changing schools and moving away from friends. A lack of affordable housing forces many women and their children to stay for long periods in temporary refuge accommodation. It can be extremely difficult for children to communicate to others about what is going on at home, due to fear or shame.

A key problem in tackling domestic abuse is the lack of national co-ordination. Patchy provision and a lack of consistency in standards, procedures and information have meant that the picture can differ quite dramatically from area to area. The new national strategy places the emphasis on national and local agencies working together to improve and standardise provision.

The Scottish Parliament made tackling domestic abuse a priority in its first term, and the issue has received wide cross-party support. Both the Executive and the Parliament have introduced initiatives, with an Executive funding package complemented by legislation emanating from a Parliamentary Committee – a Parliamentary first. As a result, Scotland is now only second to Canada in its per capita funding to tackle the problem. Issues surrounding domestic abuse have been debated in Parliament several times (though not been widely reported - MSPs from across the political divide have noted that the press gallery has been virtually empty whenever the subject has been debated). Measures taken include increased funding, an awareness-raising advertising campaign, legislation and the development of a national strategy.

The Executive’s ‘Behind Closed Doors’ advert, designed to raise awareness of domestic abuse, succeeded in prompting a record number of calls to Women’s Aid, but this placed a huge strain on the already over-stretched resources of agencies working in the field of domestic abuse. Many women had their hopes raised, only to find the resources were not available to help them leave their abusive partners. In Scotland, in 2000-2001, Women's Aid groups received almost 60,000 requests for help, and each year 9,000 women and their children are turned away from refuges because there are not enough places.

The issue of protection from abuse was raised on 31 August 1999 at the second meeting of the Justice 1 Committee. Maureen Macmillan (the MSP whose involvement with Women’s Aid prompted her to raise the issue) was appointed reporter on the subject and consulted with the Scottish Legal Aid Board (SLAB), Scottish Women's Aid, the Lord Advocate, the Law Society of Scotland, as well as with the relevant Ministers and officials of the Scottish Executive Justice Department and Courts Group. The Committee took oral and written evidence from the Family Law Association, the Chair of the Scottish Partnership on Domestic Abuse, the Association of Scottish Police Superintendents, the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland (ACPOS) and the Sheriffs' Association.

The resulting Protection from Abuse Bill was the first Committee Bill to be enacted by the Parliament. It closed a loophole in the 1981 Matrimonial Homes Act, which gave protection from abuse to current spouses only, excluding divorced and some cohabiting partners. While an interdict could be obtained against any person, the courts could not attach a power of arrest except where it was a matrimonial interdict. This meant that divorced spouses, cohabitants, non-cohabiting partners, other family members such as parents or grandparents, or neighbours of abusive people were not protected under the law. Unless a criminal offence had been committed, the police had no power to arrest an abuser who was in breach of interdict, or to take the person away from the scene. This despite the fact that 3/4 of women murdered by their partners are killed after leaving the relationship.

Under the provisions of the Act, which came into force in February 2002, it is no longer necessary to demonstrate any particular personal relationship to the alleged abuser. Abuse is defined broadly to encompass psychological as well as physical abuse. The court has only to judge that granting the power is necessary to protect the applicant from the risk of abuse. In the event of a suspected breach of an interdict, an arrest can be made, and the person removed from the scene.

Former Social Justice Minister Jackie Baillie concludes that the combined effect of legislation and funding "makes a real difference on the ground; we are speaking directly to women saying 'you don’t have to take that any more', and that’s working." She argues that this was a really good example of women in the Executive, in the Parliament and in Committees all working together.

"Long after I’m out of here I will look back with pride on helping put that to the top of the agenda" (Lyndsay McIntosh)

The Scottish Partnership on Domestic Abuse was set up by the Executive in 1998, to develop a national strategy to tackle domestic abuse. The Partnership saw domestic abuse as "a violation of human rights, closely linked to other forms of violence against women, having its basis in gender inequality and other forms of social exclusion. In 1999, the Domestic Abuse Service Development Fund was launched, allocating £3m of Executive funding to be matched by local authorities; an additional £2m came from Scottish Homes to provide refuges and permanent ‘move-on’ housing for victims of domestic abuse. In December the same year the second phase of the domestic abuse television and press advertising campaign was launched, along with a leaflet offering advice to domestic abuse victims, and a national domestic abuse helpline. In March 2000 the Executive announced that the helpline would continue on a permanent basis, after reaching an agreement with a telecommunications provider.

In November 2000, the Executive published the Partnership's "National Strategy to Address Domestic Abuse", with aims of prevention, protection and provision of support services for women and children. The National Strategy defined domestic abuse as including physical abuse (assault and physical attack involving a range of behaviour), sexual abuse (acts which degrade and humiliate women and are perpetrated against their will, including rape) and mental and emotional abuse (such as threats, verbal abuse, withholding money and other types of controlling behaviour such as isolation from family and friends). It is most commonly perpetrated by partners or ex-partners, although other family members may also be involved. This was accompanied by an Action Plan identifying areas for future work and a proposal for a National Group of "experts" to oversee implementation of the plan (as the Partnership was to be wound up).

In October 2002 a draft Prevention Strategy was produced, with the aim of eradicating domestic abuse, "including a clear acknowledgement that responsibility for abuse lies firmly with the perpetrator". Key elements are: public awareness raising; education; training; services for women and children; work with men who use violence; legislation; and workplace strategies. It recognises that "much of the behaviour that we call domestic violence is criminal; the relationship between the abused and the abuser should be viewed as an aggravating rather than a mitigating factor."

While the main thrust of the strategy is to address the needs of abused women and their children, the attitudes and behaviour of the abuser and the general culture are also seen as needing to be challenged, through awareness raising and education.

"The ultimate goal … is clearly to take all practicable measures towards the elimination of domestic abuse…"

The strategy contains both long and short term goals, encompassing primary and secondary prevention. "Primary prevention" refers to work aimed at preventing violence before it happens; it targets the whole population, but particularly children and young people, and is largely focussed on attitudinal and cultural changes. "Secondary prevention" targets women and children who have experienced abuse and men who use violence. This includes safety planning with women, children and young people and intervention programmes for abusive men.

Located within the human rights framework set earlier by the Partnership, the strategy also contains a recognition that abuse is committed primarily by men against women and is based on unequal power relations between the sexes in wider society. It adopts a mainstreaming approach across departments and agencies. The Executive have undertaken to resource the strategy adequately. Responsibility is placed on local authorities to address the issues, identify specific measures, ensure staff training and the resourcing of services. Public agencies including Health Boards, the Police and Communities Scotland are also to contribute to the strategy in collaboration with local authorities, to establish targets and monitor progress.

The Sexual Offences (Procedures and Evidence) Act 2002 was prompted by high profile case where a rape victim was subjected to cross-examination by her alleged attacker, The Act prevents a complainant being cross examined by the alleged rapist; and reinforces restrictions on the extent to which evidence regarding the character and sexual history of the complainer can be used in court. An accused in a rape trial now has to be represented by a lawyer throughout the proceedings. If the court is satisfied that sexual history evidence should be heard, the court will be able to take any previous sexual offence convictions into account to ensure balance.

The Act came into force on 31 October this year. Justice Minister Jim Wallace said the new law would "help prevent the most traumatic and unjustifiable forms of questioning that victims have had to endure in the past … The aim of this legislation was to reduce some of the "fear factor" that deters many victims from coming forward.".

The Criminal Justice Bill which is currently before Parliament also contains elements relating to harassment and sexual offences. The Bill would bring the approach to certain sexual offences into line with the requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights, and will implement recommendations of the Expert Panel on Sex Offending (set up in 1998 to advise the Scottish Ministers on relevant issues relating to sex offenders). Proposals included in the Bill are the creation of a specific power of arrest for the breach of a non-harassment order; the increase of penalties for sexual offences, allowing an extended sentence to be imposed for the crime of abduction, and enabling certain sexual offences committed abroad to be tried at sheriff court level.

In the wake of the Scottish Crime Survey 2000 which suggested that 1 in 3 incidents of domestic abuse were against men (against police figures of less than 1 in 13), the Scottish Executive commissioned research on the subject. The study, Domestic Abuse Against Men in Scotland (2000) found that the 1 in 3 figure was overstated. Male victims of abuse were less likely to suffer repeated assaults and the abuse was typically less severe, while some men who reported being abused were also assailants and did not define themselves as victims. The researchers concluded there was little evidence for a need for an agency dealing specifically with male victims of abuse, or for refuges for men, although greater support regarding welfare and housing would be beneficial.

Because funding applications are made by individual groups to their local authorities, there is not a uniform picture across Scotland; some groups have received substantial increases in funding, while others failed to benefit. A Refuge Provision Working Group is currently looking at ways to ensure adequate provision, introduce national quality standards and training, and collate national figures on refuge places. Scottish Women’s Aid will be producing a publication detailing the latest information on 25 November, which should provide an update on what has happened since the £8m funding was announced in 1999.

Recent figures showed a 5% rise in reported incidents of domestic abuse last year; Social Justice Minister Margaret Curran claimed that the increase was due to victims feeling more confident that they will be taken seriously. She added; "We have committed £23m over the four years to build new refuges, develop services and to implement the National Strategy on domestic abuse. We will continue to work with the police, women’s groups, health and education authorities to eradicate domestic abuse from Scottish society."

Louise Johnson from Scottish Women's Aid commented: "We are not surprised at the increase in police statistics as this mirrors an increase in our own figures and is, in part, due to our own work and increased public awareness resulting from the Executive's advertising campaign. We acknowledge both the Executive and the Scottish Parliament's commitment to the eradication of domestic abuse and their continued support of our work in this area. However, there is still a long way to go toward protecting women, children and young people."

The work of the Scottish Executive has been bolstered by initiatives taken by other bodies, often at local level. The police now take domestic incidents much more seriously. Where evidence is not available to warrant an immediate arrest, the alleged offender can be detained under the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995, allowing time for more investigation and multi-agency support to be obtained for the victim. The victim is also now notified of bail conditions.

The Executive set tackling domestic abuse as a national priority, alongside health and education. What makes action against abuse more problematic, however, is that there is no obvious ‘lead’ department.

The National Strategy rejects the inevitability of domestic abuse. By targeting people's attitudes, including those of children, it seeks a culture change where domestic abuse becomes a thing of the past. The strategy is clearly still in its infancy and there is a long way to go until its ultimate goal is realised. If we are to move away from a situation where 20% of women in Scotland experience abuse in the home, often witnessed by their children, we need to see this kind of abuse as more than a series of individual cases. The abuser and the abused are not the only people involved.

Economic disadvantage, social stigma, commitment to the sanctity of marriage vows and family ties can all combine to make it extremely difficult for women to leave abusive relationships. Kathy Galloway told the recent Scottish Conference on Domestic Abuse that the Church can be complicit in the conspiracy of silence which surrounds domestic abuse; by being seen to shun abused women who leave their marriages, churches can send out the message that they are effectively condoning violence within marriage.

Any faith-based approach to domestic abuse must surely start from the recognition that churches have too often been complicit in ignoring abuse, and even in seeking to justify it theologically. "Zero tolerance" sounds (and is) a difficult concept for Christians to adopt, but we cannot forget the background legacy of condoning abusive violence.

The recent ecumenical conference initiated by the Catholic Commission on Social Care showed a clear commitment to move beyond such attitudes, recognising the pain they have caused women and the damage done to families and to the church. As well as sharing a determination to ensure proper legal safeguards, effective prevention strategies and adequate support provision, we may want to ask deeper questions about the roots of abuse. Preventing abuse will demand a serious look at patterns of family and personal relationships.

A gathering on Thursday 5 December at 10.30am at the SCPO will explore some of these issues in the context of discussing the draft prevention strategy consultation (with a presentation from the civil service team); please let SCPO know

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