The Home Secretary said today, Monday, July 25, that £50 million in new money will be provided to communities throughout England and Wales to make the streets safer for everyone.
The funds will be distributed to police departments, local governments, the British Transport Police, and qualified community organisations in England and Wales to combat domestic violence, neighbourhood crime, and anti-social behaviour.
These initiatives will be able to increase efforts to alter attitudes and behaviours and stop these crimes from happening in the first place, as well as roll out more CCTV and street lighting in their areas.
Some of the organisations that have already received financing through earlier rounds include Northamptonshire, Humberside, and Nottinghamshire PCCs.
To deter young people from crime, the funds have been used for community outreach, home security, and programmes like football and boxing.
The Safer Street Fund has already awarded $125 million in total through four rounds of funding, including the Safety of Women at Night Fund.
Priti Patel, the home secretary, said:
It has been a year since I introduced our comprehensive strategy to end violence against women and girls, and throughout that time, I have presided over amazing efforts to aid victims, stop violence against women and girls, safeguard the public, and administer justice.
The Safer Streets Fund continues to make a difference in the safety of women and girls at the local level thanks to our vital work with specialised groups that provide real support and change for women and girls throughout our communities.
The Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) Strategy was published one year ago today.
The government has fulfilled a number of significant commitments since the strategy’s publication to support ensuring that women and girls are safe everywhere – at home, online, at work, and in public settings.
Fund for Safer Streets
The Safer Streets Fund enables law enforcement and municipal governments to fund innovative programmes for reducing crime.
The most recent round of the fund is the first to accept bids from qualified civil society organisations.
Her Centre, a London-based charity that provides free and private advocacy, counselling, advice, and training relating to domestic abuse, rape, sexual abuse, and other issues that affect women, was one of the successful bidders for this round.
Her Center has received a grant of £140,000 to help victims of sexual harassment, assault, rape, and stalking regain their confidence and lead fear-free lives.
Her Center will also utilise the grant to involve young people in discussions about understanding and responding to violence against women and girls in communities that are most affected by these issues, provide active bystander training, and seek to help prevent acts of violence against women.
Stacy Smith, the Her Center’s CEO, said:
Her Center wants to see greater emphasis placed on getting men to stop intimidating and harassing women.
We are happy that this award enables us to move forward with our efforts to inform the public about simple ways they can be active bystanders rather than simply stating that women must keep themselves safe from abusive and violent men.
These viewpoints ought to be the exception rather than the rule.
With a specific focus on assisting in the fight against violence against women and girls, Round Three of the Fund awarded £25 million to 57 projects in England and Wales.
The Safety of Women at Night Fund, a £5 million investment by the government, financed 22 projects testing new ideas to increase the safety of women in public places at night, including in the nighttime economy.
combating blatant street harassment
The government also announces the start of a focused consultation on whether there should be a new crime for public sexual harassment as it marks one year after the release of the VAWG Strategy.
If a new particular offence might assist address this issue, experts from a variety of fields, including charity, the police, the legal system, education, and transportation, are invited to express their opinions.
This comes after the VAWG Strategy’s Call for Evidence received more than 180,000 responses, the majority of which came from the general public, and it supports other efforts the government is making to address public sexual harassment, including new police guidance, upcoming new guidance for prosecutors to ensure existing laws are implemented, and the “Enough” behaviour change campaign.
preventing stalking and domestic violence
The Tackling VAWG plan makes it obvious that, in addition to helping victims, we also need to work to stop crimes before they start.
The Home Office has given Police and Crime Commissioners more than £25 million over the past two years to help expanding the availability of interventions for those who commit domestic abuse and stalking.
These interventions, which may include group or individual behaviour change programmes, seek to lessen the risk provided by offenders and hold them accountable.
The West Midlands Police and Crime Commissioner is in charge of the Early Awareness Stalking Intervention programme, which is funded by the Home Office and one of the first initiatives of its kind in England and Wales to provide rehabilitative treatment for stalkers with the goal of enhancing victim/survivor safety.
Nicky Brennan, the West Midlands Victims’ Commissioner, said:
Any form of abuse is never justified. Since it is crucial to reduce crime, the West Midlands is putting a lot of effort into early detection and prevention, especially when it comes to violence against women and girls.
This is why, with funding from the 2021 Home Office Perpetrator Fund, we collaborated with the West Midlands Police, Midlands Psychology Services, Black Country Women’s Aid, The Alice Ruggles Trust, and the University of Derby to pilot and evaluate the Early Awareness Stalking Intervention throughout the West Midlands.
Early results are encouraging, and we have already learned a lot. We anticipate a thorough study at the beginning of next year.
assisting those abused by intimate image
The Home Office boosted its funding to the Revenge Porn Helpline to £120,000 in the fiscal year 2021/2 in order to support victims of non-consensual intimate image sharing, a grave and destructive issue.
The Helpline offers confidential support and advice, works to report and remove content from the internet, offers guidance on reporting crimes to the police, and refers victims to specialists who can offer longer-term and more specialised support.
It also assists in reporting and removing content from the internet.
The Home Office is boosting this funding this fiscal year by an additional £150,000 to make sure the Helpline can continue to offer knowledgeable assistance to victims of exploitation of personal images.
Sophie Mortimer, manager of the revenge porn helpline, said:
The Tackling VAWG Strategy has placed a much-needed emphasis on offering serious aid and support to those who have been affected by violence against women and girls.
We were able to serve those impacted by intimate image abuse because to the additional money the Revenge Porn Helpline got throughout the pandemic and combined under the new plan.
The hotline encounters a wide range of difficult behaviours that necessitate the direct assistance of skilled professionals as well as the reporting and removal of private photographs published without permission.
Although this is a challenging and time-consuming task, it has so far resulted in the removal of over 260,000 unique pieces of content on behalf of close to 15,000 persons.
Supporting victims of intimate image abuse coincides with efforts to strengthen the law in this area through the Domestic Abuse Act 2021, ensuring that those who threaten to share intimate images without permission and with the intention of causing distress are held accountable and brought to justice.
The Istanbul Convention is ratified.
The ratification of the Istanbul Convention is another accomplishment announced with joy by the government.
The Council of Europe’s Convention on Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence, also known as the Istanbul Convention, was one of the commitments made by the government in the Tackling VAWG Strategy.
Since ratifying the Convention in 2012, which is regarded as the gold standard worldwide charter for the protection of women and girls, the government has sought to considerably strengthen its legal system and establish a variety of instruments to better protect victims.
Our protections against violence against women and girls are among the strongest in the world and, in certain cases, go above and beyond what is required by the Convention.
The ratification sends a clear message that the UK continues to treat violence against women and girls with the utmost seriousness, and it will support us in maintaining our position as a leader in combating these dreadful crimes.
Investigations into rapes changing
The Home Office is committed to funding Operation Soteria, a programme to change how rape investigations are handled and progress, with an emphasis on the suspect rather than the victim, after taking a long and honest look at how the entire criminal justice system deals with rape through the Rape Review.
Operation Soteria will now include 14 forces in addition to the initial five that were sent, the administration stated earlier this year.
A new national operating model for the investigation of rape cases will be based on this work and made available to all forces starting in June 2023.
The Rape Review Progress Update, which was released on June 16, contained the major conclusions from the programme to that point.
It is positive that more people are coming forward to report crimes to the police, that the police are referring more people to the CPS, and that there are more suspects being charged.
Campaign to modify behaviour
We started our extensive, multi-year “Enough” communication campaign in England and Wales in March 2022.
The campaign aims to target and challenge harmful behaviours that exist in larger society, teach young people about healthy relationships and consent, and ensure that victims can recognise abuse and receive support.
It does this through a television commercial, billboards, digital content, and a comprehensive campaign website.