Reports Of Coercive Control Offences Have Nearly Doubled In The Last Year

The number of recorded coercive control offences has doubled in the last year, new research has found. Counterintuitively, the massive increase is in some ways a good thing. While the numbers are horrifying, they represent an increase in recording the offences by police and increased reporting by victims.

The research, released by the Office of National Statistics (ONS) from the 2018/19 report into domestic abuse in England and Wales, found that there were 9,053 recorded incidents in the year ending March 2018. By March 2019, this had risen to 17,616. Legislation on coercive control in domestic abuse relationships came into force in December 2015.

‘It is encouraging that the coercive control legislation is being used more and that recorded incidents have almost doubled,’ Adina Claire, acting co-chief executive of Women’s Aid said in a statement. ‘However, domestic abuse remains at epidemic levels, with an estimated 1.6 million women experiencing domestic abuse last year alone.

‘Despite this, police are making fewer referrals to the CPS and there has been a decrease in the proportion of female victims reporting domestic abuse to the police,’ she continued. ‘What these statistics show is that, while domestic abuse can happen to anyone, women experience the most severe and repeated forms of abuse.

According to the statistics, 84% of homicide victims killed by a current or former partner are female, which Claire says, ‘shows why specialist refuge services for women, including expert services for BME women, have to exist.’ The statistics also show that three women a fortnight are killed by a male partner or ex-partner.

Of the domestic abuse prosecutions taken forward by the CPS, over three-quarters were successful in securing a conviction in the year ending 2019 – showing no improvement from last year’s similar statistic.

But the most jarring statistics is the overall number of women that experienced domestic abuse from March 2018-2019: an estimated 1.6 million, of those aged 16 to 74.

And yet, with a general election incoming, we have barely seen domestic abuse mentioned by the three major parties on the campaign trail. It’s about time women’s lives were made a priority.

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