EFFORTS to tackle police violence against women and girls requires “urgent improvement,” the human rights watchdog warned today ahead of International Women’s Day.
The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said there is more work for the government to do to meet targets to improve women and girls’ safety.
Last week, the inquiry into Sarah Everard’s murder by off-duty police officer Wayne Couzens found that he was a serial sexual predator who should never have been employed by the police.
Amid a series of scandals, including Ms Everard’s murder and the unmasking of another officer, David Carrick, as a serial rapist, the Metropolitan Police has faced heavy criticism for the way it deals with certain offences.
And today, Scotland’s Justice Secretary Angela Constance announced an independent, judge-led statutory public inquiry into the police response to the murder of Emma Caldwell almost 20 years ago.
Her murderer Iain Packer was only convicted last week.
The EHRC said its recommendations to help improve women and girls’ safety include the government “prioritising further action to address the prevalence of violence against women and girls perpetrated by the police.”
It backed a recommendation from the Domestic Abuse Commissioner to ensure the removal of warrant cards from officers who are under investigation for crimes relating to violence against women and girls, and statutory recognition that convictions of this nature should automatically constitute gross misconduct.
Among “areas for urgent improvement,” the EHRC also described prosecution rates for sexual offences as remaining “unacceptably low” and branded access to domestic abuse refuges “concerningly poor.”
The human rights watchdog also called on the government to commit to protecting migrant women who are victims of violence.
It said the government must withdraw its reservation to Article 59 of the Istanbul Convention, which would ensure all migrant women have access to independent residency rights in certain cases of relationship breakdown connected to domestic abuse.
The EHRC said the government’s current approach means migrant women who are victims of violence are not adequately protected, leaving some domestic abuse sufferers, and their children, “at risk of further abuse or destitution.”
EHRC chairwoman Baroness Kishwer Falkner said: “Ahead of International Women’s Day, we urge the UK and Welsh governments to look closely at our report and implement its recommendations, so we can move towards a society where women and girls feel safe going about their everyday lives.”
A Welsh government spokesperson said it shares the EHRC’s concern around support for migrant victims and has called for the Westminster government to ensure they are recognised and supported “as the Istanbul Convention intended.”
A spokesperson for the Home Office said: “We ratified the Istanbul Convention in 2022 and are committed to upholding it.”
But it declined to say it would withdraw its reservation on Article 59.
The issue of police violence against women and girls was also raised at the TUC Women’s Conference in London today, with trade union delegates calling for an end to intimate police searches.
The conference called for a commitment by the union body to co-ordinate campaigning against the movement for a complete ban of such searches on educational premises and to work with survivor-led organisations against the misuse of police powers as in the cases of Child Q and Konstancja Duff.
Speaking at the event, Dr Kat Lord Watson of the NASUWT said that the injustice against Child Q, who was strip-searched while at school, was “so profound.
“We have the right to bodily autonomy and the right to feel safe in our [educational] institutions,” she said, calling it a “betrayal of safeguarding.”
