Communities and Culture Committee

Scrutiny Enquiry : Domestic Abuse

Response from Brecknock Women’s Aid Ltd

Brecknock Women’s Aid Ltd
Registered Office: 2 Wheat Street, Brecon, Powys, LD3 7DG
Registered in Wales

28^th April 2008

Brecknock Women’s Aid welcomes The Communities and Culture Committee of the National Assembly for Wales Inquiry into Domestic Violence. Brecknock Women’s Aid is a charitable organisation, established in 1987, and has two bases within the rural communities of Brecon and Ystradgynlais in Powys.

We are listing below the issues that currently impact on our service delivery, as an agency supporting survivors of domestic abuse by the provision of refuge accommodation as well as floating support and outreach services within the community:

Need for Domestic Violence to be recognised as largely a gender based crime within Wales and the United Kingdom and for this to be made clear within the framework of a common definition
Need for secure, long term core funding, including funding for Children’s Workers, for victims of Domestic Abuse
Need to consider funding the provision of support services for women survivors of Domestic Abuse, and their children, from all areas of the welfare system i.e. social services, health, education and housing, for a truly holistic approach. At present funding is primarily from the housing section of WAG and consequently all support has to be shown to be housing related
Concern that the Supporting People Commissioning Consultation Exercise, that is being carried out in Wales, will result in rural parts of the country losing SP grants and services becoming centralised
Need for more Specialist Domestic Violence Courts in Wales
Lack of suitable move-on accommodation for women in refuge
Difficulty proving women are unintentionally homeless as a result of domestic abuse. Housing department regularly request 'proof’ in the form of physical injuries or evidence that the police attended an incident
Lack of funding for women with No Recourse to Public Funds
Need for mandatory Domestic Abuse training within all Statutory Agencies
Need for education and awareness raising within school and youth services
Need for specialist refuges (for example for women with mental health and/or drug and alcohol abuse support needs)
Lack of core funding to provide counselling for survivors of domestic abuse, including children
Lack of recognition within the family court system that contact with abusive fathers is not necessarily in a child’s best interests
Lack of perpetrator programmes for men who wish to change, but have not been convicted of a crime and so not able to access support via probation and the courts
Lack of core funding to provide 'Drop- In’ Support Groups. Please see attached sheet evidencing the need for this as demonstrated by our recent pilot event
These issues are covered at length in Welsh Women’s Aid’s response to the Inquiry. Welsh Women’s Aid is the umbrella organisation for Women’s Aid within Wales in addition to being our organisation’s Accredited Service Provider for SPRG funding from WAG. We request that you give careful consideration to their comments and suggestions.

Brecknock Women’s Aid welcomes the opportunity to give evidence directly to the Inquiry if required to do so.

Melanie Sharman
Floating Support Worker
Brecknock Women’s Aid - Supporting Survivors of Domestic Abuse