SEX & RELATIONSHIPS
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IN SOUTHAMPTON According to the Crown Prosecution Service, domestic abuse is defined as ‘any incident of controlling, coercive or threatening behaviour, violence or abuse between those aged 16 or over who are or have been intimate partners or family members, regardless of their gender or sexuality.’ Domestic abuse comes in many forms, and is a lot more complicated and widespread than the media might lead you to think. Alongside physical violence, the Government defines the following actions as domestic abuse: •
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Financial abuse (controlling your partner’s finances and preventing them from having financial independence). Sexual abuse (rape, sexual assault, revenge porn and coercing your partner into sexual acts). Psychological abuse. Emotional abuse. Coercive control (which became a criminal offence in 2015).
The National Prevalence of Domestic Abuse However, although 1,198,094 incidents of domestic abuse were recorded by the police, only 68,098 (5.68%) of these led to a successful conviction. Consequently, considering these extremely low conviction rates, is it really any surprise that so many domestic violence cases go unreported? Although the number of recorded domestic abuse incidents is just over a million, there is an estimated 2.4 million adults who live with domestic abuse. Note the discrepancy between these two figures - it suggests that approximately 1.2 million adults suffer abuse in silence, never bothering the report their struggles to the police. Indeed, domestic violence charity Refuge points to many systematic failures that contribute to the growing national prevalence of domestic abuse. Refuge themselves report that they have received cuts to 80% of their services since 2011, with some funding being cut by 50%. Furthermore, since 2010, this country has lost 17% of its specialist domestic violence units.
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What makes it worse is that as well as domestic abuse victims having less resources to turn to, the resources they have left are not doing enough. Before receiving effective help to stop the abuse, it is reported that 85% of abuse victims sought help from professionals an average of five times. To make it worse, consider this - although the police receive domestic violence-related calls every 30 seconds, only 8% of domestic abuse cases end in prosecution. Domestic Abuse in Southampton But how does Southampton come into this? Unfortunately, Hampshire is one of the worst area in the UK for domestic abuse cases. In 2017/18, Hampshire (Southampton inclusive) reported 21.9 domestic violence incidents per 1000 people. This is higher than the South East average, which reported only 20.0 cases per 1000 people. Indeed, 30% of all violent crime reported in Southampton had a domestic abuse element. Whilst 1,430 domestic abuse incidents were reported in 2010/11, there has been a steady increase over the last seven years, with the latest data showing that the number of such crimes stands at 3,031. This shows that the rate of domestic abuse cases has more than doubled in less than a decade. Furthermore, research by SafeLives shows that Southampton has an abnormally high level of ‘high risk’ domestic violence cases. ‘High risk’ refers to cases where the domestic violence victim is at risk of ‘serious harm and death’ at the hands of the abuser. In a city like Southampton, there should only be 45 high-risk cases per a population of 10,000. However, this number actually stands at 80.3 high-risk cases per a population of 10,000 again, almost double what it should be. More concerningly, 13.5% of all recorded crime in Southampton was flagged as domestic in 2018/19, which marked a 13.1% increase of such crime compared to the year before. In turn, if we look at violent crime specifically, 31.5% of all violent crime in Southampton was marked as domestic in 2018/19 - which was a 15% increase in comparison to the previous year alone. Risk Factors Statistics shows that a low income, low educational levels, a lack of education and being of a young age are all factors in people becoming domestic abuse perpetrators.
Sex & Relationships
