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Convicting Rapists/Protecting Victims

I beg to move,"That this House has considered the matter of the Government consultation on convicting rapists and protecting victims." I welcome the opportunity to open this debate on convicting rapists and protecting victims, which follows the publication yesterday of our response to a consultation paper of the same name. Rape is one of the most feared and most damaging crimes in our society—5 per cent. of women and 0.4 per cent. of men have been raped as adults—and it devastates the lives of victims, often some of the most vulnerable people there are. The harm caused can be severe and long-lasting, affecting the sexual, physical and mental health of the victim. It takes enormous courage for a victim of sexual violence to report such a crime and they deserve to be treated with dignity and respect, and to see justice done. Our new public service agreements will, for the first time, make it clear that tackling sexual violence must be a priority across England and Wales. Contrary to the popular view—it cannot be said too often—rape is not usually perpetrated by a stranger: a man in a mask on an isolated footpath hitting someone over the head and grievously injuring them. According to the British crime survey, 54 per cent. of rapists are current or former partners of the victim and only about 17 per cent. could be called strangers. With non-stranger rape, there is often no independent witness present and little or no forensic evidence. The Government have already made a number of changes to the law and to how police and the Crown Prosecution Service work together to try to tackle rape. In particular, we have excluded much previous sexual history evidence from trials. That used to undermine victims and make it frightening for them to countenance coming to court. We have strengthened the law on rape through the Sexual Offences Act 2003, improving the definition of consent and requiring that any belief that the complainant was consenting has to be reasonable before it can operate as a defence. We have updated the law on bad character and hearsay to ensure that all relevant evidence is considered by a jury. We are determined to take all measures necessary to improve the conviction rate in rape cases. Ministers have said many times that the conviction rate is unacceptably low. Increasing the conviction rate is vital in order not only to deliver justice for victims but to send a deterrent message to potential offenders, prevent rapists from committing further offences and secure the confidence of victims and the wider public in the criminal justice system. It is also important for the criminal justice system, as a low conviction rate can deter the application of the rigour and thoroughness that it is appropriate to apply to inquiries into serious sexual offending behaviour.