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Violence against Women and Children

My Lords, I am delighted that my noble friend Lady Gale has secured this debate, which, in her usual fashion, she introduced with such passion, to be followed by such diverse contributions. As has been said, there have been positive initiatives to support women who are victims of violence. I have seen in the press recently that steps have been taken to make local authorities provide services. It was a shock to me to learn that one in four local authorities offers no specialised services for women who are victims. Important though such services are, however, today I shall discuss what might cause violence against women and children—indeed, against people in general—and what might be done to prevent or diminish its incidence. A great deal of research and literature from psychologists and psychiatrists examines violent behaviour. Many have discussed the differences between aggression and violence and the spectrum between the two. For me, violence is an exaggerated form of aggression that will involve cruelty, torture and extreme power differences and may be rooted in sexual insecurity. Other noble Lords have referred to this kind of violence already. The psychiatrist Felicity de Zulueta says that violence is an extreme expression of rage due to injuries to the perpetrator at an early date. She says that it is rooted in fear, without resolution. It is about dehumanising the person to whom violence is committed and may arise from psychological trauma, loss or deprivation. She emphasises, as do many others, the crucial importance of interpersonal and early relationships and the need to co-operate rather than destroy. Those are the aspects that I shall focus on. This all points to the need for children to be brought up without violence in the home and to have positive parenting. There is strong evidence that children who experience or observe violence in the home will be profoundly affected, many seriously, and that they may grow up to be violent themselves. The noble Baronesses, Lady Walmsley and Lady Finlay, have focused on this. This week we have had the result of the Good Childhood Inquiry, which I shall return to later. We have had a UNICEF report that concluded that children in England were less happy than others around the world. We have had the joint report of the Children’s Commissioners for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, which showed many good things about being a child in England but also many disturbing worries for children about, for example, being bullied, having little space to play and being overtested in school; I believe that our children are the most tested in the world. It is and always has been obvious that the quality of parenting and of relationships with significant adults has a profound influence on the child’s ability to be happy, grounded and confident, to resist pressure and to perform well. Such children who are well nurtured tend to develop good relationships and co-operate rather than become aggressive or violent. The director and the head of capabilities at Demos had an article in last week’s New Statesman saying: "““It’s the quality of parenting in Britain, rather than the education system, that’s really failing our children—and the government is doing nothing to address it””." They go on to talk about this in the context of inequalities. I cannot agree that the Government are doing nothing, but perhaps there could be more emphasis on prevention and intervention as well as on treatment. The Government have done much to support parents. We have only to look at the impact of Sure Start, the attack on child poverty, child tax credits and other welfare reform that supports families. We have the recent and expanding family intervention projects, which are showing very positive results. In our schools, we have programmes on the social and emotional aspects of learning. Personal and social health education will become a statutory subject. We have anti-bullying strategies and so on. We need a huge focus on the importance of parenting, not when a child gets into trouble but from birth. Health visitors are vital. Their role is not just about health and the practicalities of parenting, but about whether a parent is interacting with a baby in a positive way. We certainly need more nurture groups of parents and children. We need to encourage the programme that I spoke of in a Question earlier this week, the UNICEF Rights Respecting Schools initiative, which emphasises the need for children to develop wide concepts of rights and responsibilities as they grow up. If a child is nurtured, he or she is more likely to be able to co-operate rather than to use violence to relate to others. If a child is nurtured, he or she is able or more likely to be able to resist and challenge bad behaviour in others, including negative media influences, bullying, drug taking, indulging in early sex, violence and so on. The Government’s 10-year strategy Aiming High for Young People talks about protective influences and their impact on young people. One of the things that struck me from the Good Childhood Inquiry was the emphasis by the children on the importance of relationships. They said that they want love and care from the people whom they want to love and care for them. They want someone to talk to and someone to listen. They want people to respect one another. They want close friends and a loving home—a nice home. Good families provide all this. Sadly, some families do not and, if children go into care, the system too often fails to make amends for a broken family life. I know that improvements are in train. Some things are not complicated, such as having a child attached to a key worker and not moved around. I am worried by the rise in the use of custody for children. Both victims and perpetrators of violent crime are becoming younger. Only 4 per cent of 10 to 25 year-olds are very frequent and serious offenders, but the number of children being locked up has increased by 550 per cent in the last decade and there have been terrible examples of violence inflicted on these children. What impact must violent punishment have on damaged individuals, mainly boys? Many of these children will have been in care, will have been suspended or expelled from school and will have had educational difficulties or some trauma in their life. I agree with Barnardo’s that such children are children in need. Early interventions in their problems could help them. They are damaged and should not be encouraged by our systems to damage or become violent towards themselves and others. If only those children who committed grave crimes or violent offences were put in custody, about £27 million could be saved to put into early intervention. The Audit Commission estimates that, if effective early intervention were provided for one in 10 of young people in young offender institutions, annual savings of more than £100 million could be made. That saving could be put to good use in prevention programmes. Financial savings are only part of this equation. Early intervention, nurturing and good upbringing are absolutely vital if we are to encourage non-violent behaviour and prevent violence against women and children. The roots of violence, as I said, are to be found in emotional neglect, poor communication and lack of boundaries for acceptable behaviour. I ask the Minister whether the Government will expand their support for interventions to enable children to be properly nurtured so that they do not grow up to be depressed and unhappy people whose last resort is violence of some kind. Does she agree that we could pull together what we now know about effective interventions to inform government policy? I look forward to her reply.