- Conference
- 2021 National Disabled Members' Conference
- Date
- 8 July 2021
- Decision
- Carried as Amended
Conference notes that an unfortunate and unwelcome result of the national lockdown has been a reported increase in domestic abuse and domestic violence. Often isolated and shut off from previous support networks, victims can struggle to access support or alert others to their situation. Perpetrators of domestic abuse have been able to use the restrictions to create real barriers and increase their control over their victims. With cutbacks on the support services, any services that may be able to help are even more restricted with being able to accommodate disabled women and their needs. For example, a safe house or women’s refuge may not be fully accessible.
Disabled women suffering domestic abuse, whether from their partners, their children, carers or even family members, are trapped and isolated and fearful of the future.
Victims in these situations can find going to work a safe place and this could allow the victim the opportunity to raise the alarm. However, during lockdown a majority of people have been working from home and not going into the office. This is true for most vulnerable people, especially disabled women who may have been shielding. Conference is calling on employers to extend this safe place to disabled women working from home.
Among disabled women, 17.5% experienced domestic abuse from 2019-20, while the rate for disabled men was 9.2%. These figures have increased since the pandemic as calls to the UK’s largest domestic abuse helpline are rising “week on week”. More than 40,000 calls were made to the national domestic abuse helpline during the first three months of the COVID-19 restrictions.
Anybody who experiences domestic abuse may face broader risk factors, but disabled women face specific risks. They are often in particularly vulnerable circumstances that may reduce their ability to defend themselves, or to recognise, report and escape abuse. Impairment can create social isolation, which, along with the need for assistance with their health and care raises the risk of domestic abuse for disabled women.
Physical and environment inaccessibility, stigma and discrimination can also exclude and isolate them. Their reliance on care increases the situational vulnerability to other people’s controlling behaviour and can exacerbate difficulties in leaving an abusive situation especially if any benefits they received are controlled by the perpetrator.
Not only do disabled women experience higher rates of domestic abuse, they also experience more barriers to accessing support, such as health and social care services and domestic abuse services.
Conference welcomes the ‘Ask for ANI’ (Assistance Needed Immediately) initiative that is being rolled out across all four countries of the UK in community pharmacies. The initiative is a codeword scheme that allows those who are experiencing violence in the home to discreetly ask for help in contacting the police and other services. However, Women’s Aid has reported concerns that the scheme may not be accessible to all marginalised groups for example, disabled women who may not be able to access a pharmacy.
The Domestic Abuse Act was given royal assent and became law on 29 April, after years of campaigning from survivors, charities and unions, including UNISON. For the first time in history, there is now a wide-ranging legal definition of domestic abuse, going beyond physical violence to include emotional, coercive or controlling behaviour, and economic abuse.
Abuse protection orders will also extend their coverage to victims’ workplaces to make sure victims stay safe at work and will also cover other places where a victim may regularly be found, such as their place of worship or any children’s school.
In order to take this work forward, conference calls on the National Disabled Members Committee, working with the National Women’s Committee, to:
1)Continue to promote UNISON guidance and other resources relating to domestic abuse through social media, bulletins to activists and members, and other media including highlighting the support ‘There For You’ can offer.
2)Regularly update our domestic abuse guide and model policy to include consideration of those who work from home, such as disabled workers.
3)Campaign to make women’s refuge housing fully accessible, including barrier-free access to sleeping rooms and common areas, architectural features that comply with regulations, visual and auditory alarm systems and provision for assistance dogs.
4)Work with branches to identify employers that have adopted domestic abuse policies and highlight best practise as well as use information to promote benefits of doing so to other employers.