Women’s Aid responds to MHCLG’s funding announcement for the Part 4 safe accommodation duty
“We welcome the Government’s announcement that domestic abuse refuges will continue to be funded, and that there will be a £30 million increase for local councils to deliver their legal duties under the Domestic Abuse Act 2021. We are pleased that the overall figure has increased from the last year (to a total of £160 million), however the amount available still falls short from our estimate of what is needed to fully sustain, the life-saving network of services that remain in high demand. Women’s Aid estimates a minimum funding settlement of £228m for refuge services (of which £78m to be ring-fenced for the ‘by and for’ sector) is needed to fund life-saving services via the safe accommodation duty.
We are concerned that this money is not being delivered through a ring-fenced and dedicated funding pot, however we hope that with accompanying memorandums for councils, and clear guidance from the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government, that councils will ensure this money is spent on the most critical and cost-effective services,1 delivered by specialist refuges to ensure we are meeting the needs of survivors of this national emergency.
Without a protected funding pot for this purpose, there is a risk that specialist domestic abuse refuges, and wider violence against women and girls (VAWG) services will see funding cuts or services being fully decommissioned, as local communities are faced with further cuts to public services. Unfortunately, we have seen this happen following the issuing of Section 114 notices across the country and local authorities struggling with bankruptcy. As ever, this has had a disproportionate impact on specialist ‘by and for’ services. In the past three months, we have seen a sharp increase in the number of services led ‘by and for’ Black and minoritised women facing closure.
Any ambitions set out in the Government’s upcoming VAWG Strategy simply will not be met without specialist ‘by and for’ services, who support and save the lives of victims facing additional barriers and systemic discrimination. We therefore urge the Government to address the decommissioning specialist services in favour of more generic organisations.
Councils have a critical role in the whole-system approach needed to deliver the Government’s ambition of halving VAWG in a decade. We hope that councils will avoid competitive commissioning practices, that force life-saving domestic abuse services to competitively bid against one another and waste public funding. Women’s Aid have a range of resources available to support councils to understand legitimate alternatives to harmful procurement practices – you can find out more by contacting policy@womensaid.org.uk.
We also look forward to working with the government to ensure the multi-year funding settlement announced in Spring 2025 will sustain our network of unparalleled experts and specialist domestic abuse, and support the Government’s ambition of halving VAWG by 2035.”
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