Archives

Deputy Chief Constable awarded Practitioner in Residence at Violence and Society Centre

    Katy Barrow-Grint, Deputy Chief Constable, Gloucestershire

    City St George’s, UoL, offers a Practitioner in Residence programme at the School for Policy and Global Affairs. It is for mid-level and senior policy practitioners within the UK and provides a platform to grow and explore their practice in partnership with the school.

    Katy Barrow-Grint, Deputy Chief Constable in Gloucestershire and an executive leader in national policing, became aware of the opportunity via her work with VISION Senior Research Fellow, Dr Ruth Weir,  on the VISION adolescent domestic abuse (ADA) research programme. Having recently written a book entitled ‘Policing Domestic Abuse’ with Ruth and others, the research identified a national gap academically and in policing with how ADA is understood.

    Katy’s focus will be on how police constabularies document ADA and developing a better understanding of the impact of the statutory age limitations on the practical work police officers do on the front line.

    Forces do not routinely record ADA as the statutory guidance states that domestic abuse occurs in relationships where both parties are aged 16 or over. As a result, whilst crimes against young people will be recorded and investigated, they are not necessarily classified as domestic abuse, and it may be that child protection, domestic abuse or front-line response teams deal with the case.

    Her project work will seek to understand how forces are recording such incidents, and what type of officer and role is investigating. Katy will work with policing nationally through the National Police Chief‘s Council (NPCC) domestic abuse and child protection portfolios and collate an up-to-date picture across all forces in England and Wales to understand how they are recording and who is investigating ADA.

    Katy is also undertaking specific localised work in Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire and Northumbria, hosting roundtables with Dr Ruth Weir and  practitioners from all relevant agencies to gain a qualitative understanding of the problems staff encounter when dealing with ADA.

    Photograph from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

    VISION-funded research: Surviving Economic Abuse survey initial findings released

      Tackling economic abuse should be part of the solution to meet the new government’s ambitious target to halve violence against women and girls in a decade. It is important that the government’s measurement approach can understand the range of ways that economic restriction, exploitation and sabotage that victim-survivors experience at scale across the UK.

      Recent survey results from Surviving Economic Abuse (SEA) tell a powerful story that highlights experiences of economic abuse across the UK. The full report will be launched by SEA in March 2025, but their early release of key findings include:

      • Economic abuse is often understood to only be about creating dependency through restriction, but it can take many forms e.g., having a partner or ex-partner steal money, refuse to pay bills, or scare their partner into taking out credit. Early analysis suggests that a wider range of behaviours may continue post-separation than previously thought.
      • The data shines a light on the dangerous situation for young women- an area that SEA and VISION are seeking funding to explore further. 18–24-year-olds experienced more economic abuse than any other age group, for example 12% of this sample had been prevented from having log-in information (e.g. passwords, usernames) to key accounts such as online banking, utilities accounts, emails by a partner or ex-partner compared to 4% of all women.
      • Black, Asian and racially minoritised women in the UK may be more than twice as likely to experience economic abuse from a partner or ex-partner than White women, with women with a Black/African/Caribbean or Black British ethnicity particularly at risk.
      • Disabled women in the UK may be nearly twice as likely to experience economic abuse from a partner or ex-partner as non-disabled women

      The VISION consortium was delighted to financially support SEA’s research, A rapid impact survey to monitor the nature and prevalence of economic abuse in the UK, through our Small Projects Fund in spring 2024. Their full report will be widely shared in 2025, including on the VISION website and through our networks.

      Photograph from Adobe Photo Stock subscription

      VAWG data dashboard consultation highlights usefulness of tool

        The UK Office for National Statistics (ONS) developed a prototype violence against women and girls (VAWG) data dashboard in 2022. The webpages presented statistics and charts on violence against women and girls in England and Wales, drawing on multiple sources. However, due to reprioritisation at ONS, maintenance of the dashboard stopped and as of April 2024 it was no longer accessible.

        VISION developed a consultation to ascertain the usefulness of a VAWG data dashboard as a result. The call was open from March to May 2024, and 102 responses were received. Most participants responded in their capacity as individuals (n=61), although 25 stated that they were responding on behalf of an organisation and four on behalf of a group. Some participants both responded as an individual and on behalf of an organisation or group.

        Consultation participants responded as people from across a variety of roles and sectors. The
        most commonly cited were working in research or education (n=40) and in policy or planning
        (n=28), 27 people responded as someone with lived experience and 13 as members of the
        public. The remainder comprised those in service provision (n=17), a campaign role (n=10) or
        some other capacity (8).

        Consultation results

        Many participants had heard of the data dashboard before the VISION consultation (n=51), although 28 reported that they had not. Of those who had heard of the dashboard before, most had made use of it (n=39).

        Most participants reported that having a dashboard that brought together data on violence
        and abuse would help them either ‘somewhat’ (n=12) or ‘a lot’ (n=39).

        Participants were asked what they found to be useful about the data dashboard:

        • Data discovery
        • Finding data and finding it faster
        • Breakdowns and local profiles
        • Comparisons
        • Authoritative context
        • Source material

        Participants were asked for their thoughts on the limitations or what was missing from the dashboard:

        • Wider coverage in relation to topics (health, disability, suicide, law, family courts, policy), types of violence and abuse (homicide, forced marriage, sexual violence), and particular groups (men, perpetrators)
        • Deeper context in terms of much more nuanced contextual discussion of what the data means, ‘data without context is misleading’
        • Critical interrogation such as the highlight of methodological limitations
        • Interactive functionality with more scope for further breakdowns by local authority areas and police forces for example
        • Improved search function
        • Positive action such as a ‘section about work being done to support victims/reduce cases’
        • Human stories meaning to go beyond numbers and to tell the human stories that underpin them

        Recommendations

        Through this consultation, approximately 100 people told VISION that a VAWG data dashboard is
        something that they valued having and wish to have again. These included people with lived
        experience of violence and abuse, people working in health, justice, specialist and other
        services, researchers and academics across disciplines, and members of the wider public.

        A violence and abuse data dashboard is needed because it has:

        • Symbolic value: indicating that violence against women and girls matters to the
          Government, and
        • Practical value: as a functional and easy to use tool facilitating access to high
          quality data spanning a range of types of violence, groups, areas and years.

        In April 2024, ONS’ prototype VAWG data dashboard was withdrawn due to reprioritisation of
        resources within that organisation. Since then, a new Government has come into office with a
        stated mission to halve violence against women and girls within the decade. How progress towards this commitment is monitored will be essential to its success. General population health and crime surveys, alongside other data sources, will be key and that includes a revitalised, fit for purpose VAWG data dashboard. To instill trust and collective investment in this goal, a public platform for transparent monitoring is needed and the dashboard could be an effective, useful tool.

        Next steps

        VISION is a cross-sectoral consortium of academics and government and service partners
        working with UK data on violence and abuse. We are aware that further development and relaunching of a data dashboard will require a collaborative effort from relevant departments of
        state, data providers (not least ONS) and external funding. Drawing on our work in this area
        we aim to coordinate this effort, with three initial objectives:

        • Resource: Identify partners and funding source(s)
        • Define: Agree clear definitions to best capture and monitor subgroup and temporal
          trends in VAWG and violent crime in the population
        • Design and test a revised violence and abuse data dashboard with people from
          across sectors

        To download the report:

        Consultation: Is there a need for a Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) data dashboard

        Or for further information, please contact Sally at sally.mcmanus@city.ac.uk

        Photo licensed by Adobe Stock online images

        How much violence is there?

          This VISION Policy Brief proposes improvements to the definitions and measurement of violence using the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW), in order to more fully capture different aspects of violent crime, including violence against women and girls (VAWG). The briefing is aimed at researchers, national statistics offices, and others involved in violence research and policy. It draws on a paper recently published in The British Journal of Criminology, Definition and measurement of violence in the Crime Survey for England and Wales.

          Key findings:

          • The current definition of violent crime excludes key types: The Office for National Statistics (ONS) headline measure of ‘violent crime’ currently excludes sexual violence, robberies, threats of violence, and many incidents of violence where criminal damage was also involved.
          • A broader definition would better capture scale, harm and inequalities: We use a broader measure of violence that includes these currently excluded forms of violence. This broader measure not only reveals a higher prevalence of victimisation in the population as a whole, it also reveals hidden inequalities. Women are more likely than men to experience sexual violence and threats of violence: excluding these from current estimates leads to rates of violence in women, especially domestic violence, being underestimated. The proportion of people physically and emotionally harmed by violence is also better estimated using this broader definition, particularly affecting estimates for women.

          Recommendation for change:

          • National statistics on violence in England and Wales should show violence estimates using a broader definition of violence alongside violent crime statistics to give a more comprehensive overview of violence and its societal impact.

          To download the policy briefing, please see below. To download the paper upon which the policy recommendation is based, please see: Definition and Measurement of Violence in the Crime Survey for England and Wales: Implications for the Amount and Gendering of Violence | The British Journal of Criminology | Oxford Academic

          The citation for the paper: Davies, E., Obolenskaya, P., Francis, B., Blom, N., Phoenix, J., Pullerits, M., and Walby, S. (2024), Definition and Measurement of Violence in the Crime Survey for England and Wales: Implications for the Amount and Gendering of Violence, The British Journal of Criminology. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azae050

          VISION Policy Briefing for downloading:

          Violence Measurement_VISION Policy BriefingDownload

          Violence in the workplace in the United Kingdom

            Our latest research examines two nationally representative datasets, The Commercial Victimisation Survey (CVS) and the UK Household Panel Survey (UKHLS), to examine variance in the prevalence of workplace violence by industrial sector and occupational group.

            The authors, Dr Vanessa Gash and Dr Niels Blom, found 28% of commercial businesses reported criminal victimisation on their premises in the past year, including 8% reporting violent victimisation (namely assaults, robberies, and threats).

            Using individual-level data, the report also found 8% of employees had been threatened, insulted or physically attacked at work in the past year, and a similar percentage have felt unsafe at work, with public sector workers most at risk.

            The authors call for enhanced recognition of the problem of workplace violence for a significant proportion of workers in multiple different sectors, alongside improved policies to minimise workplace violence going forward.

            Figure 1. Prevalence of Violence and Fear of Violence in the Workplace by Sector, UKHLS data 2020-2021, weighted estimates

            The report can be downloaded here: VISION Policy Report – Violence in the workplace in the UK: Business and individual-level exposure

            Acknowledgements:

            The report benefited from input and insights from the Home Office, who provided us with access to the Commercial Victimisation Survey used here.

            Photograph licensed by Adobe Stock

            The benefits system: source of support or hindrance to victims of violence?

              Previous VISION research showed how 4% of domestic violence victims lose their job as a result of abuse and that half of unemployed women have experienced intimate partner violence in their lives.

              A report just published by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) further confirms high levels of trauma and mental distress among people not in employment and approaching benefits services for support. The report focuses on those in receipt of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) aimed at people with an impairment or health condition that affects how much work they do.

              VISION researcher Sally McManus, with colleagues Claire Lapham and Ann Conolly from the National Centre for Social Research, analysed the government’s main mental health study. They found that nearly one in three (30%) ESA recipients screened positive for post-traumatic stress disorder. This was more than twice the rate for Jobseeker’s Allowance (JSA) claimants (12%), and ten times that of employed people (3%). The analyses show that the claimant population experienced high levels of stress, in which self-confidence was low and anxiety high. Compared to those in employment, few ESA claimants owned their home and many faced serious debt arrears.

              Sally presented findings from this study as oral evidence to the Work and Pensions Committee’s Inquiry into Safeguarding Vulnerable Claimants, including domestic violence victims. She drew attention to calls from Women’s Aid for reform they highlight is needed to make the benefits system the lifeline survivors need, rather than a source of re-traumatisation and further harm.

              Women’s Aid recommendations include implementing a named domestic abuse lead in every Jobcentre Plus and ensuring staff receive regular, specialist domestic abuse training, so that work coaches and other frontline staff are better able to recognise claimants experiencing domestic abuse. Specialist domestic abuse services need to be properly funded to support and advocate for survivors in making their claims to DWP. Extending the domestic violence easement to up to a year would also help, alongside exempting those who are moving to or from refuges from repayment of Jobcentre Plus advances.

              The report can be downloaded from the DWP website: A health, social and economic profile of ESA recipients: Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey 2014 – GOV.UK

              To cite:

              Claire Lapham, Anne Conolly, Sally McManus (2024): A health, social and economic profile of ESA recipients: Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey 2014 DWP ad hoc research report no.79.

              Photograph licensed by Adobe Stock

              Uncovering ‘hidden’ violence against older people

                By Dr Anastasia Fadeeva, VISION Research Fellow

                Violence against older people is often overlooked. As a society, we often associate violence with young people, gangs, unsafe streets, and ‘knife crime’. However, violence also takes place behind front doors, perpetuated by families and partners, and victims include older people. 

                Some older people may be particularly vulnerable due to poorer physical health, disability, dependence on others, and financial challenges after retirement. Policy rarely addresses the safety of this population, with even health and social care professionals sometimes assuming that violence does not affect older people. For example, doctors may dismiss injuries or depression as inevitable problems related to old age and miss opportunities to identify victims (1). In addition, older people may be less likely to report violence and abuse because they themselves may not recognise it, do not want to accuse family members, or out of fear (2). 

                Given victims of violence often remain invisible to health and social services, police, or charities, the most reliable statistics on violence often come from national surveys such as the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) conducted by the Office for National Statistics. However, for a long time the CSEW self-completion – the part of the interview with the most detail on violence and abuse – excluded those aged 60 or more, and only recently extended to include those over 74. Some national surveys specifically focus on older people, but these ask very little about violence and abuse. Additionally, despite people in care homes or other institutional settings experiencing a higher risk of violence, it can be challenging to collect information from them. Therefore, many surveys only interview people in private households, which excludes many higher-risk groups.

                We need a better grasp of the extent and nature of violence and abuse in older populations. First, reliable figures can improve the allocation of resources and services targeted at the protection of older people. Second, better statistics can identify the risk factors for experiencing violence in later life and the most vulnerable groups.

                In the VISION consortium, we used the Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey (APMS 2014) to examine violence in people aged 60 and over in England (3). While we found that older people of minoritised ethnic backgrounds are at higher risk of violence (prevalence of 6.0% versus 1.7% in white people in 12 months prior to the survey), more research needs to be done to distinguish the experiences of different ethnic groups. Our research also showed that loneliness and social isolation were strongly related to violence in later life. Older people may experience social isolation due to limiting health issues or economic situations, and perpetrators can exploit this (4). Moreover, isolation of victims is a tool commonly used by perpetrators, especially in cases of domestic abuse (5).  Knowing about these and other risk factors can help us better spot and protect potential victims.

                Additionally, more needs to be learnt about the consequences of life course exposure to violence for health and well-being in later life. This is still a relatively unexplored area due to limited data and a lack of reporting from older victims and survivors. It is sometimes more difficult to establish the link between violence and health problems because the health impacts are not always immediate but can accumulate or emerge in later life (6). Also, as people develop more illnesses as they age, it is more challenging to distinguish health issues attributable to violence. Therefore we are also using the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) to examine temporal relationships between lifetime violence exposure and health in older age.

                Dr Sophie Carlisle, Evaluation Researcher at Health Innovation East Midlands, and former VISION researcher, also reflects on violence against older people and includes an analysis of our study’s strengths and weaknesses in her 10 December 2024 blog on the Mental Elf website, Violence against older people – linked to poor mental health #16DaysOfActivism2024. Sophie highlighted how the study reported that violence against older people is often perpetrated by an intimate partner and is strongly associated with poor mental health.

                In an inclusive society, every member should be able to lead a life where they feel safe and respected. We are delighted that the CSEW has removed the upper age limit to data collection on domestic abuse, which is one step towards making older victims and survivors heard. Continuous work on uncovering the ‘hidden’ statistics and examining the effects of intersectional characteristics on violence is crucial in making our society more inclusive, equal, and safe for everyone. For example, one VISION study (7) has demonstrated that the risks of repeated victimisation in domestic relationships had opposite trends for men and women as they aged. We are committed to support the Hourglass Manifesto to end the abuse of older people (8), and are willing to provide decision makers with evidence to enable a safer ageing society.

                For further information, please see: Violence against older people and associations with mental health: A national probability sample survey of the general population in England – ScienceDirect

                Or please contact Anastasia at anastasia.fadeeva@city.ac.uk

                Footnotes

                • 1.  SafeLives U. Safe later lives: Older people and domestic abuse, spotlights report. 2016.
                • 2.  Age UK. No Age Limit: the blind spot of older victims and survivors in the Domestic Abuse Bill. 2020.
                • 3.  Fadeeva A, Hashemi L, Cooper C, Stewart R, McManus S. Violence against older people and mental health: a probability sample survey of the general population. forthcoming.
                • 4.  Tung EL, Hawkley LC, Cagney KA, Peek ME. Social isolation, loneliness, and violence exposure in urban adults. Health Affairs. 2019;38(10):1670-8.
                • 5.  Stark E. Coercive control. Violence against women: Current theory and practice in domestic abuse, sexual violence and exploitation. 2013:17-33.
                • 6.  Knight L, Hester M. Domestic violence and mental health in older adults. International review of psychiatry. 2016;28(5):464-74.
                • 7.  Weir R. Differentiating risk: The association between relationship type and risk of repeat victimization of domestic abuse. Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice. 2024;18:paae024.
                • 8.  Hourglass. Manifesto A Safer Ageing Society by 2050. 2024.

                Photo from licensed Adobe Stock library

                Presentations from the 2024 VISION Annual Conference

                  The presentations from the 3rd VISION annual conference are now available for downloading.

                  The event was held at Kings College London, Strand campus, on 11 June. The theme was Violence prevention in research and policy: Bridging silos. Keynote speakers, Dr Claudia Garcia-Moreno (World Health Organisation) and Professor Katrin Hohl (City, UoL) considered the changes needed for effective violence prevention from the perspectives of health and justice. Three symposiums highlighted interdisciplinary research from the VISION consortium and partners on:

                  – Violence against older people: Challenges in research and policy;

                  – Learning across statutory review practices: Origins, ambitions and future directions; and

                  – Responding to experiences and expressions of interpersonal violence in the workplace

                  Approximately 80 academics, central and local government officials, practitioners, and voluntary and community sector organisations attended from a range of health and crime / justice disciplines.

                  All the slides that could be shared are available below. Please feel free to download.

                  Photo caption: Symposium 3, ‘Responding to experiences and expressions of interpersonal violence in the workplace’. From left to right: Chair, Dr Olumide Adisa (University of Suffolk) and Panellists Dr Vanessa Gash (City, UoL), Dr Alison Gregory (Alison Gregory Consulting), Catherine Buglass (Employers’ Initiative on Domestic Abuse) and Dr Niels Blom (City, UoL)

                  Professor Gene Feder, VISION Director – Welcome – 1 download

                  Welcome_VISION-Annual-Conference-2024Download

                  Keynote Speaker, Dr Claudia Garcia-Moreno – Violence against women: From research to policy and action – 1 download

                  Keynote-Speaker-2_Research-to-policy-and-action_2Download

                  Symposium 1 – Violence against older people: Challenges in research and policy – 4 downloads (Hourglass, Office for National Statistics, Public Health Wales & VISION)

                  Symposium-1_Older-people-and-violence_HourglassDownload
                  Symposium-1_Older-people-and-violence_ONSDownload
                  Symposium-1_Older-people-and-violence_PHWDownload
                  Symposium-1_Older-people-and-violence_VISIONDownload

                  Symposium 2 – Learning across statutory review practices: Origins, ambitions and future directions – 1 download

                  Symposium-2_Statutory-Review-Practice_AllDownload

                  Symposium 3 – Responding to experiences and expressions of interpersonal violence in the workplace – 3 downloads (Employers’ Initiative on Domestic Abuse, and 2 from VISION)

                  Symposium-3_Violence-and-the-workplace_VISIONDownload
                  Symposium-3_Violence-and-the-workplace_EIDADownload
                  Symposium-3_Violence-and-the-workplace_VISION-2Download

                  Calling all crime analysts: Share your experiences of using text data in analysis

                    Are you a crime analyst or researcher? If so VISION would really like to hear about your experiences of using text data in your analysis.

                    We developed a short survey that will take approximately 5 minutes to complete. Qualtrics Survey | Crime Analyst Survey

                    This survey is designed to explore your experiences working with free-text data. Your feedback will enable us to evaluate the need for software designed to assist analysts working with large amounts of free text data.

                    Participation is voluntary and all responses will be anonymous. Information will be confidential and will not be shared with any other parties, and will be deleted once it is no longer needed.

                    The deadline to provide feedback using the link above is 30 June 2024.

                    Illustration from licensed Adobe Stock library