THE Scottish Government has jumped on the reported increase in emails and calls to a domestic abuse helpline as the basis for a high-profile campaign against domestic violence but we should raise a few questions about the efficacy of this approach.
Unlike the extremely difficult issues raised by the lockdown, not least of which is what are we going to do about the collapsing economy, a campaign against domestic abusers is relatively unproblematic and politically unchallengeable.
Domestic abuse campaigns face almost no opposition because they are virtuous ie one of those issues that all “right thinking people" nod their head to and express outrage. It is no longer just feminist groups and “radicals" who want to talk about domestic abuse.
Almost all politicians can be found demanding that more must be done to solve this problem. Theresa May, for example, when discussing her legacy as Prime Minister, went out of her way to explain that her campaign against domestic violence is a key thing for which she wants to be remembered.
When there is no opposition to increasing laws and increasing police powers, and little media scrutiny, there is a danger that authoritarian approaches develop largely unnoticed.
In this case we find that despite the increase in calls to one helpline there has been no noticeable increase in calls to the police.
Yet, within days of the press release about the rise, a new government policy has been developed and speeches made about this so-called hidden crimewave. Developing new initiatives on this basis could and perhaps should be described as a knee jerk reaction.
Predictably, opposition voices have played their role, expressing their outrage and arguing that the government has gone nowhere near far enough, to deal with what Lib Dem home affairs spokesperson Christine Jardine called the “terrifying rise in domestic violence”.
Despite the expanding definition of domestic abuse and the significant increase in the public and political profile of this issue, it is worth noting that, according to the Office for National Statistics, “the number of estimated victims of domestic abuse...for the year ending 2019 is significantly lower than the number in the year ending March 2005”.
Calls to a helpline do not prove any terrifying rise. Panic responses on the other hand risk elevating public unease unnecessarily.
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