Our Head of Advocacy and Communications, Sara D’Arcy, attended the Labour Party Conference. Here are her seven key takeaways from this year’s conference.
The Labour Government has committed to halving violence against women and girls (VAWG) within a decade. So we hit the party’s conference to learn more about its plans to achieve this ambitious goal, and to make the case for why it must put tackling economic abuse at the heart of its long-awaited VAWG strategy.
Party conferences are an incredible opportunity to speak to the people in power as they walk between conference events (sorry Rachel Reeves if our chat about economic abuse made you late for the Prime Minister’s speech!).
The term lobbying, in fact, comes from the art of members of the public or interest groups hanging about in corridors to seize their chance to speak with and influence MPs. We were also lucky to be joined by 10 other partner VAWG organisations to take over the conference so that violence against women and children could not be ignored by decision-makers and attendees.
While we are still recovering from a hectic three days where we put VAWG top of the agenda, I’ve pulled together our seven key takeaways from this year’s conference:
1. The VAWG strategy will be published when the ministers are confident it is strong enough
We made sure to speak with Ministers Alex Davies-Jones and Jess Phillips, who are leading the VAWG strategy, to ask them about when the strategy will be published. While neither could give us an exact date, both ministers were clear that it would be published when they are happy it is robust enough.
We hope that this is very soon because survivors and their children cannot wait any longer. And we hope that the strategy includes clear, funded commitments to tackle economic abuse, including ring-fenced funding for specialist “by and for” services. This is vital to ensure victim-survivors get the support they need to escape abuse and rebuild their lives.
2. Financial inclusion for victim-survivors was top of the agenda
Our hard work is paying off. It was great to hear economic abuse survivors’ financial inclusion featured heavily in many discussions at events across the conference.
In particular, we were gobsmacked when the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, Lucy Rigby, highlighted the unique financial exclusion challenges faced by victim-survivors, especially as a result of perpetrators’ joint mortgage abuse – unprompted. Despite only being a few weeks into the job, her understanding and commitment to the issue are very positive signs.
We are looking forward to working with her to ensure the upcoming Financial Inclusion Strategy contains ambitious measures to remove financial barriers for economic abuse survivors.
3. Safety before status for migrant victim-survivors
The Home Secretary, Shabana Mahmood, lowered the mood of the conference when she outlined new conditions, such as community volunteering, for migrants to qualify for indefinite leave to remain. Abusers often prevent survivors from working or studying, and these new measures fail to consider migrant survivors’ lived experiences and simply put their lives at risk.
We will be following up by writing to the Home Secretary to make it clear: the government must prioritise the safety of migrant victim-survivors, many of whom have insecure immigration status as a direct consequence of the perpetrator’s economic abuse.
We stand with Southall Black Sisters, Latin American Women’s Rights Service, and the wider VAWG sector to demand that the government prioritises migrant survivors’ safety.
4. Survivors continue to be abused twice: first by the abuser, and then by the state
Survivors at conference events voiced their frustrations clearly: legal aid, police, employers, and family courts are all falling short. In fact, the survivor and campaigner Claire Throssell MBE described it at one event as being abused first by the perpetrator and then by the state.
While we welcomed Minister Sarah Sackman’s announcement that she will regulate the debt enforcement industry to stop harmful bailiff actions that retraumatise survivors, piecemeal fixes like this aren’t enough.
Across four panel events, our CEO, Sam Smethers, urged the government to deliver widespread systemic change, including reforming the Child Maintenance Service (CMS), addressing both public and private sector coerced debt, legislating to stop joint mortgage abuse, and transforming family court financial remedy proceedings. Without wholesale systemic change, survivors and their children will continue to be failed.
5. Tackling economic abuse is everyone’s business
With 4.1 million UK women experiencing economic abuse from current or former partners last year alone, the shocking scale of the issue demands a whole society response.
We were honoured to be invited to speak at panel events supported by TSB and Experian, who championed the role of business in response to economic abuse. It was really encouraging to see businesses commit to working with survivors and specialist organisations like SEA to drive forward their response to domestic abuse and urge their industries to follow suit.
The government must ensure that tackling economic abuse is everyone’s business. However, on several panel events, female MPs highlighted the worsening, horrific online abuse they face as women in positions of power.
There were also many unanswered questions about women’s role in the development of AI and whether it will be a force of good or evil when it comes to tackling VAWG. It is therefore essential that AI and big tech play their part in the mission to halve VAWG too.
6. The VAWG strategy must support all children
In a packed VAWG sector takeover fringe event on post-separation abuse, campaigner Claire Throssell MBE moved many to tears with her story of the family courts failing to protect her sons from unsafe contact with an abuser. It is one of my career highlights to have worked with Claire to support her campaign to end the presumption of child contact – the government must now get on and do it before more children’s lives are lost.
More widely, it was also heartening to hear MPs across several events call for urgent reforms to the CMS to stop perpetrators’ economic abuse and lift children out of poverty. Much more needs to be done to protect children from domestic, including economic, abuse.
Claire’s call to reframe the government’s strategy as Violence Against Women and Children (VAWC) was a powerful one. Boys, like her sons Paul and Jack, deserve recognition and support as victims of domestic abuse too.
7. Where’s the funding to match the ambition?
Specialist domestic abuse organisations save lives and money – Women’s Aid research shows that for every £1 invested, the public purse saves £9. With domestic abuse estimated to cost £78 billion annually, Labour’s mission to halve VAWG must be matched by meaningful investment.
I managed to “lobby” the Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, about economic abuse by catching her on route to watch Sir Keir Starmer’s conference speech. I told her about the devastating impact of this form of abuse on victim-survivors and our high hopes that both the VAWG and Financial Inclusion strategies will include robust measures to address it. With her autumn budget taking place on Economic Abuse Awareness Day (26 November), wouldn’t it be an opportune moment for the first female Chancellor to seize the opportunity to commit funding that supports all government departments to break the cycle of economic abuse for good?
While that’s a wrap for this year’s Labour Party Conference, our work to influence meaningful and lasting change for victim-survivors doesn’t end here.
You can find out more about our priorities for the legal and policy reforms needed to support victim-survivors, disrupt abusers, and prevent economic abuse on our website. But we can’t do it alone. You can join our campaign for change here.
Sara D’Arcy, Head of Advocacy and Communications at Surviving Economic Abuse
