VAWG
Violence against women and girls is a significant problem that affects at least one in twelve women every year, but efforts by the Home Office and other government departments to address the issue in recent years have not led to improved outcomes for the victims of these crimes or the safety of women and girls more widely, according to a new (31 January 2025) National Audit Office (NAO) report.
The scale of the problem
Over one in four women are estimated to be victims of sexual assault or attempted assault in their lifetime, and one in 12 women are victims of VAWG each year, although the actual number is likely to be much higher. The National Police Chiefs’ Council reported that, in 2022-23, 20% of all police-recorded crime was related to violence against women and girls. The victim was female in 86% of all police-recorded sexual offences in the year to March 2022. In the year ending December 2023, over 97% (23,723) of people convicted of sexual offences were male, and crimes are often committed by someone known to the victim.
The Government response
The Home Office introduced the Tackling Violence Against Women and Girls strategy (the VAWG Strategy) in 2021, the third such strategy since 2010, and published the Domestic Abuse Plan in 2022. However, the Home Office does not know what effect government’s work has had on VAWG.
Key findings
Violence against women and girls is a serious and growing problem. In 2023‑24 the prevalence of sexual assault against women aged 16 to 59 in England and Wales (the percentage of the population estimated to have suffered a sexual assault each year) was higher than in 2009-10 (4.3% and 3.4% respectively). Conversely, the prevalence of domestic abuse against women was lower (9.2% and 7.4% respectively).
To date, the Home Office has not led an effective whole-system response. Successfully addressing the harms caused by VAWG requires the coordinated effort and commitment of many government departments. But the cross-departmental governance in place did not ensure all departments were prioritising the VAWG Strategy’s aims and were pulling in the same direction. The Home Office created a dedicated team to lead the VAWG Strategy, but it has found it challenging to get buy-in from other government departments. The Home Office’s Officials’ oversight group, established to progress the Strategy, did not meet until a year after the VAWG Strategy’s launch.
The lack of a consistent definition for VAWG across public bodies and their approaches to measuring the scale of VAWG crimes has made it difficult to measure progress in a consistent way. The Home Office’s definition of VAWG includes all victims, across all ages and genders, whereas police forces only include women and girls. The Home Office told us it uses estimates from the Crime Survey for England and Wales to measure prevalence, which does not include children under the age of 16, even though they are included in the Strategy.
While 78% of the 126 commitments from the VAWG Strategy and Domestic Abuse Plan had been met by July 2024, several of these were not new, and many were activities such as holding meetings or publishing guidance. In July 2024 there were 25 commitments still to deliver – the Home Office originally planned to implement all commitments by December 2024 but has been behind schedule since the beginning of the VAWG Strategy.
The Home Office did not develop the VAWG Strategy based on an understanding of what works. It has published three VAWG strategies since 2010, all with consistent aims, but the NAO found little evidence that the Home Office had applied learning from previous strategies.
The Home Office has not made the most of the available expertise and knowledge to inform the VAWG Strategy.
The Home Office does not know what effect the government’s work is having on VAWG.
The Home Office is conducting a review to improve its ability to tackle VAWG, in parallel with developing a new strategy, due in spring 2025. Despite the review being due to complete in spring 2025, the scope of the review was still evolving in November 2024.
Conclusion
The new government has set an ambitious target to halve violence against women and girls within the next decade. To meet this ambition the Home Office will need to lead a coordinated, whole-system response that addresses the causes of VAWG. The Home Office’s review of the existing evidence base could provide a foundation from which to develop the next strategy. But it will need to maintain a focus on continuous evaluation to ensure it can capture learning from local innovation and adapt its approach. The Home Office also needs to quickly establish the structures and incentives necessary to align all delivery partners behind the goal of reducing the significant harms caused by violence against women and girls.
The NAO makes three key recommendations for the Home Office to take forward the new VAWG strategy more effectively:
- establish a shared vision for how the government’s target to halve violence and women and girls will be met;
- strengthen accountability for delivering against the government’s target; and
- embed learning and evaluation through the new strategy.
Thanks to Omar Lopez for kind permission to use the header image in this post which was previously published on Unsplash.
One Response
This is a very interesting and depressing accumulation of stats and having witnessed it against my own mum when I was 10-11, I’m very acutely aware that had I stepped in and done something then my elder sister wouldn’t have went through 4 years of abuse at his hands and, that aside, I find myself apprehensive about drawing too many conclusions from stats that contain no larger picture.
For example, “The National Police Chief’s Council reported that, in 2022-23, 20% of all police reported crime was related to Violence Against women and Girls”. That is horrific but just how bad I don’t know. Does it mean that the remainder (80%) is violence against men and boys? Probably not but what is that number? So without a chart detailing the split of all police-reported crime it would be a fool’s errand to come to any conclusion. In addition, it does not mention that most violence that is women on men goes unreported. I know I never considered reporting two of my ex’s for domestic abuse, I just took the hits… there are plenty of charities that have those estimates, they also say that the number one killer of men aged 20-45 is suicide. But as usual, without knowing the stats for women that last stat is left wanting.
Then there is “The victim was female in 86% of all police reported sexual offences in the year to March 202”. This speaks nothing of the alleged perpetrator which by the above statement could be any gender. Then there are statistics that show that men are less likely to report sexual offences against them than women, especially if the alleged perpetrator is a woman.
Then there is “In the year ending December 2023, over 97% (23, 732) of people convicted of sexual offences were male”. Again, a horrific number but I have to think about a few other cases. When my exes used emotional blackmail with words like “you don’t love me” or “you don’t find me attractive any more” or “you’re seeing other people” to make me have ‘sex’ when they wanted even when I didn’t, I did not say it was abuse or that I was raped and I did not report it. How many other people have experienced the same and not reported it? Now it is coercion at best and rape at worst if a male was to use those or any other methods to make a woman be part of any sexual acts. How many other instances are there where a male has been coerced into such acts by women?
Additionally, that stat did not say all the victims of those convicted were women – a fact left out, in my opinion, to make the reader assume. The stat does not deal with cases where a woman has been convicted of non-sexual offences where if it had been a male who committed the same crimes against women they would be classed as sexual offences. There have been a number of reports about female prison officers ‘having sex’ with male prisoners (Five Wells seems rife), the officers were charged with Misconduct in Public Office however, if there is a person that is in a significant position of authority over a subordinate (such as prison officer over prisoner) said subordinate could be in a position where they feel they could not say no, if that is the case it is rape. I am forced to ask the question – if the prison officer(s) were male and the prisoners female would the charge be the same?
Then there is the case where a female teacher was found to be in a relationship with a male student under 16 years old and became pregnant and had a child with said minor. The charges against the teacher were Misconduct in Public Office and Perverting the Course of a Minor – not sexual offences. I ask again, if it were a make teacher and female minor student would the charges be Grooming, Rape (because an under 16 cannot legally consent to sex with an adult) and a whole host of other Sexual Offence charges?
I am forced to ask, how many other instances exist where, if the genders were reversed would there be sexual offence charges?
Now let’s take those two sentences together… “The victim was female in 86% of all police reported sexual offences in the year to March 2022. In the year ending December 2023, over 97% (23, 723) of people convicted of sexual offences were male”. These two were clearly made to look like an increase… “86%…year to March 2022” and year ending December 2023, over 97%” tries to make the reader think “hmm 86-97% in one year” but the fact is both statements are completely different, one talks about accusations, the other about convictions, one about the alleged victim being female, the other about convicted males. This is written to make the reader draw links and conclusions that simply don’t exist in the text.
The next statistic I will examine is “in 2023-24 the prevalence of sexual assault against women aged 16 to 59 in England and Wales (the percentage of the population estimated to have suffered a sexual assault each year) was higher than in 2009-2010 (4.3 and 3.4% respectively)”. This is saying that the estimated percentage of women aged 16-59 in England and Wales who have suffered a sexual assault in the year 2009-10 is 3.4% and 2023-24 is 4.3%. Firstly, these are estimated figures since both these dates have passed why are the estimates used and not actual figures? Perhaps it is because estimates include all accusations not just those that are proven (guilty until proven innocent?) and includes educated guesses as to those who go unreported. Where are the guesses of domestic abuse female to male that goes unreported?
Next we have “Conversely, the prevalence of domestic abuse against women was lower (9.2% and 7.4% respectively)”. The ‘conversely’ links it to the previous statement and suggests the earlier mentioned date 2023-24 was 9.2% and the latter mentioned date 2009-10 was 7.4% – indicated with ‘respectively’ but that would mean an increase between 2009-20 and 2023-24 not decrease as the sentence states. And again, these are all estimates. Where is the balancing data showing estimates of domestic abuse against men? We also need to remember that not all domestic abuse is violent or sexual offences, a fact that is omitted (perhaps deliberately) from the above. The ambiguous wording of both sentences together makes it difficult to draw any meaningful conclusions from them.
Since the author seems to want to present estimations as facts here is one estimation that is derived from fact. Fact – on 9th June 2010 David Cameron stated during PMQ’s that 8-10% of rape allegations were false, this figure was derived from cases that were proven to be false and speaks nothing about the estimated number that were false but remain unproven. Now it is not a huge leap to use that figure as an estimation across all accusations of sexual assault. So now we have an estimation that 8-10% of all sexual assault allegations are false, from there it may be easy to estimate that the value holds equal to cases where innocence could not be proven after conviction. So now we have an estimation that 8-10% of people convicted of sexual offences are innocent. If you put those into figures stated it estimates that between 1,957 and 2,447 people are innocent of the sexual offences of which they were convicted.
This demonstrates how dangerous it is to use estimates as though they were facts especially when it is not clear how those estimates were reached.
Conclusion:
To draw any meaningful conclusion from the statistics as presented in this article would be woefully negligent at worst and demonstrate an acute lack of critical thinking at best
My adoration goes out to the author Russell Webster. The article seems specifically to be evocative to make headlines regarding VAWG and to hoodwink less learned readers into believing that VAWG is much worse than the facts support and Russell achieves those goals with flying colours. However, I would caution anyone reading any statistics of any kind to pay particular attention to the way those stats are presented and if they are balanced appropriately.
In writing this I am in no way trying to reduce the severity of VAWG (as stated at the start, my family has been horribly scarred as a result of VAWG), it is horrific that such crimes exist, just as it is equally horrific that crimes of violence and crimes of a sexual nature exist, period. And, I would be more concerned about what is being done to reduce violent crimes and crimes of a sexual nature against all people, not just against Women and Girls. After all, we are supposed to be promoting equality and in my opinion women, girls, boys, men and people with other genders are all equal and anyone that suggests otherwise runs the risk of being sexist – a trait we can all agree is undesirable, unwanted and abhorrent in today’s society.