Minoritised Ethnic Women's Experiences of Domestic Abuse and Barriers to Help-Seeking: A Summary of the Evidence

Footnotes

1. See Why we no longer use the term 'BAME' in government (Equality Hub Blog 7 April 2022) www.gov.uk

2. See A guide to race and ethnicity terminology and language. www.lawsociety.org – accessed 16 April 2024

3. See Police Scotland What is Domestic Abuse? – accessed 16 April 2024

4. See Honour-based Abuse – Safeguarding Network. See also Gill and Brah (2014).

5. Structural inequality – inequality that is embedded in social structures, based on institutionalised conceptions of differences based on, for example, gender, race, sexual orientation or disability. (Scottish Government, 2022a)

6. Social norms are the perceived informal, mostly unwritten, rules that define acceptable and appropriate actions within a given group or community, thus guiding human behaviour (UNICEF, 2021)

7. The 2018 act (DASA) created a new statutory offence of engaging in a course of abusive behaviour towards a partner or ex-partner. Within this new statutory offence, the act reflects the sustained and ongoing nature of abuse that can often occur, and psychological and emotional abuse which were previously much more difficult to prosecute under existing laws.

8. This sharp increase is likely due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic which resulted in court closures and reduced court capacity during 2020/21.

9. For example, the Police Scotland's Chief Constable's statement on institutional discrimination (May 2023) - see Police Scotland Chief Constable Sir Iain Livingstone addresses institutional discrimination. - Police Scotland

10. Partner abuse in the SCJS is defined as 'any form of physical, non-physical or sexual abuse, which takes place within the context of a close relationship, committed either in the home or elsewhere. This relationship will be between partners (married, co-habiting or otherwise) or ex-partners'.

11. See 9.3 Partner Abuse - Scottish Crime and Justice Survey 2019/20: main findings - gov.scot (www.gov.scot). Note: No difference was found in 2018/20 by area deprivation in experience of partner abuse in the 12 months prior to interview (3.6% and 3.1% respectively).

12. Developments are underway to explore data analysis opportunities, such as utilising a pooled sample of all previous SCJS survey sweeps, to enable more intersectional analysis in the future.

13. Some caution is advised in interpreting these measures as they are based on eight months of data collection (rather than 12) because of an error in the survey, which resulted in missing data.

14. The Crime Survey for England and Wales defines domestic abuse as "any incidence of threatening behaviour, violence or abuse (psychological, physical, sexual, financial or emotional) between adults, aged 16 and over, who are or have been intimate partners or family members, regardless of gender or sexuality." This is different from how the Scottish Crime and Justice Survey (SCJS) measures domestic abuse which does not include abuse by family members.

15. MARACs (Multi Agency Risk Assessment Conferences) are regular, local meetings where information about domestic abuse victims at risk of the most serious levels of harm (including murder) is shared between representatives from a range of local agencies to inform a coordinated action plan to increase the safety of the victim and their children.

16. The literature search did not include 'grey' literature such as reports by third sector organisations. Further analysis of these resources may provide useful evidence for policy to consider such as Sikh Women's Aid 2021 report on the impact and prevalence of domestic and sexual violence in the Sikh/Panjabi Community; and, AMINA's 2023 report on Extended Family Abuse in Muslim and BME Communities in Scotland.

17. In 1987 Ann Phoenix, the feminist scholar, coined the phrase 'normalised absence, pathologized presence' to illustrate the fact that some groups are excluded from the 'norm' and that any behaviours outside the accepted norm is seen as pathological. (Phoenix, 1987)

18. The term 'intersectionality' was first coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989 and is rooted in Black feminism.

19. See Chantler & McCarry (2019) for a discussion of how the concept of the conducive context can be applied to GBV (in this case forced marriage). The term 'conducive context' was first coined by Kelly (2007) in relation to human trafficking (as cited in the Chantler & McCarry, 2019 study).

20. Case files were from one police force in Southern England and 50 domestic abuse agencies across England and Wales.

21. These cases were more likely to involve forced marriage, with abuse from the own victim's family related to rejection of the family's preferred marriage, choice of partner or (less commonly) lifestyle choices. They also had higher rates of male victimisation than the other types.

22. Cases and interviews were drawn from one UK police force (not named).

23. Similar discussions about (mis)interpretations of religious norms that strengthen the patriarchal order and marginalise women are also highlighted in Idriss (2020).

24. Five out of nine of Kanyeredzi (2018)'s participants had been sexually abused by a male caregiver. One of them was abused by her grandfather, who helped her mother by bringing her to church once a week.

25. Fahmy et al. (2016)'s evidence review for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation reports a correlation between poverty and increased vulnerability to domestic abuse. Poverty statistics show that people from non-white minority ethnic groups were more likely to be in relative poverty after housing costs compared to those from the 'White - British' and 'White - Other' groups. Poverty and Income Inequality in Scotland 2019-22 (Last updated: March 2023). www.equalityevidence.scot. See also the 9.3 Partner Abuse - Scottish Crime and Justice Survey 2019/20: main findings - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) which reports experiences of partner abuse by area deprivation.

26. This was based on research commissioned by a county police force in southern England. Qualitative data were gathered from 24 victims and practitioners, including 10 female victims of British Pakistani, British Bangladeshi, or broader South Asian heritage.

27. As referenced in the 'Background and Policy Context' section - Guidance for Maracs Cases involving victims who are black or minority ethnic at Marac – Scotland (Safe Lives, 2019) See also: Supporting B&ME victims – what the data shows | Safelives and BMA Board of Science Domestic Abuse Report (BMA, 2014)

28. The literature search did not include HBA due to the scope and time constraints involved. See the Methodology chapter for more detail.

29. Joint protocol between Police Scotland and the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (last updated 12 Jun 2023). www.copfs.gov.uk – accessed 11 April 2024.

30. The research involved interviews with government officials, police, women's NGOs, other agencies and HBV survivors/family members in Iraqi Kurdistan Region; and, 34 interviews in the UK with professionals from the police, criminal justice, and government officers, and front-line women's organizations.

31. See discussion in What Works to Prevent Violence Against Women and Girls on p73 and p76 which describes how a lack of data inhibits understanding of the issue and serves as a barrier to reporting. (Scottish Government, 2020)

32. E.g. Prohibition of Female Genital Mutilation (Scotland) Act 2005; Forced Marriage etc. (Protection and Jurisdiction) (Scotland) Act 2011; Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 (which made forcing someone into marriage a criminal offence in Scotland).

33. See Statistics on so called 'honour-based' abuse offences, England and Wales, 2022 to 2023 - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk). For the year ending March 2023 there were 2,905 HBA-related offences. recorded by the police in England and Wales (excluding Devon and Cornwall). Of these, there were 84 FGM offences and 172 forced marriage offences. The remaining offences were made up of other HBA-related tagged offences as listed above.

34. The other categories were forced marriage and female genital mutilation.

35. The Scottish Government publishes statistics on recorded crimes for forced marriage. There have been 6 recorded crimes for forced marriage in the last five years (2018/19-2022/23). Recorded Crime in Scotland, 2022-23 (Table A3)

36. 22-0063 - Incident Stats - Honour Based Abuse - 2014 To Date. Police Scotland, 25 Feb 2022

37. 71% of cases involved partner abuse. This was made up of Type 1 (partner only) and Type 3 (partner and family) cases which were reported as 40% and 31% respectively.

38. As the literature search for this review did not include the term HBA (and its synonyms) there is likely to be other studies not included in this review which could provide further data and insight on this topic.

39. Hester et al's research comprising individual and group interviews was conducted with 50 victim-survivors of HBA in England, for a research project commissioned by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) to identity victim-survivors and to understand their lived experiences. This research involved participants from 15 different countries of origin and/or ethnicities including Somalia, India and Pakistan.

40. It is important to note however, that Pande (2013)'s discussion does not delineate clearly what the study's methodology is, besides that cross-translation activities were given to multilingual practitioners who could speak both Hindi and English, to see how they translated different phrases that were related to issues of abuse or sex.

41. It is unclear how many South Asian women were interviewed, and how the data was analysed.

42. See also Eshareturi et al (2014) for a critical review of UK policy responses to HBA. Chantler et al (2019) is also helpful in understanding how anti-multicultural policies and rhetoric following 9/11 has had adverse effects on Muslim women and their experiences of domestic abuse and reporting.

43. For critiques of how the UK Government has addressed domestic abuse experienced by minoritised ethnic women, see Thiara and Chantler (2017). See also Siddiqui (2013), Gill and Harrison (2019), Begum et al (2020) for research about addressing HBA in the UK.

44. For more discussion on the difficulties of addressing domestic abuse in mosques in the UK, see Idriss (2020).

45. Key agents were workers drawn from refuge/support work, police officers, solicitors/legal workers, and local authority employees.

46. Whilst not within the scope of this review, the reader may be interested in the UK Government Women and Equalities Committee Inquiry into So-called honour-based abuse (published in 2023) which found that HBA can "occur within any community and is not a mainstream practice of any specific religion or culture".

47. For more information go to the NRPF Network website.

48. See NRPF Network website for a fuller description of the MVDAC and the UK Government website.

49. The study included 83 interviews with minoritised ethnic participants from a wide range of backgrounds, the most common being Pakistani, Indian and other Asian ethnic background. However, the study also included participants with Arab, African and Gypsy, Roma and Traveller backgrounds.

50. Data was derived from desk-based investigation and 51 interviews with professionals who had contact with BME women with NRPF who had experienced domestic violence.

51. Current guidance on the NRPF Network website states that where this occurs, so long as the application for ILR was made within the 3-month period, applicants will "continue to be able to work and access benefits whilst they are waiting for a decision from the Home Office".

52. See also Mulvihill et al (2018)

53. The most recent findings for the partner abuse module found that around one-in-ten reported the [partner abuse] incident to the police, or told a doctor (11% and 10%, respectively) (SCJS, 2019-20)

54. E.g. Police Scotland: Racism, sexism and homophobia uncovered in review (BBC Scotland Website, 23 May 23).

55. Cultural insensitivity can be thought of as a failure to take sufficient account of ethnic and cultural characteristics, experiences, norms, values, behavioural patterns, and beliefs of a target population as well as relevant historical, environmental, and social factors, into the design, delivery, and evaluation of services, both at 'surface structure' and 'deep structure' levels (based on Resnicow et al.'s (1999) model of cultural sensitivity). Surface structure might involve adaptations such as translating service information into different languages and having bicultural and bilingual staff delivering the intervention. Deep structure interventions might involve activities like involving the target group in the design and evaluation of an intervention (see Henrikson et al., 2023).

56. This involved analysis of a pooled sample of the SCJS findings (main survey only), combining the nine surveys conducted between 2008/09 and 2019/20 comprising 90,000 interviews which allowed analysis of experiences of crime by ethnicity for the first time.

57. The ethnic categories used are those used in the Scotland Census 2022: White; Mixed or multiple ethnic groups; Asian, Scottish Asian or British Asian; African, Scottish African or British African; Caribbean or Black; and, Other ethnic group (the latter includes sub-categories: Arab, Scottish Arab or British Arab, or Other (where survey respondents are asked to write with examples given e.g. Sikh, Jewish).

58. Particularly property crime – see Appendix C Table A3.1 Violent crime includes sexual assault although this is not reported separately.

59. See also Hester et al (2015) who reported victim-survivor experiences of police negligence reported by victim-survivors that they interviewed.

60. Participants came from 15 different countries of origin and/or ethnicities including Somalia (10), India (9), and Pakistan (8).

61. The chapter draws on evidence from the Halo Project (the charitable arm of the Tees Valley Inclusion Project) focusing on the failings and weaknesses in police practice in the context of sexual violence experienced by people from Black and racially minoritised communities in England. This is framed with in the Halo Project's 'super complaint' which details nine failures in police responses to reports of sexual abuse within Black and racially minoritised communities.

62. The original study was commissioned by the Scottish Government – see Understanding forced marriage in Scotland (Chantler et al., 2017) www.gov.scot – accessed 16 Apr 2024.

63. Race anxiety/cultural privacy framework is described in the research paper as understanding GBV in minoritised communities as a private, cultural issue.

64. This involved 12 victim-survivors of HBA and 2 support workers from a non-profit that provides support to HBA victim-survivors who were recruited through the Honour Abuse Research Matrix (HARM) network based at the University of Central Lancashire.

65. Seven participants were from minoritised community organisations or services, seven were from LGBT organisations or services, and the remainder were from outwith these group-based support services but "worked closely with these communities in some capacity" (Love et al 2017, P. 167).

66. It is unclear from the article to how many minoritised women were involved in the research. Love et al (2017) however states explicitly that "two semi-structured interviews were conducted with questionnaire respondents, of whom one identified as heterosexual and Asian, and another identified as lesbian and Black British/Caribbean" (p. 167).

67. In this study, 7 out of 8 of the participants were white.

68. To note that Kumar (2018)'s article is based on secondary data and the author's own reflections on GBV and intersectionality rather than on a primary research study.

69. Larasi (2013) raises the example of the Commission on Integration and Cohesion report published in 2007 which included an annex on "single group funding", which stated that single group funding should "be the exception rather than the rule" as doing otherwise would "increase insularity and a sense of separation" (Commission on Integration and Cohesion 2007: 160-161, quoted in Larasi 2013). This report was based on findings in England.

70. Minority ethnic groups in Scotland have increased (approximately 4.5%) with Asians being the largest group and mainly concentrated in the four main cities (Audit Scotland 2021 cited in Scottish Government, 2023e).

71. There is a forthcoming report which will add to this evidence base: 'Diversifying Justice: Revealing domestic abuse realities and viable help-seeking pathways for South Asian women', authored by Nughmana Mirza, Lisa Bradley and Nicola Dickson, funded by the Scottish Government.

72. See for example VAWG-Dec-2023.pdf">Sabr, Silence and Struggles:Extended Family Abuse in Muslim and BME Communities in Scotland (AMINA, 2023) & From Her, Kings are Born: Impact and prevalence of domestic and sexual violence in the Sikh/Panjabi Community (Sikh Women's Aid, 2021)

73. Kaur-Aujla et al (2019), who conducted a critical literature review of Sikh women's experiences of domestic abuse outwith the UK, makes similar calls for further research. Femi-Ajao (2018), Ajayi et al (2022), and Kanyeredzi (2018), all researchers working with African women victim-survivors of domestic abuse have drawn attention to a research gap in African women's experiences of domestic abuse in the UK.