Home Office Domestic Abuse Drive and Perpetrator Funds

On 18th September 2020 the Home Office Domestic Abuse Perpetrators competitive grant funding for 2020-21 was opened to Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) in England and Wales to submit applications, both independently and/or in partnership with other organisations.

Funding for successful applications is to be distributed by the Home Office through PCC’s via grant agreements, and PCC’s will also retain oversight of the programmes and report to the Home Office.

MOPAC submitted a number of bids relating to its commissioned services and also extended this opportunity to all local authorities/districts in London. This report provides a summary of successful funding allocations as announced by the Home Office on 27th of October 2020.

This decision is requesting approval to:

• formally accept funding awards of £843,781 from the Home Office for all successful bids in form of grant agreements; and

• formally award applicable awards totalling £644,276 to three successful local authority bidders in form of grant agreements.

The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime is recommended to:

1. Approve the acceptance of the funding allocations totalling £843,781 as outlined in Appendix A.

2. Approve the individual awards totalling £644,276 to the successful local authority outlined in Appendix A.

1. Introduction and background

1.1. MOPAC is committed to holding perpetrators of domestic abuse to account and the Mayor’s Police and Crime Plan (PCP) 2017-2021 demonstrates this by committing to developing effective interventions for perpetrators that minimise repeat patterns of abuse and ensures support for victims and their families.

1.2. Tackling violence against women and girls (VAWG) is one of the key priority areas in the PCP. The Mayor’s Violence Against Women and Girls Strategy 2018-2021 sets out a commitment to challenge perpetrators of domestic abuse to change their behaviour.

2. Issues for consideration

2.1. On 18th September 2020 the Home Office Domestic Abuse Perpetrators funding for 2020-21 was opened to Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) in England and Wales to submit applications, both independently and/or in partnership with other organisations.

2.2. The funding is for delivery in 2020-21 only and in addition, as part of the criteria set by the Home Office, bids were required to provide six months match funding (monetary or in kind) that supported continuous delivery of the programme for a total of twelve months from October 2020.

2.3. A breakdown of the funding made available nationally at this time in England and Wales is below:

(i) Drive Fund (£1.1m)

(ii) Perpetrator Fund: Programmes/interventions delivered to perpetrators of DA in the community other than Drive (£5m)

2.4. Funding for successful applications is to be distributed by the Home Office through PCC’s via grant agreements, and PCC’s will also retain oversight of the programmes and report to the Home Office for the grant period.

2.5. MOPAC submitted bids into both the Drive and Perpetrator Funds and have been awarded a total of £843,781 from both funds.

2.6. MOPAC have been awarded a total of £199,505 from the Home Office Drive Fund and formal DMPC decisions related to this award for the Drive programme will follow in due course.

2.7. In relation to the Perpetrator Fund, MOPAC extended this opportunity to all local authorities/districts in London, inviting them to submit bids in support of the Mayor’s PCP and VAWG Strategy commitments.

2.8. MOPAC have been awarded a total of £644,276 from the Perpetrator Fund for the local authority led programmes listed below and in Appendix A:

(i) Re-MOVE abuse – London Borough of Barking and Dagenham, £209,052. An intervention and accommodation-based approach to stopping domestic abuse.

(ii) Perpetrator Intervention Project – Royal Borough of Greenwich, £200,000. A perpetrator intervention programme of intensive intervention and therapeutic support.

(iii) The Redbridge Perpetrator Programme – London Borough of Redbridge, £235,224: An expansion of its existing virtual intervention service set up by Children’s Social Services in response to COVID-19 for low/medium risk perpetrators.

2.9. The funding for local authorities from the Perpetrator Fund will be distributed by MOPAC to each local authority through individual grant agreements that will be put in place.

3. Financial Comments

3.1. This decision requests authority to accept £843,781 grant funding from the Home Office, in accordance with the grant conditions set out by the Home Office.

3.2. The funding will support both the Drive and Perpetrator programmes and form part of the approved 20/21 budget for MOPAC’s Offender Commissioning.

3.3. MOPAC will act as the lead partner for the three local authorities awarded a total of £644,276 as set out in section 2.8 for the delivery of DA perpetrators within the community. The Drive award of £199,505 will be directly commissioned by MOPAC as part of its existing investment this financial year.

3.4. It is noted the grant agreement for the DRIVE Fund has a match funding requirement of at least six months funding from April 2021.

3.5. The match funding request provides no budget risk next financial year. 21/22 CJC budget plan will allocate funds from the Violent Offender Fund to support DRIVE Home Office grant conditions.

4. Legal Comments

4.1. Officers must ensure the Financial Regulations and Contract Regulations are complied with.

4.2. Officers should ensure that the funding agreements are put in place with and executed by MOPAC and each of the providers before any commitment to fund is made.

4.3. Officers can confirm that sufficient assurance has been carried out to this decision to determine that the DMPC has legal authority to agree the recommendations on funding of grants.

4.4. Paragraph 4.8 of the MOPAC Scheme of Delegation and Consent provides that the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime (DMPC) has delegated authority to approve:

• All bids for grant funding made and all offers made of grant funding; and/or where appropriate a strategy for grant giving;

• The strategy for the award of individual grants and/or the award of all individual grants whether to secure or contribute to securing crime reduction in London or for other purposes.

5. Public Health Approach

5.1. These Grant Awards are informed by the Mayor’s public health approach to violence reduction and therefore part of MOPAC’s contribution to overall efforts led by the Violence Reduction Unit.

5.2. VAWG is a significant public health issue, costing the health care system £1.3 billion a year. Domestic abuse has a significant and enduring impacts on individual’s physical health and mental wellbeing. These programmes seek to intervene with perpetrators and provide support to victims (and their children) and will work in partnership with local agencies such as health, social care, criminal justice and the voluntary sector to manage the risks posed by these individuals and seek to reduce repeat victimisation.

6. GDPR and Data Privacy

6.1. MOPAC will adhere to the Data Protection Act (DPA) 2018 and ensure that any organisations who are commissioned to do work with or on behalf of MOPAC are fully compliant with the policy and understand their GDPR responsibilities.

7. Equality Comments

7.1. MOPAC is required to comply with the public sector equality duty set out in section 149(1) of the Equality Act 2010. This requires MOPAC to have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations by reference to people with protected characteristics. The protected characteristics are: age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation.

7.2. The promotion of VAWG support services supports MOPAC’s equalities duties.

7.3. The programmes receiving funding focus on the delivery of domestic abuse interventions. Domestic abuse is a gendered crime and is a form of violence against women and girls. Women experience higher rates of repeated victimisation and are much more likely to be seriously hurt (Walby, S. and Towers, J. May 2017 ‘Measuring violence to end violence: mainstreaming gender’, Journal of Gender-Based Violence, vol. 1), or killed than male victims of domestic abuse (Office for National Statistics 2017 Domestic abuse in England and Wales: year ending March 2017. Published online).

7.4. In addition, women are more likely to experience higher levels of fear and are more likely to be subjected to coercive and controlling behaviours.

7.5. MOPAC is clear that providers are required to deliver services in line with MOPAC’s equalities duties and this is reflected in the standard equalities’ clauses within grant agreements, as well as MOPAC’s monitoring framework of the services for their duration.

8. Background/supporting papers

Appendix A: Overview of programmes and breakdown of funding allocations